Pentagon – Today, at the request of the Libyan Government of National Accord, the U.S. military conducted precision airstrikes against Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant targets in Sirte, Libya, Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook said in a news release.
The airstrikes were in support of GNA-affiliated forces seeking to defeat ISIL in its primary stronghold in Libya, Cook said. These strikes were authorized by President Barack Obama following a recommendation from Defense Secretary Ash Carter and Marine Corps Gen. Joe Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, he said.
The strikes, Cook said, “are consistent with our approach to combating ISIL by working with capable and motivated local forces.
There are believed to be about 1,000 ISIS fighters in Sirte, defense officials said. The last round of airstrikes there were conducted in February. Since then, U.S. officials have been reluctant to authorize more until a cohesive government emerged from the country’s chaotic civil war.
Let’s not forget that Muammar al-Gaddafi has been brought down in 2011 by the so famous “Arab Spring”, uprising led by the National Transitional Council (NTC) broke out, resulting in the Libyan Civil War. NATO intervened militarily on the side of the NTC, uphold the no fly zone over Libya…bringing about the government’s downfall. Retreating to Sirte, Gaddafi was captured and killed by those same NTC militants.
Lybian civil war is raging since then. From “stable” Lybia now we have unstable country, civil war, fragile “government” and a country that is overwhelmed by ISIS militants.
Read more about mistakes of the past at:
EGYPT COUNTDOWN – MISTAKES OF ARAB-SPRING
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