there you go. go national. go like a pro. amateur video of explosions monday in misrata. the fierce battle for misrata, libya s third largest city, has been going on now for re than a week. let me take you to the map here.
and ance, oers possibly, at will take part in what b would be called close air support or air-to-ground missions, so that gadhafi s forces that are engage with rebel forces are going to have separated. that s where this other element llwi take place. so clearly it s a bit confusi. let me ask youbout the u.s. ambassador to libya. he was just on our air speaking at a press conrence at the state aidepartment. he said that gadhafi s regime is reaching out to possible h mediators and he suggested that this is a sign of desperation. at s yr outake on that? utely. i mean, i m not the political or the diomatic guy, but absolutely. gadhafi knows that his oath wnl out of here is either going to be in a coffin or he disappears in some way so that there can be some form of transition. but i have toell you that it seems to me a rather abrupt change in what we ve understood
rising. i think part of it that time will play a role, but in addiumenon one of the things noticed in our documentary, when you talk to both sides, it s angry, angry fight. you say, have you sat down with the other side? have you sat down and had a conversation about your issues? both sides would say, no, no, we haven t. keep in mind, thiis a city of . 104,000 people. so i think to a large degree if you want to change any numbers, a dialogue is going to be the first step. you certainly gave us a great preview. looking forward to it. soledad, thank yo u. soledad o brien chronicles the dramatic fight over a construction of the mosque in the heart of the bible belt, it s caed unwelcome the muslims next door, sunday, 8:00 p.m. eastern here on cnn. be sure to tune in. let s get caught up with some other top stories. in libya,nn c has confirmed jts rom qatar have joined the mission today. earlier british fighters bombed government tanks inositionjd to target ajdabiya. pro-gadhafi force
you know the geography, folks. it s right next to libya. this is gates first trip to the region since the coalition started striking libya s military. of course he was asked about the possibility of negotiating with moammar gadhafi. gadhafi has basically sworn that he will show no mercy to anybody who has been in opposition. that s not exactly an invitation to negotiate. it seems to me that if there is a mediation to be done it is, if there is a role to be played, it is wrong tamong the libyans the. this matter, at the end of the day, is going to have to be settled by libyans. settled by libyans. but the coalition does appear to be making pretty rapid progress right now in libya. i want to bring in chris lawrence live there at the pentagon. chris, is it safe to say now that the no-fly zone is firmly in place? yeah.
are six nato warships started patrolling off libya s coast. what are they there for? they d be there for a couple of things. first in case there were any aircraft that managed to sneak through at low level and overfly, you ve got additional surface-to-air radar there and capability to tie into the air early warning system. then in addition you can intercept any libyan ships that come out that might be trying to reinforce gadhafi s troops, and you could enforce an arms embargo. right. okay. and then we had talked about this yesterday, that f-15 fighter jet that had crashed. the pilot and the number two okay, but we know that the u.s. aircraft drop precision guard munitions on what s left of that f-15. what s the purpose of destroying that? there s classified equipment in that air frame. this is a very high-technology fighter, best fighter bomber in the world, and we wouldn t want the wrong people to get a grip