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Libya
Invasion of Chad
Libya's involvement in Chad dates to the early 1970s, when Qadhafi
began supporting the antigovernment rebels of the Front for the
National Liberation of Chad (FROLINAT). Libyan intervention has
resulted in de facto control over the northern part of the country
and three phases of open hostilities--in 1980-81, 1983, and late
1986--when incursions were launched to the south of Chad. During
the first two phases, the Libyan units acquitted themselves more
professionally than in their previous encounters with Egypt and
in Uganda. In mounting the 1980 incursion, they successfully traversed
hundreds of miles of desert tracks with armored vehicles and carried
out air operations under harsh climatic conditions. They also
gained valuable experience in logistics and maintenance of modern
military forces over lengthy supply lines.
Libya's 1980 intervention in Chad was on behalf of President
Goukouni Oueddei against the French-backed forces of Hissein Habré,
who at the time also enjoyed Libyan support. Qadhafi's actions
were portrayed as support for the Chadian northern groups of Islamic,
and to some extent Arab, culture, but his objective was the creation
of a Libyan sphere of influence in Chad. Even before 1980, Libyan
forces had moved freely in northern areas of the country, operating
from the 100-kilometer-wide Aouzou strip (see Glossary), which
Libya had occupied by 1973.
In June 1980, an offensive by Habre's forces resulted in the
capture of Faya Largeau, the key center of northern Chad. Beginning
in October of that year, Libyan troops airlifted to the Aouzou
strip operated in conjunction with Goukouni's forces to drive
Habré back. Faya Largeau was then used as an assembly point for
tanks, artillery, and armored vehicles that moved south against
the capital of N'Djamena.
An attack spearheaded by Soviet T-54 and T-55 tanks, and reportedly
coordinated by advisers from the Soviet Union and The German Democratic
Republic, brought the fall of the capital in midDecember . The
Libyan force, numbering between 7,000 and 9,000 men of regular
units and the paramilitary Islamic Pan-African Legion, 60 tanks,
and other armored vehicles, had been ferried across 1,100 kilometers
of desert from Libya's southern border, partly by airlift and
tank transporters and partly under their own power. The border
itself was 1,000 to 1,100 kilometers from Libya's main bases on
the Mediterranean coast.
Under increasingly insistent pressure from other African countries
and from political factions in Chad, the Libyans withdrew in November
1981. Upon their return to Libya, Qadhafi announced that his troops
had killed over 3,000 of the "enemy" while losing 300 themselves;
other estimates of Libyan casualties were considerable higher.
Without military support from Libya, Goukouni's forces were unable
to stop the advance of Habré's Armed Forces of the North (FAN),
which overran the capital in June 1982. The second Libyan intervention
in favor of Goukouni occurred between June and August 1983, with
the distinction that Goukouni was now the head of a rebel faction
against the legally constituted government of Habré. To make the
1983 phase of the Chadian war appear purely indigenous, the Libyans
recruited, trained, and armed Chadian dissidents under Goukouni's
nominal command. Supplemented by heavy artillery, the insurgents
began well but were soundly defeated in July by Chadian government
forces, bolstered by French and United States military supplies
and a token force of Zairian troops. Qadhafi called for a Libyan
intervention in force. A sustained air bombardment was launched
against Faya Largeau after its recapture by Habré on July 30,
using Su-22 fighters and Mirage F-1s from the Aouzou air base,
along with Tu-22 bombers from Sabha. Within ten days, a large
ground force had been assembled east and west of Faya Largeau
by first ferrying men, armor, and artillery by air to Sabha, Al
Kufrah, and the Aouzou airfield, and then by shorter range transport
planes to the area of conflict. The fresh Libyan forces attacked
the Faya Largeau oasis on August 10, driving the Chadian government
units out.
The subsequent intervention of 3,000 French troops ended the
Libyan successes and led to a de facto division of the country,
with Libya maintaining control of all the territory north of the
sixteenth parallel. Under an agreement for mutual withdrawal from
Chad, French troops withdrew by early November 1984, but the Libyans
secretly dispersed and hid their units.
In December 1986, an estimated 2,000 to 3,000 Chadian government
troops were moved into the Tibesti Massif region of northwestern
Chad to support Goukouni's forces, most of whom who had rebelled
against the Libyans after Goukouni grew disillusioned with his
Libyan backers in late 1986. Combined Goukouni and Habré forces
then reportedly routed a 1,000-man Libyan garrison at Fada, claiming
to have captured or destroyed a large number of tanks.
In March 1987, the main Libyan air base of Wadi Doum was captured
by Chadian forces. Although strongly defended by mine fields,
5,000 troops, tanks, armored vehicles, and aircraft, the Libyans
Base was overcome by a smaller Chadian attacking force equipped
with trucks mounted with machine guns and antitank weapons. Two
days later, the Libyans evacuated their main base of Faya Largeau,
150 kilometers farther south, which was in danger of being encircled.
Observers estimated that in the Chadian victories in the first
3 months of 1987 more than 3,000 Libyan soldiers had been killed
or captured or had deserted. Large numbers of tanks, armored personnel
carriers, artillery, fixed-wing aircraft, and helicopters were
captured or destroyed. In some cases, Libya sent its own aircraft
to bomb abandoned Libyan equipment to deny its use to the Chadians.
It was reported that in many cases Libyan soldiers had been killed
while fleeing to avoid battle. At Wadi Doum, panicked Libyans
had suffered high casualties running through their own mine fields.
These military actions left Habre in virtual control of Chad
and in a position to threaten the expulsion of Libya from the
Aouzou Strip. The full effect of these stunning defeats had yet
to be assessed as of May 1987. It was clear, however, that they
had affected the perception of Libya as a significant regional
military power. They also cast renewed doubt on the competence
and determination of Libyan fighting men, especially in engagements
beyond the country's borders to which they evidently felt no personal
commitment.
Data as of 1987
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