reported sometimes less than two weeks after starting plavix. welcome back, everyone, to cnn s special coverage of target libya. a coalition of countries including thest, france and great britain are taking out key targets across libya right now. today strikes in libya have been swift and lib rat, two days after the u.n. imposed a no-fly zone over the country. so how s it all happened so fast? for a leader who s ruled so long. freedom s cry erupted in tunisia, deposing a dictator. engulfed, egypt, ousting a president. swept across libya, virtually
after. how long does it take to set up the no-fly doan? reporter: well, you know, really behind the scenes they have been working on it for many years. the aircraft are place. the bases in southern europe are in place. the refueling, the command and control, all of it. but the essential problem is, even though u.s. war planes for the moment have no plans to fly in to libyan air space, you really cannot send the pilots over libya whether they are french, british, acanadian, from arab league countries, you have to get rid of gadhafi s air defenses. everybody says they re old and out of date and that is true. they do date from the soviet era but he does have something called the sa-5, surface to air missile. it has a fairly long range and reach out towards incoming aircraft and potentially shoot them down so they re going to
probably get the full rundown of what happened. it sounds like there was a second wave of aircraft that went in. brits went in, maybe others went in with them. maybe french go in again. maybe only arab aircraft went in this the strike in the early morning hours there. we don t know yet. we ll hear that tomorrow but as the air defenses are taken down, the air patrols over libya will become more routine, will have broader allied and coalition member participation, i m sure. and real issue is going to be what happens on the ground? what s going to keep this from being a stalemate if gadhafi freezes in place, do we go after him and attack him or do the rebels try to regain ground or exactly what happens? and if gadhafi moves forward, do we then have the assets to stop that move decisively? exactly, general. i think the term for this is mission creep and the concern
explosions of unknown origin that took the ground. moammar gadhafi is defiant. gadhafi is also asking other islamic nations to help libya fight against what he called naked aggression. the libyan government also claims the missile strikes have caused real harm to civilians. gadhafi says the coalition attacks are being carried out by a quote crusader army. happened quickly after the june rez dugs 1973. the ambassador, you know, put it into motion and then all of a sudden we re to this point. from international point of view, diplomatic point of view, light speed. light speed. bring in pentagon correspondent barbara starr to talk about this. let s talk about the military strategy of operation odyssey dawn. coalition forces trying to take out libya s defenses earlier. have they moved on to the next phase? reporter: well, this s what they re trying to determine. of course, now, we are at first
deadly clashes over control of the rebel-held towns west of the capital. days later, in the east, two towns controlled by dissidents were bombed for the second straight day. followed by a report that the government was once again in control ofzawaia and at the center, gadhafi. translator: thousands and thousands of people will be killed. i came here in order to greet you, greet your courage and i tell you to repel them. reporter: and at times, delusional. they love me all. reporter: meanwhile, libya became a no man s land for foreigners, including the vast number of foreign guest workers. some 200,000 are said to have fled. many across the border with tunisia, creating a mass refugee crisis. the airports were swamped by