WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama’s top national- security aides emerged from private talks Wednesday with a growing sense that imposing a no-fly zone over Libya would have a “limited impact” on halting the kind of violence raging in the North African nation, senior administration officials said.
That position, sure to shape the international debate about potential military intervention in Libya, came as Obama’s principal security aides reviewed potential recommendations for the president during a White House Situation Room meeting.
The officials underscored that the creation of a no-fly zone over Libyan airspace was not off the table from the U.S. perspective if the facts on the ground change, chiefly Moammar Gadhafi’s use of air power to attack the rebels threatening his grip on power.
Defense chiefs to meet
The administration maintains that planning for such intervention should continue, particularly at a pivotal NATO meeting in Brussels of defense chiefs today, and that the no-fly zone also remains in consideration as a way to increase pressure on Gadhafi.
Military experts say the use of jets by Gadhafi loyalists poses less of a threat than the deployment of attack helicopters, which can get around flight prohibitions because they are harder to detect.
Even before Wednesday’s talks, the Obama administration has had little enthusiasm for military intervention in Libya or for the no-fly zone in particular. Defense Secretary Robert Gates has said that beginning the flights would require an assault on Libyan air defenses, a step tantamount to war. And Obama officials have consistently warned of the costs and the risks.
A reluctant alliance
The NATO alliance said it was planning for any eventuality in the Libyan crisis. But with Gates preparing to join today’s NATO meeting to discuss military options, there was little sign they would agree to set up a no-fly zone.
NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen told reporters Wednesday that “NATO is not looking to intervene in Libya.” He said the alliance, however, was doing the planning for “all eventualities.”
The NATO chief said the alliance will extend its surveillance of Libya’s coastal area by keeping an airborne warning and control plane on patrol 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
There are at least five major U.S. warships in the Mediterranean, including the USS Kearsarge with its Marine contingent on board. And there are Air Force fighters, bombers, tankers and electronic-warfare aircraft easily available from bases in Germany, England and Italy.
