Word: libyans
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...strike had been years in the making. The President has been preoccupied with the problem of terrorism since his early days in office. Two events in Reagan's first year helped to fix his thoughts on Gaddafi as a symbol of virtually everything he hates. One was a Libyan attack on U.S. jets in the Gulf of Sidra that resulted in the shooting down of two of Gaddafi's Soviet-built Su-22 fighter planes. Later in 1981 U.S. intelligence picked up information that Libya was sending hit squads to the U.S. to assassinate Reagan and some of his close...
...serious debate about what the U.S. should do. "We'd been a pretty determined bunch ever since the Achille Lauro," said one senior Reagan official. "The only major point of discussion was targeting." Reagan insisted that the targets be chosen with a view toward holding down casualties among Libyan civilians. That damage nonetheless occurred in downtown Tripoli might indicate that a so-called surgical air strike is much easier to plan than to achieve...
...talk the U.S. out of an attack. Meeting in emergency session in the Hague only hours before the strike, foreign ministers of the twelve European Community nations went further than they ever had before toward meeting U.S. requests for collective action. They pledged to reduce the number of Libyan diplomats allowed into their countries, to limit their freedom of movement and to keep them under close surveillance. That move has some importance: Libyan "diplomats" are believed often to pass instructions, money and weapons to terrorists...
...besides coming too late, the move fell short of meeting Washington's urging that the Europeans shut down the Libyan people's bureaus entirely. Meeting again on Thursday, two full days after the attack, the twelve tried to come up with some further move that might satisfy the U.S. but could agree only to wait for a committee report due this week...
...Libyans, who make a point of observing the niceties of the relationship between host and guest, were understandably cool to the U.S. correspondents. "Their mood was sullen and angry," notes TIME's Fischer, "but their hostility did not seem directed at us." After Gaddafi's brief TV appearance Wednesday night, demonstrators began chanting "Down, Down, U.S.A.!" in front of the hotel, while others, in a more festive mood, organized a horn-tooting, flag-waving victory procession along the city's + corniche. Libyan radio reports that U.S. pilots had been lynched by furious mobs did not engender affection for Americans...