Promoting their war on Libya the three stooges boosted:
[I]t is impossible to imagine a future for Libya with Qaddafi in power.
It seems that in sight of the stalemate in Libya they now have some second thoughts:
“I do think that is it going to be difficult to meet the UN mandate of security for the Libyan people as long as Gaddafi and his regime are still attacking them,” [Obama] said. “And so we are strongly committed to seeing the job through, making sure that, at minimum, Gaddafi doesn’t have the capacity to send in a bunch of thugs to murder innocent civilians.”
The minimum Obama layed out does not include the removal of Gaddhafi. This smells of retreat.
The Independent, boosting an “exclusive” about yet another of Gaddhafi’s ceasefire offer, also has some bits on this:
Behind the scenes, there are signs that Western powers may agree to a ceasefire without the precondition of Muammar Gaddafi and his immediate family going into exile.
..
Whitehall sources say there is a widespread feeling that the Cameron government “set the bar too high” in stating that the departure of the Libyan leader was a prerequisite for a deal to end the strife.
That indeed does sound like a change of purported aims of the war.
But now comes the problem:
Meanwhile the opposition’s political leadership, based in Benghazi – some of them senior former regime officials – insists that no talks can be held until Colonel Gaddafi and his family go into exile.
Having rushed into the war without a strategy and any plan b, c or d, the three stooges now depend on the goodwill of the rebels they promoted. It will be very difficult to get them to agree to any scheme which keeps Gaddhafi in some position of power.
But the only alternative is a much longer and continuously escalating war to which the political constituencies of Obama, Cameron and Sarkozy are unlikely to agree.
A predicament for which they only have to blame themselves.