Destruction of an adversary’s air defences becomes the first priority in the process of imposing a ‘no fly zone’ over its airspace as it ensures freedom of friendly aircraft to carry out their missions without the danger of being engaged by its ground-based weapon systems

Armed with the UNSC Resolution 1973 adopted on March 17, 2011, the coalition forces led by the United States lost little time to intervene militarily in Libya. Within 48 hours of the adoption of the ‘resolution,’ military action was well on its way to impose a ‘no fly zone’ over the Libyan airspace. First on the scene were the hundred plus Tomahawk cruise missiles unleashed on the very first day by the coalition naval warships and submarines already patrolling in the Mediterranean waters off the Libyan coastline. These largely targeted the Libyan air defence radars and weapons such as its large arsenal of Soviet-built surface-to-air missile (SAM) sites. Destruction of an adversary’s air defences becomes the first priority in the process of imposing a ‘no fly zone’ over its airspace as it ensures freedom of friendly aircraft to carry out their missions without being engaged by its ground-based weapon systems. While the Destruction of Enemy Air Defence (DEAD) missions were still on, a trio of B-2 stealth bombers, operating from the US homeland bases had carried out devastating counter air attacks peppering Libya’s major air bases, successfully grounding the Libyan Air Force aircraft under Gaddafi’s control. French warplanes were next to secure the Libyan air space, shooting down a Libyan aircraft which ventured to get airborne. The frisk air action continued and by March 22, almost full-fledged ‘no fly zone’ had been established over the entire Libyan air space.

A large number of nations contributed their air resources for the effort under different code names for air operations such as Operation Mobile for Canada, Operation Harmattan for France and Operation Elammy for the UK. The US in combination with Italy, Denmark and Norway named it Operation Odyssey Dawn. A list of the countries with their commitments for imposition of the UNSC ‘no fly’ resolution is given in the box.