A NEW LIBYAN NIGHTMARE – AT 7:22 P.M. ET:  Late reports say that regime thugs, including foreign mercenaries, are now attacking protesters in areas around Tripoli.  A brief report this afternoon said that Qaddafi was dead, but there is absolutely no confirmation, and news organizations are completely skeptical.  It appears, and this is pure informed speculation, that Qaddafi will make his last stand in a bunker in Tripoli.  He must have seen a lot of war movies.

And now there is a new worry, from CBS News:

As Muammar Qaddafi continues his violent crackdown on opposition protesters, U.S. officials are worried how far the embattled Libyan leader may go to neutralize the growing threat to his power.

According to a Wall Street Journal report, Qaddafi still possesses caches of mustard gas and other chemical weapons, as well as a stockpile of Scud B missiles and 1,000 metric tons of uranium yellowcake, leaving Washington skittish.

"When you have a guy who's as irrational as Qaddafi with some serious weapons at his disposal, it's always a concern," a U.S. official told the paper. "But we haven't yet seen him move to use any kind of mustard gas or chemical weapon."

Libya abandoned its nuclear program in 2003 in favor of normalized relations with the U.S. and the West, but plans to destroy its chemical weapons stockpiles were waylaid by bureaucratic spats with the U.S., officials told the paper.

Given the escalation of violence in an attempt to quash the opposition and Qaddafi's unpredictability, the officials' concerns may have merit.

COMMENT:  Saddam Hussein used chemical weapons.  Why wouldn't Qaddafi?  Dictators facing the end have often fought with enormous ferocity, and, like Hitler, can turn on their own people.

The violence in Libya is, by far, the greatest we have seen in the current wave of Arab revolts.  The protesters may, in the end, be crushed.  Even if they win, the cost can be ghastly.

Meanwhile, the American administration is involved in "consultations" with allies.  I'm sure there's an app for that.

February 24, 2011