Between 1973 and 1989, various Western powers and Libya were entangled
in a seemingly never-ending exchange of blows. Supposedly launched in
retaliation for one action or the other, this confrontation resulted in
a number of high-profile, even though low-scale, clashes between the
Libyan Arab Air Force (LAAF), the US Navy and even the French.
Meanwhile, almost as a sideshow, the LAAF - quantitatively one of the
most potent air forces in North Africa and the Middle East - also saw
intensive deployment in Chad. Initially, with sporadic fighting between
different parties for the control of N'Djamena, the Chadian capital,
this conflict eventually turned into a major war when Libya invaded the
country outright. The LAAF deployed not only French-made Mirage but also
Soviet-made fighter-bombers of MiG and Sukhoi design, Mil-designed
helicopters and even bombers of Tupolev design, to establish her
dominance over the extensive battlefield of the Sahara Desert.
Because of the Cold War but also due to confrontation with Libya over a
number of other issues, France - a one-time major arms supplier to
Libya - and the USA gradually got dragged into the war. Deployments of
their troops and intelligence services in Chad, Egypt and the Sudan
never resulted in a full-scale war against Libya, but time and again
culminated in small-scale aerial operations that proved crucial to
developments on the ground, several of which are still a matter of
extensive debate.
Detailing not only the aerial operations but the ground war and the
geopolitical background of these conflicts, and illustrated with over
100 contemporary photographs, maps and all-new color profiles, this
volume provides a unique insight into an otherwise completely forgotten
conflict that raged from the skies over the southern Mediterranean to
southern Chad and northern Sudan, yet one that not only represented a
formative period of the LAAF, but which also prompted a number of
crucial modifications and developments in France and the USA.
