The report begins: "Civilians and fighters clambered on the ruined tanks, taking photos and picking through the pockets of the dead."

The remains of Gaddafi's force smolders on the road near Benghazi, 03/20/11. (photo: Goran Tomasevic/Reuters)

Remains of Gaddafi's Force Smolders Near Benghazi

By Mohammed Abbas, Reuters

20 March 11

uammar Gaddafi's wrecked tanks and other army vehicles smoldered on a strategic road in east Libya on Sunday after Western powers launched air strikes that galvanized embattled rebels.

Rebels who had been driven back to their stronghold of Benghazi by the Libyan leader's air, sea and land offensive in the past two weeks were returning in 4x4 pick-ups to the town of Ajdabiyah, the hard fought over gateway to east Libya.

The road the rebels drove was a scene of devastation. This correspondent counted at least 16 corpses, though the scale of the bombardment made identifying bodies difficult.

"This is all France ... Today we came through and saw the road open," said rebel fighter Tahir Sassi, surveying one area where blackened vehicles lined the road to Ajdabiyah, about 150 km south of Benghazi. Lamp posts were broken in two or bent double.

About 14 tanks, 20 armored personnel carriers, two trucks with multiple rocket launchers and dozens of pick-ups - all destroyed - were visible, indicating the strength of the force sent to retake Benghazi from rebels.

One tank was a blackened wreck with its turret blown off. Another tank, a tank transporter and armored personnel carriers smoldered. A few hundred meters (yards) ahead, munitions were still exploding as flames licked around vehicles and stores.

Rebels had pleaded for military intervention as they were pushed back and after Gaddafi vowed "no mercy, no pity" as he advanced toward Benghazi where the interim rebel National Libyan Council has its headquarters.

France led the calls for intervention and its planes were the first into Libyan airspace to launch raids, before U.S. and British warships and submarines fired Tomahawk missiles overnight against air defenses.

About 70 km (45 miles) out of Benghazi, rebels faced small arms fire. Mortar rounds launched by Gaddafi's forces to the south landed on either side of the road. Rebels fired back.

'No More Retreat'

"Gaddafi is like a chicken and the coalition is plucking his feathers so he can't fly. The revolutionaries will slit his neck," said Fathi Bin Saud, a 52-year-old rebel carrying a rocket propelled grenade launcher and surveying the wreckage.

"There is no more retreat, we are going forward from now on," he said. "Not all of this is the coalition. We did some of it as well. They encourage us. We were fighting even before they came. This has raised our morale."

Rebels, who have mainly relied on 4x4 pickups with machine guns, were heavily outgunned by Gaddafi before the West acted.

They reached the town of Bin Jawad about 525 km (330 miles) east of Tripoli before being driven back to Ajdabiyah, more than 700 km from the capital.

Battle debris on the road out of Benghazi showed Gaddafi's forces had nearly breached the inner parts of the city. Near Tarria village about 20 km south of Benghazi on the highway to Ajdabiyah, locals said they had advanced up the road early on Saturday and were only beaten back by the first foreign air strikes after fighting reached the suburbs.

Civilians and fighters clambered on the ruined tanks, taking photos and picking through the pockets of the dead.

Mohamed Joma, who said he was a pharmacist, said the planes had struck about 4 am (0200 GMT) that morning.

"Look, the tanks were pointing to Benghazi. They wanted to go to Benghazi. They did not escape," he said.

Some of the bodies on the road were charred, others were already covered with blankets. Some were beside vehicles and one lay inside a destroyed ambulance, with no sign of those who would have attended him.

Flesh and blood was smeared on the ground at one spot, where there were bandages scattered on the floor.

Gaddafi's forces about 20 km south of Benghazi appeared to have been taken by surprise by one air strike on their camp.

Enough bedding and clothes for hundreds of men littered the area for 200 meters on either side of the road, along with boots, body armor, cigarettes and cassette tapes.

"Tell the West to destroy Gaddafi slowly, piece by piece by piece, the way he did to us for 40 years," said Jamal al-Majbouri, who owns a farm nearby.

(Additional reporting by Angus MacSwan; Writing by Edmund Blair in Cairo, editing by Mike Peacock.)

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-19 # Activista 2011-03-20 09:42

Pro western revolutionaries :
... picking through the pockets of the dead.
... Flesh and blood was smeared on the ground at one spot
... Not all of this is the coalition. We did some of it as well!
.... revolutionaries will slit his neck
Tripoli can not wait to be "liberated"
This is bloody tribal war ... and bloody Hilary is responsible ...

-10 # Activista 2011-03-20 09:51

www.michaelmoore.com/
like joke about Obama Peace Price

tweets ... with information that is "missing" from the NYT.

Obama Secretary of defense - REPUBLICAN - was clear with Sarkozy war on Islam scenario - but power hungry bloody Hillary has her war ..
Do not waste reading newspapers - tune to AIPAC agenda - what AIPAC wants, America gets.

0 # stannadel 2011-03-21 02:09

Neither Israel nor AIPAC have anything to do with events in Libya but conspiracy theorists like Activista always look for an Israeli (Jewish?) plot behind everything--they sound just like the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. This isn't leftism, it's idiocy. The great German Socialist Bebel once said, "Antisemitism is the Socialism of fools" -- these days anti-Zionism seems to have taken over as the anti-imperialism of fools.

-2 # Glen 2011-03-20 12:01

This could actually be a second edition of Iraq. How about Afghanistan. Remember the descriptions of both attacks? Remember the amazing night time coverage on U.S. television? Libya of course is small potatoes in comparison. Wonder if the CIA went in ahead of time to buy off the "military". Those B-2 bombers running in on them might put the fear of death on their heads. But no worries. Ambulances won't be available to help ANYBODY.

0 # Activista 2011-03-20 13:05

"CIA went in ahead of time to buy off the "military"" - yes - it did.
Today "revolutionary" leaders are long time ex-generals or ex-ministers of the dictator's regime. I would even go so far and speculate that Kadafi son (London School of Economis) was planning reforms - and these people would loose power.

+2 # Anagnorisis 2011-03-20 12:06

Yes, another Mid Eastern dictator is about to bite the dust as well they should. One could hope that the US does not occupy the region though since that is the root of all tension there. Tis all a precursor to fabled Armageddon.

+8 # Glen 2011-03-20 14:49

Considering how many dictators there are on the planet, and how many the U.S. has supported, just what truly is the solution? Constant attacks and warfare?

The U.S. government reminds me of a scene from a cowboy movie in which the bad guy throws down a gun and tells the unhappy, and accidental pedestrian, to PICK IT UP. PICK IT UP. When the pedestrian does, out of fear, he is shot through the heart.

The U.S. does NOT have the moral imperative to adjust every issue in every country and then plant a new military base there. We are all paying for those actions, and it ain't pretty.

+3 # Lee Loe 2011-03-20 13:05

I wonder whether the French weapons are US made and therefore spreading "depleted" uranium around, which would impact the lives of future generations in an ugly way. Lee Loe, Texas Grandmother for Peace

+1 # Vincent Czyz 2011-03-20 20:42

No, the French make their own weapons and no A-1 "Warthogs," which use shells made from spent uranium, were sent in; no depleted uranium this time.

+1 # Vincent Czyz 2011-03-20 20:44

I never saw so much sympathy for a dictator who has a reputation for being fairly brutal. I have a feeling the same people criticizing these military strikes would be SCREAMING for them if the world stood idly by as it did when Bosnia was sacked, raped, razed, and pillaged by Serbia.

+2 # Activista 2011-03-20 21:10

"if the world stood idly by as it did when Bosnia was sacked, raped, razed, and pillaged by Serbia"
mostly be Croats - and Kosovars/Albanians raped, razed, and pillaged the Serbs.
And NATO bombed civilians. Ask anybody from Yugoslavia.
If Tripoli gets what Belgrade got from NATO - ask civilians who were there. And genocide of Serbs by Albanians.

+14 # wfalco 2011-03-20 14:57

Isn't it possible that this intervention- with real allies- is finally for the right side?
Wasn't the Libyan uprising home grown and weren't the revolutionaries asking for help? Wasn't Gaddafi mowing down innocents? I'm just asking-I honestly can not pretend to know the answers but will not automatically assume by reflex reaction that the U.S. is the bad guy again.

+3 # Lydia Lord 2011-03-20 15:55

Thank you, wfalco. I don't know the answers either, but assumptions never get us anywhere but into a hole.

+5 # jayne.milner 2011-03-20 16:32

The excuse this time is that Libya was killing innocent civilians - well so is the U.S. in Afghanistan. There are many dictators around the world. Most of the world's dictators are supported by the U.S. Saudi Arabia and Bahrain recently mowed down innocent protestors - the U.S. no only didn't attack - they didn't even so much as yawn. Several African countries have been committing genocide on a scale far, far greater than anything going on in Libya - yet absolutely no response at all from the U.S. Libya has oil! The dictator of Libya is not friendly to the U.S. That is all there is to this. Libya has oil and the dictator there is not on a leash to the U.S.

+2 # James38 2011-03-20 16:36

In the first place, not all US made weapons use depleted uranium in the projectiles. DU (depleted Uranium) is used in armor piercing projectiles because it is very dense. It is slightly radioactive, and uranium metal is not good for you anyway, so it is not a good idea to use much of it. Also the latest designs of Nuclear Reactors can use DU and other components of "nuclear waste" as fuel, so we should use it that way. Get some facts before you spread useless propaganda. Peace is nice, but it needs facts behind it, not nonsense.

+3 # Glen 2011-03-20 17:19

Lee is merely expressing a concern for thousands of folks who just might be exposed to bunker busters or anything related, which have been dropped in Iraq, recently, as well at the first attack under George H.W., in the Balkans, and in Iraq. Thousands of children and adults have been exposed, including U.S. military, and cancer, namely leukemia took thousands of lives in Iraq.

If illegal weapons can be used with impunity elsewhere, why not in Libya? Cluster bombs have also been a favorite with Israel and the U.S.

There is little honor involved when the U.S. attacks another country.

0 # James38 2011-03-20 16:48

I hope this is a case where the "Free World" gets it right. It sounds good so far. BushI (GHWB) started the first Gulf War to rescue Kuwait from Saddam, but when the Iraqi army was in total retreat BushI encouraged the opposition in Iraq to rise up against Saddam. He implied that the US would support them, but he failed to come through. The people rose up against Saddam and were massacred. About 20,000 died. They and their friends and families were the ones who would have fully supported the US. By the time BushII (W or Shrub) finally decided on his stupidly ill-advised invasion, there was nothing left in much of Iraq but bitterness and the memory of betrayal. Small wonder we have had such a terrible time there. I hope the situation in Libya works out well for all concerned. Gadafy is a madman and a greedy dictator. His cronies are like the followers of dictators everywhere. They are inhumane greedy parasites, and need to be kicked out of power anywhere they take root. The next one to go should be Mugabe in Zimbabwe. The UN needs to redefine "Sovereign State". Dictators should not be accorded the respect due to a democratically elected leader of a country.

+4 # Glen 2011-03-20 17:23

Well, if you were president, James38, the U.S. would essentially have to eliminate all jobs but in the military, just to keep the attacks on schedule. Who would keep you under control and who could we trust to "redefine" those sovereign states? Better be careful - a lot of folks would like to redefine the parameters of the U.S. and their growing need to eliminate those deemed unsuitable for international consumption and U.S. control.

+3 # Activista 2011-03-20 21:03

James38 - Libya is tribal war for oil. Would like to read your neocon excitement 8 years ago when we bombed Iraq. It is scary how AIPAC controlled media can brainwash people.
Let's talk one month from now about civil war in Libya.

+4 # Long Cold Winter 2011-03-20 21:06

It's all about USA control of World Oil Futures.
Keeping China/Russia choked from Oil Supplies in the Middle East is all the White House/Pentagon is concernded with in this Game of World Monopoly.
The only Mercenaries involved in Lybia are Egyptian Special Forces supported by CIA. Where is the No-Fly Zone under every other deadly Middle East Dictatorship?

+2 # Leslie Henderson 2011-03-21 08:34

The thing is, all the rebels asked for in Libya was a "no fly zone" and that was it, nothing more! But the US and other powers can't help themselves, they have to play with all those buttons in there flying killing machines. Today on CTV I actually heard Dan Matheson say "they had great news, and that Canada was called in for a mission and has seen action", OMG how the hell is that great news?

Meanwhile (off this subject) Barry Bonds is going to be prosecuted for steroids, something he's done to himself and yet the banksters who stole billions of dollars from the US people along with their homes, and caused soooo much financial grief, get to run free!!! What the hell is the world coming to! Everyone must stand up and say no more, everyone!

+1 # Glen 2011-03-21 11:16

The next step, Leslie, is debtors prisons. The wealthy will see to that, and take all you have left.

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