The time to arm the Libyan rebels may just around the bend

According to an article by Hadeel Al-Shalchi of the Associated Press titled Former US rep in Libya to seek Gadhafi's exit “A former U.S. congressman invited by Moammar Gadhafi arrived in Tripoli on Wednesday on a self-described private mission to urge the Libyan leader to step down as rebels and pro-government forces waged near stalemate battles. Curt Weldon, a Pennsylvania Republican who has visited Libya twice before, said he leading a private delegation and had informed the White House and some members of Congress about his trip.” Even though this news is worth major consideration there was a portion of this article which I think carries greater consequences.

That portion was “Neither government forces nor the rebels have made any serious gains in recent days, nor the conflict has shifted to smaller objectives on both sides, such as control of the key oil port of Brega. Rebels have complained that NATO airstrikes come too slowly to seriously disrupt the pro-Gadhafi troops. But the French foreign minister, Alain Juppe, defended the air campaign, saying the missions are becoming more complicated as Gadhafi's forces position themselves in heavily populated civilian areas to make targeting difficult. Juppe said airstrikes have destroyed most of Gadhafi's aircraft and armored vehicles, but that his troops are increasingly blending in with the rebels by using pickups and less sophisticated weapons similar to those the opposition uses. "The military situation in the field is confused and uncertain and the risk of engulfing exists," he said in a radio interview.” This statement here leads me to believe that arming the rebels with armament equal to or greater than that of their opposition is the only option left to bring this conflict to an end. If the idea is to leave this fight to the Libyan people themselves and not be seen as using your own army to affect this change in leadership, arming them is the only option.

No outside country want to be blamed for killing hundreds of civilians via airstrikes nor wants to put their combat troops on the ground. If pro-Gadhafi forces are using civilians as human shields as was done in Iraq and Kuwait, only those native to that area would really be able to tell the difference. It has been widely reported that they are well out-numbered and out gunned but handing them non-American weapons to fix that problem should solve that issue easily.