Libya: RAF Tornados strike 15 targets in Libya
British warplanes see heaviest day of action so far as Nato steps up bombing campaign
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Richard Norton-Taylor
guardian.co.uk, Monday 11 April 2011 21.22 BST
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RAF Tornado aircraft struck 15 targets on Sunday. Photograph: Andrew Milligan/PA
British warplanes saw their biggest day of action since the invasion of Iraq on Sunday as RAF Tornados hit 15 targets in Libya.
The deployment of high-cost weaponry will have made it the most expensive RAF mission in recent years. The aircraft struck 12 tanks, two surface to air missile launchers and an armoured fighting vehicle during armed patrols over Misrata, Brega, and Ajdabiyah on Sunday, Major General John Lorimer, chief military spokesman at the Ministry of Defence, disclosed.
As part of the highest number of combined strikes on Libya since Nato took command of the military operation on 31 March, the Tornados fired Brimstone anti-tank missiles and Paveway IV bombs, described by defence officials as precision weapons with an accuracy of a few metres. Nato said its aircraft had conducted 154 sorties over Libya on Sunday, including 70 "strike sorties", which it defines as missions to identify and engage targets, but which do not necessarily involve weapons being fired.
It said the number of sorties since Nato took over the operation was 1,721.
The Nato secretary general, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, said 300 sorties since Saturday had destroyed 49 tanks, nine armoured personnel carriers, three anti-aircraft guns and four large ammunition bunkers. He said the large majority of the strikes were near Misrata and Ajdabiyah.
The MoD said Tornado pilots had fired at a tank close to where Muammar Gaddafi's forces were loading other tanks on a transporter, their original target. The pro-Gaddafi forces fled the scene. Nato said the message to Gaddafi's troops was: abandon heavy weapons and you will not be attacked.
Brimstone missiles, developed at a cost of £850m to replace cluster bombs used in Iraq, were first fired from RAF Harrier jets in Afghanistan. Paveway IV bombs are made in the US and are laser-guided.
Tornados have also fired an unknown number of Storm Shadow air-launched cruise missiles which cost an estimated £750,000 each.
Though Eurofighter/Typhoons are now based in Italy with the Tornados, they have not yet been fitted with modern ground attack weapons and have yet to fire in anger over Libya, defence officials said.Tornados struck 17 tanks and seven armoured vehicles in Libya last week, according to MoD figures.
The RAF now has 20 fast jets – 12 Tornados and eight Typhoons – based at Gioia Del Colle in southern Italy. Three VC10 aircraft based at Trapani in Sicily provide air-to-air refuelling for them.
Monday, April 11, 2011
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