Reply #52: very insightful report from France24 wondering how long #Gaddafi's army can hold

[Catherina]

iyad_elbaghdadi Iyad El-Baghdadi
Here's a very insightful report from France24 wondering how long #Gaddafi's army can hold: http://j.mp/gvz1In #Libya
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LATEST UPDATE: 09/03/2011
How long can Gaddafi and his forces hold out?

Muammar Gaddafi is much better armed than the often rag-tag opposition forces, but with his army carrying outdated equipment and his loyalists defecting in significant numbers, he cannot hold out for ever.


By Perrine MOUTERDE (text)

On paper, Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi has an army of 76,000 soldiers and 40,000 paramilitary troops. He also has 260 attack aircraft (mostly MIG 25 and 23s), 650 tanks, 2,300 artillery pieces and more than 100 helicopters (figures from Israeli site Middle East Military Balance).

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A significant number of towns (including most of the country’s eastern coastal strip) have fallen to the opposition without fighting, attack aircraft have been missing their targets (by considerable margins) and Libyan soldiers have deserted in droves.

“It’s impossible to have a precise estimate of the strength of those forces still loyal to Gaddafi,” said to Jean-François Daguzan of the Paris-based Fondation de Recherche Strategique. “But if the official estimations of the forces at his disposal were correct, there wouldn’t be any insurgents left in Libya right now.”

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Obsolete equipment

A second factor is that that most of Libya’s heavy equipment was bought from the former USSR in the 1970s (the country was subject of an international arms embargo for most of the last four decades). Most of this equipment can now be considered obsolete compared to other modern armies.

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http://www.france24.com/en/20110309-gaddafi-military-libya-civil-war-mercenaries-army-rebels