US service personnel play key part in Libya campaign even as US withdraws from front-line role

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Sunday, April 17, 2011

US service personnel play key part in Libya campaign even as US withdraws from front-line role

http://www.google.com/hostednews/canadianpress/article/ALeqM5ge0dMgJ6C25VbEY52jM_4VdGbAJQ?docId=6575644

The United States, which originally led the Libya campaign, has been steadily reducing its role over the past two weeks. On March 31, it handed over command and control of the international campaign to NATO, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, and shortly after that it ceased all attack missions over Libya — setting of a search by NATO for more planes capable of carrying out precision strikes against Gadhafi's forces.
NATO said Friday that the U.S. still flies one-third of the Libya operation's missions. But that refers to surveillance and refuelling missions, not to attack flights over Libyan territory.
But even though the U.S. has withdrawn its forces from the front lines of the NATO campaign, a handful of Americans serving on this French navy carrier remain at the forefront of the action.
They are members of a little-known French-American naval exchange program in which U.S. officers spend time in the French navy — known as the "Marine Nationale" — and French officers spend time in the U.S. navy.