Word: libya
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Gaddafi's most worrisome ally is the shadowy Palestinian radical Abu Nidal, who is reported to be living in Libya. The U.S. has accused him of carrying out the Rome and Vienna airport assaults, using passports provided by Libya. It also holds Abu Nidal responsible for hijacking an EgyptAir passenger jet to Malta last November, an act that ended in disaster when 60 people were killed as Egyptian commandos stormed the plane in a rescue raid. Much of Gaddafi's mischief has been aimed at his political foes. Since 1980, more than 15 anti-Gaddafi Libyan exiles have been assassinated...
Gaddafi's reputation as an international meddler was firmly established in 1977, when he intervened to support the nightmare dictatorship of Uganda's Idi Amin. He has invaded Chad twice, prompting French President Francois Mitterrand to send French troops to the landlocked African country. Libya and France signed an agreement in 1984 to withdraw each nation's forces. France did so, but Gaddafi promptly embarrassed Mitterrand by reneging. Libya fought a minor border war with Egypt in 1977 and supplied materiel to coup leaders in Burkina Faso in 1983. Gaddafi is suspected of having mined...
...They also serve who only stand and wait." That was what White House Chief of Staff Donald Regan recalls thinking early Monday morning after he heard that Libya had fired two errant SA-5 missiles at U.S. planes flying off the Libyan coast. For 36 hours, Regan and other top aides had been waiting for news from the Gulf of Sidra, where three U.S. carrier groups were skirting Muammar Gaddafi's "line of death." Vice Admiral Frank Kelso, commander of the Sixth Fleet, had orders to fire if fired upon, but he had yet to make his move...
Ever since Reagan took office in 1981, Gaddafi has been the Administration's archfiend, an erratic adversary whose sinister hand was perceived behind a tangle of bloody atrocities. As early as 1981, the CIA accused Libya of being the most prominent sponsor of international terrorism, and Reagan talked ominously about Libyan hit squads sent out to assassinate U.S. officials. That same year, F-14 fighter jets shot down two Soviet-built Libyan fighters after a sudden dogfight over the Gulf of Sidra. Last June, when TWA Flight 847 was hijacked and 39 Americans were held hostage, the Administration saw Gaddafi...
...covert action involving other North African governments. McFarlane dispatched Poindexter, then his deputy, to confer with Egypt and other allies in the Middle East and Europe. "We even approached Israel," the intelligence official notes. But the response was discouraging; intelligence reports showed little chance of fomenting a coup within Libya, and none of the ideas jelled. "We learned the hard way," says the CIA man, "that if we want to settle the account with Gaddafi we will have to do it ourselves...