Mullen: Gadhafi’s Military Nowhere Near ‘Breaking Point’

Reiterates Regime Change Not the Goal

Testifying Thursday before the Senate Armed Services Committee, top US military commander Admiral Michael Mullen insisted that the Libyan military was not nearing a “breaking point,” and that regime change would be “welcomed,” but is not the goal of the Libyan War.

Mullen said that the strikes had “degraded” the Libyan military significantly, but seemed to suggest that the goal wasn’t to crush them on the rebels’ behalf.

At the same time, it seems the number of US strikes was artificially low in recent days. Mullen said that the weather was so unseasonable for warfighting that the planes couldn’t effectively launch attacks, and seemed to suggest that the strikes will pick up again once the weather clears up.

Mullen, as with the rest of the Obama Administration, has struggled to present anything resembling goals or an exit strategy for the war in Libya, and today was no different. The more comments are made, the less seems to be known about this conflict.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.