Qaddafi, Muammar

El Dorado Canyon: Reagan's Undeclared War With Qaddafi

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Reagan talks loud, carries a little stick
Good resource on the attack...
Insightful History for today's events in the middle east
overall, not worth the money
opening round in the war on terror

El Dorado Canyon: Reagan's Undeclared War With Qaddafi
Joseph T. Stanik
Manufacturer: US Naval Institute Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Libya | Africa | History | Subjects | Books

General | Military | History | Subjects | Books

Reagan Vs. Qaddafi: Response to International Terrorism
Fighting for Peace: 7 Critical Years in the Pentagon
Best Laid Plans: The Inside Story of America's War Against Terrorism (A Touchstone book)
Joint Air Operations: Pursuit of Unity in Command and Control, 1942-1991 (A Rand Research Study)
Americans at War, 1975-1986: An Era of Violent Peace

ASIN: 1557509832

Book Description

America's war on terrorism did not start on 11 September. Long before the overt war in Afghanistan and the covert war against al-Qaida, U.S. forces struck at one of the hotbeds of terrorism in the world. On 15 April 1986, in the dead of night, American strike aircraft roared into the very heart of Muammar Qaddafi's Libya, attacking carefully selected targets and nearly killing the "brother leader" himself. Code-named Operation El Dorado Canyon, the raid was in direct response to Qaddafi's support of a terrorist act against U.S. service personnel stationed in Europe and was a result of President Ronald Reagan's pledge to respond to terrorism with "swift and effective retribution."

Stanik, a retired naval officer and Middle East scholar, provides a detailed account of the raid as well as an in-depth analysis of its causes and effects. He also describes three other hostile encounters between U.S. and Libyan forces during Reagan's presidency and details U.S. covert operations. From a bombing in Berlin, West Germany, to terrorism in the skies over Lockerbie, Scotland, from the halls of power in Washington to airbases in England and the decks of American warships in the Mediterranean, Stanik has woven a truly international thriller that is all too real and forebodingly relevant to current events. A study in diplomacy, strategy, high-level policy, deck-plate operations, and the unique challenges offered by a new brand of evil, this book is required reading for a better understanding of the ongoing war on terrorism.

Customer Reviews:

Reagan talks loud, carries a little stick.......2006-11-17

During the 1980s, the United States government made two strategic mistakes for which its citizens paid, and are still paying, a desperate price.
One was supporting the termination of the Iran-Iraq war, which was usefully keeping two of our worst enemies preoccupied. The other was what Joseph Stanik calls Ronald Reagan's undeclared war with Muammar Qaddafi, the Libyan murderer.
It was a sitzkrieg, a phony war. As soon as he entered office, Reagan started talking tough about fighting terror and particularly about Libya, which at the time was supporting indiscriminate violence in more than 50 countries.
But Reagan never interrupted his serial napping long enough to instruct the government to do anything. And until George Shultz was appointed secretary of state, the Cabinet was divided between the timid and the temporizers.
Stanik traces a history not of vigorous and forthright action against terrorism but of vacillation, inattention and confusion.
The CIA floated its usual cockamamie plots, several of which were terminated by leaks from within the administration; but no serious action was proposed. At the highest policy levels, study after inconclusive study was done while Libya escalated its murders of Americans continuously.
Meanwhile, in the Mediterranean Sea, the Navy was winning some skirmishes with Libya's military over freedom of navigation claims.
Stanik confuses these freedom of the seas operations with antiterrorism, but despite this "El Dorado Canyon" is still a useful template for evaluating current events.
After years of pushing, Shultz finally persuaded Reagan to authorize a small military strike -- code-named El Dorado Canyon -- to punish Libya for one of its many terrorist attacks.
It was a punchless gesture. Although Reagan had made his reputation by scorning the gloves-on incrementalism of Democratic administrations in Vietnam, his answer to Qaddafi limited the United States to a single, small air strike that did no material damage to Libya.
The Air Force component was a disaster, only one of 18 planes hitting its target. Nearly half the planes had technical failures. The Navy strike was more successful but the weight of ordnance was too light to be effective.
Stanik unaccountably describes this demonstration as an operational success that showed the capability of weaponry and the skill of American warriors. Skill they had, but their weapons didn't work.
Nearly half the F-111F planes never managed to drop their bombs, the targeting systems failed to work in combat conditions and the Aegis radars were unable to discriminate targets -- the last a portent of a much more consequential failure the next year when Aegis shot down an airliner in the Persian Gulf.
The strike did persuade Qaddafi, apparently, that he was doomed if he provoked the United States into a determined attack, but it did not dissuade him from terrorism. He went on blasting airliners out of the sky, but he did pull back from his extravagant support of "liberationist" movements around the world.
Stanik credits the American attack for this, which would have been the only gain it could have shown for a decade of effort; but it is just as likely that Qaddafi pulled in his horns because he lost the support of his arms supplier, the decaying Soviet Union.
Reagan administration leaders, and Stanik, were well satisfied by their little slap at terrorism, but they had misjudged who the enemy was. It was not just Libya.
While Qaddafi, unable to compete at all militarily with the U.S. Navy, may have learned circumspection, a very different lesson was being learned in the rest of the Koran Belt.
What Islamic revolutionaries saw was that you could attack the United States repeatedly and suffer only pinprick responses at intervals of several years -- the United States used military force against Islamic terrorists in 1986, 1991, 1993, 1998 and 2001, but its enemies launched successful attacks in every year since 1979.
No wonder the Islamists concluded that the United States lacked resolution and courage.
They also noticed that the Third World was too weak and Europe too cowardly to take part in even the spastic American efforts. They noticed that collective security is a myth and that the United Nations is a joke -- Stanik is able to write about international terrorism spanning two decades without mentioning the U.N., which shows how useful it has been.
"El Dorado Canyon" is an odd book. On the first page, Stanik states the obvious: "He (Reagan) did not act." The rest of the book seems devoted to obfuscating that simple truth.
Five stars for a lousy book because of what it reveals to those who can read between the lines

Good resource on the attack..........2003-09-04

This book gives a deatil look about why United States was forced to attack Libya. And author does this very convincingly. Based on the real news the book is able to justify the attack. Eventhough author claims that he looks the attack in "US view", the reader will definetly understand the US' position in Libya's attack. Very well documented of the war plans and behind the scene events makes this book readable.

The author tries to explain painstackingly the rumblings in the Reagan administration which may be boring to some readers who wants the action immediately. But his efforts to cover all the ends should be appreciated. To some extent, he is brave enough to point out the goof ups made by Reagan administration and very rare from a western author. Reading this book one can relate how the US went to war without any allies(it could be a thesis subject about how the so-called allies are not sharing the war efforts with US but other green pastures) support.

Overall a very good book to know about the attack, US' military power and Reagan's administration's activities during that time.

Insightful History for today's events in the middle east.......2003-03-30

Joseph Stanik, a retired naval officer and former history instructor at the U.S. Naval Academy, provides readers with a well-researched political and military history of U.S.-Libyan relations from the start of Reaganýs presidency through the aftermath of Operation El Dorado Canyon, the precision air strike aimed at Libyan leader Muammar al-Qaddafi's terror apparatus. He chronicles the development of administration policies to confront international terrorism and its most prominent advocate, Colonel Qaddafi, and carefully describes the political and economic strategies, diplomatic initiatives, covert actions, and military operations aimed at the Qaddafi regime. A major asset of Stanik's book is his clear analysis of those policies. Along the way, he explains why it took Reagan so long to retaliate against horrendous acts of terrorism directed against American citizens. Disagreement within the administration over the application of military force and unsupportive allies--Sound familiar?--are among the reasons.
Four times during Reaganýs presidency, hostilities erupted between American and Libyan forces; therefore, Stanik devotes considerable space to operational planning, descriptions of military equipment and tactics, and accounts of combat action. He provides thrilling accounts of two dogfights between U.S. Navy and Libyan fighters, naval surface action in the Gulf of Sidra, and tension inside the cockpits of U.S. Air Force F-111Fs as the planes bore down on Qaddafi's compound in downtown Tripoli. Stanik also takes readers through the Lockerbie affair and relates our current war against global terrorism to Reaganýs controversial pledge to strike terrorists with ýswift and effective retribution.ý

overall, not worth the money.......2003-02-19

Unless you are a lover of bureaucracy, don't buy this book; if you're mainly interested in military affairs, you'll be disappointed. Except for a pretty good, but brief, summary of Libyan history, the entire first half is a tedious recitation of memos, briefings, meetings, press conferences, etc that just goes on and on. Following the actual attack, the description of which is pretty good, the aftermath up to and including Lockerbie and Sept 11th is again overlong and plodding. A major theme in the book is the extreme mission undertaken by USAF F-111s based in England. The book says there were sound reasons why these aircraft had to be included (ie, not just interservice rivalries) but, after the mission in which most of them failed due to mechanical and operational problems, it's pointed out that the F-111s were notoriously unreliable after just 2-3 hours flying. This mission was 14 hrs, 6000 miles! Some of them almost ran out of fuel due to poor post-mission planning! One is left with (a) a profound appreciation of the courage and professionalism of the Air Force pilots and (b) a bit of anger over why they were put in this position. The Navy pilots, operating under much better circumstances, had better success. Overall, the good information in this book isn't worth the trouble of finding it, turning page after page.

opening round in the war on terror.......2003-02-12

As the U.S. ramps up toward war with Iraq, Mr. Stanik's book assumes new interest. He tells the story of the six-year confrontation between the Reagan administration and the secular Islamic dictator Muammur Qaddafi of Libya. It's hard slogging through the first half of the book, which details in sometimes confusing terms Qaddafi's terrorist games and the American responses. But the second half--the chapters involving Operation El Dorado Canyon--are fascinating because they illustrate the first use of the type of warfare that has since become the hallmark of American arms: a precision strike, at night, with split-second timing and guided bombs, over incredible distances. Well worth reading. -- Dan Ford

Raid on Qaddafi: The Untold Story of History's Longest Fighter Missing by the Pilot Who Directed It

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Raid on Qaddafi: The Untold Story of History's Longest Fighter Missing by the Pilot Who Directed It
Robert E. Venkus
Manufacturer: St Martins Pr
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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Similar Items:

El Dorado Canyon: Reagan's Undeclared War With Qaddafi
Best Laid Plans: The Inside Story of America's War Against Terrorism (A Touchstone book)
Reagan Vs. Qaddafi: Response to International Terrorism
Joint Air Operations: Pursuit of Unity in Command and Control, 1942-1991 (A Rand Research Study)
Fighting for Peace: 7 Critical Years in the Pentagon

ASIN: 031207073X

Qaddafi's Green Book: An Unauthorized Edition

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Qaddafi's Green Book: An Unauthorized Edition
Muammar Qaddafi , and Henry M. Christman
Manufacturer: Prometheus Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Africa | History | Subjects | Books

Libya | Africa | History | Subjects | Books

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The Third Way

The green book
Muammar Qaddafi
Manufacturer: Jerusalem International Pub. on behalf of the Green Book World Center for Research and Study, Tripoli, Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Customer Reviews:

The Third Way.......1999-12-11

This book is a definate MUST READ by anyone who has any interest in politics - a genuine interest.

The Green Book is the ideological springboard from which many of the self-determining factors of the Popular Rule system were based. This is one of the most blatantly suppressed books of the Twentieth Century. One read and you will know why it is so potentially explosive and literally terrifies the corrupt and decadent "democracies" (oligarchies!) of the New World Order today!

This will also tell you, beyond any shadow of a doubt WHY Muammar al Qadhafi is portrayed as he is - for only the Third Universal System (The Third Way) will provide TRUE National Freedom and Social Justice to the People of the world.

Book Description

Libya's leader reveals the story behind his country's extraordinary transformation from a rogue state to "a key player in the war against terrorism."

In 2004, the international embargo and sanctions that had been imposed on Libya for more than a decade were lifted by the UN Security Council when Colonel Muammar Gadaffi announced that Libya would give up its nuclear weapons. Further, Gadaffi agreed to compensate the families of the victims of the Lockerbie bombing and the attack on the TWA flight that occurred in the late 1980s. This remarkable gesture showed Gaddafi's commitment to seeing Libya rejoin the international community. In the sprit of reconciliation, Prime Minister Tony Blair flew to Tripoli, declaring that Libya was now an ally in the fight against global terrorism. How is this reversal explained? Born from conversations between Gaddafi and political expert Edmond Jouve, this book retraces the Libyan leader's political and ideological journey.

Escape to Hell and Other Stories
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Qadhafi as a writer

This Dangerous Dream

Thought provoking

Great Reading If You Suffer From Insomnia

Escape to Hell and Other Stories
Muammar Qaddafi
Manufacturer: Stanke
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Contemporary | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books
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ASIN: 276040613X

Customer Reviews:

Qadhafi as a writer.......2004-05-18

This is an excellent book because it gives insight into Qadhafi the man. It is more current than many of the books written about Qadhafi. The stories "The City", "The Village" and "Escape to Hell" are very revealing. I feel one can learn much more about a person by reading what he has written than by reading what has been written about him.

This Dangerous Dream.......2003-10-15

Go to the Geocities.com website about LIBYA to read a full review which is necessarily more than a 1,000 words, as this book and this subject have been boycotted mostly by Amazon. I wrote the review in 1998 and Amazon has refused to run it.

Thought provoking.......2001-05-15

Qaddafi and many arab leaders have been demonized by the American press. This book is invaluable because it gives the reader a chance to read what Qaddafi has to say in his own words.

Great Reading If You Suffer From Insomnia.......2001-02-03

Reading this drivel along with Pierre Salinger's Valentine from the Heart to the misunderstood tyrant - I could not help but thinking of Mel Brook's movie "The Producers" with its climatic play "Spring Time For Hitler". If there ever was a more lunatic writer and dictator then Qaddafi (how do you spell the nut jobs name - Qaddafi, Gadafi, Khadafy?)I would like to know about it. If there ever was a more idiotic "journalist" then Salinger - please let me know. Shame on the publisher!

DETERRING LIBYA THE STRATEGIC CULTURE OF MUAMMAR QADDAFI COUNTERPROLIFERATION PAPWERSS FUTURE WARFARE SERIES NO. 8

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DETERRING LIBYA THE STRATEGIC CULTURE OF MUAMMAR QADDAFI COUNTERPROLIFERATION PAPWERSS FUTURE WARFARE SERIES NO. 8
COMMANDER, U. S.. NAVY CRAIG R. BLACK
Manufacturer: Air University
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000JI51V6

The Qaddafi green syndrome: Shaking the foundations

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The Qaddafi green syndrome: Shaking the foundations
Themba Sono
Manufacturer: World Center for Research and Study of the Green Book
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Qaddafi and the United States Since 1969

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Qaddafi and the United States Since 1969
P. Edward Haley
Manufacturer: Praeger Publishers
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Book Description

Offers direct answers to the main questions about Qaddafi and U.S. policy toward Libya.

Average customer rating:

Outdated

Libyan sandstorm
John K Cooley
Manufacturer: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding

Libya | Africa | History | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0030604141

Customer Reviews:

Outdated.......2002-04-07

This is an interesting view of this madman although the material is getting dated. There are not a lot of other detailed works of his life so this may be your best bet. The book moves ok with some interesting facts but I doubt it will keep you up at night.

Rulers and Royalty:

Rulers and Royalty

Rulers and Royalty