NATO officials: Libya war can't go on

Fri Sep 16, 2011

Some of NATO's senior military officials have expressed serious concern over the US-led military alliance's prolonged mission in Libya, urging its quick termination.

"We must end this Libyan business quickly," said one of the alliance's military commanders on condition of anonymity on Wednesday, the Associated Press reported.

Since March, the United States and NATO have unleashed a punishing United Nations-mandated offensive against the fugitive Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi in an alleged attempt to pressure him into giving up power.

The NATO official reminded that the operations were coupled with the alliance's protracted and costly military campaigns in Afghanistan and Kosovo -- which have been kept up for around 10 and 12 years respectively.

"We just cannot afford this proliferation of missions which just drag on and on. One needs to finally end."

Several other senior military officers, who likewise demanded not to be named due to the sensitivity of the matter, have similarly voiced concerns that NATO could not manage to press ahead with another long-term engagement, while its member states faced deep defense budget cuts at home.

NATO's Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen has stressed that any follow-up mission in Libya, namely ones aimed at nation-building and police-training, had to rather be led by the UN.

Thousands of airstrikes by the alliance have killed many Libyan civilians and revolutionary fighters, who are fighting the government troops.

Source: PressTV.
Link: http://www.presstv.com/detail/199390.html.