states. we will support an international coalition as it takes all necessary measures to enforce the terms of resolution 1973. as you may know, french planes are already in the skies above benghazi. now, america has unique capabilities and we will bring them to bear to help our european and canadian allies and arab partners stop further violence against civilians including through the effective implementation of a no fly zone. as president obama said, the united states will not deploy ground troops but there should be no mistaking our commitment to this effort. as secretary clinton was asked what the american interest is in getting involved in libya and she says there are three clear american interests. one is that given gadhafi s past
executing their operational plans. they ve moved the aircraft down into the region. we should expect to see some participation by the danes, maybe the canadians and others. uae apparently has their aircraft now moved into the mediterranean area and then potentially of course immense u.s. naval air power and precision guided munitions could also be brought into the battle. and there is our u.s. ships that are now in the mediterranean sea. the united nations resolution clearly calls out not just for enforcement of a no fly zone but to intercept any sort of military aid that is banned by u.n. resolution that could be going into support moammar gadhafi s forces. and yet already we re seeing today a resolution that russia abstained on and so did china, russia taking a stand and saying it regrets western forces are taking this action. is that problematic for this effort in any way? i don t think it really is
launched now the first missiles inside libya. the action that was taken earlier today was on behalf of the french, french jets over head striking armored military vehicles and tanks that had potentially violated the cease-fire by firing on benghazi today and now these missiles. we had heard from the president from the secretary of state earlier that they were committed to supporting the effort by all necessary measures. do you think this goes beyond just supporting the effort? oh, no. i think this is rather modest, tentative kind of aimless military effort. we have to sort out what do we want to achieve? do we want to take down gadhafi? do we want to negate his huge advantage in ground combat power? by the way, those libyan tanks advancing on benghazi are fighting an armed rebellion that s fairly heavily armed. so this is not protecting civilians. we re on one side providing air power to an armed rebellion in
people are fleeing benghazi east toward tobruk where i am and i suspect we ll see wounded people in the hospital here tomorrow. reporting from tobruk, libya, lindsey, thank you very much and take care. cohost of the daily rundown chuck todd is traveling with the president. chuck, the president s in brazil but he made a very strong statement today about the willingness of the united states to support the military effort. how far is he willing to take our troops? reporter: it s clear there is going to be we already have a certain amount of naval ships in the mediterranean and they are going to participate in whatever is needed in this international decision to enforce this no fly zone but also the obama administration is taking pains to make sure that the world community realizes they re not leading this effort. it was french president sarkozy that made the first announcement. then you heard from david cameron. then you heard from the president.