The Air Force F-111Fs would spend only 11 minutes in the target area, with what at first appeared to be mixed results. Anti-aircraft and SAM opposition from the very first confirmed that the Libyans were ready. News of the raid was broadcast while it was in progress. One aircraft, Karma 52, was lost, almost certainly due to a SAM, as it was reported to be on fire in flight. Capt. Fernando L. Ribas-Dominicci and Capt. Paul F. Lorence were killed. Only Ribas-Dominicci's body was recovered; his remains were returned to the US three years later.

Thursday, April 21, 2005 · Last updated 9:41 a.m. PT

General: U.S. seeks relations with Libya

By ROBERT BURNS
AP MILITARY WRITER

WASHINGTON -- The U.S. military would like to establish official ties with Libyan armed forces if Libya can satisfy the Bush administration that it has renounced its sponsorship of terrorism, the second-in-command at U.S. European Command said Thursday.

Gen. Charles Wald said the matter was under consideration by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld.

"I think it's going to happen," Wald said in an Associated Press interview at the Pentagon. He believes Libya and nearly every other nation in North Africa is interested in closer relations with the United States, in part because they share a concern about Islamic extremism.

"There's obviously discussion going on: What are we going to do with Libya? How do we want to engage? Should they be part of the process? Do you bring them into the fold?" he said, adding that if Libya lives up to its promises on foreswearing weapons of mass destruction and ending its sponsorship of terrorism, then the United States should establish military relations.

"I think it would be hugely beneficial" to U.S. interests in North Africa, the four-star Air Force general said.

Wald's command, which is based in Germany, has focused increasing attention on North Africa, where it sees a rising danger from transnational terrorists seeking to exploit instability.

Prior to the rise to power of Libyan leader Moammar Ghadafi in 1970, the U.S. military had bases there, including operations at Wheelus air base near Tripoli, the capital. In the 1950s the U.S. Air Force stationed long-range bombers at Wheelus, and for a period it was headquarters for the 17th Air Force of U.S. Air Forces Europe. U.S. intelligence agencies also operated from Wheelus, mainly on missions to monitor activities of Soviet military forces.

But for much of the past quarter century Libya has been viewed by U.S. administrations as an adversary.

In April 1986, President Ronald Reagan ordered the bombing of targets in Tripoli and Benghazi, following U.S. accusations of Libyan involvement in a bomb explosion at a German nightclub frequented by U.S. soldiers.

Last summer President Bush announced that the United States was resuming diplomatic relations with Libya. Bush acted after Ghadafi agreed to give up his nuclear weapons program, revealed secrets about the nuclear black market and accepted responsibility for the 1988 bombing of Pan Am flight 103, promising to pay compensation to relatives of the 270 people killed.

Wald's interest in Libya is shared other elements of the Defense Department. The POW-MIA office at the Pentagon, for example, sent representatives to Libya last year to discuss possible cooperation on accounting for U.S. military personnel shot down over Libya during World War II, as well as the recovery of an Air Force pilot missing from the 1986 bombing raid on Tripoli.