The Challenges of Explosive Remnants of War in an Insurgent Libya

As Libya sinks into escalated violence, the prevailing rhetoric from outside the country focuses unduly on the potential threat posed by man-portable air-defense systems (MANPADS). Rightly so, but widely available and unaccounted-for explosive remnants of war (ERW) pose an equally troublesome problem for the Libyan government and interested outside actors. Libya's government remains paralyzed, while hardline insurgent groups take advantage of the weak state security apparatus to run rampant across the country. Rogue General Haftar’s continuous campaign against Islamist militias in Libya's east is a premonition of continued escalations in the scope of violence within Libya. Haftar’s actions signify a growing consensus towards confronting Islamist militias that will return the conflict back to the intensity of 2011's civil war. A breathtaking array of weapons could be deployed to deadly effect against either the government or Haftar's forces.Across Libya, the amount of abandoned ordnance remains extremely high following the country's 2011 civil war. The United Nations initiated efforts to track and recover the weapons, but a huge number of “phantom weapons” still disappeared into thin air. During the earlier stages of the NATO bombing campaign against Muammar Qaddafi, the ex-leader began moving stockpiles of weapons from their original secure locations in bunkers and warehouses to hidden isolated groves and farms of regime loyalists. No longer secure after Qaddafi's fall, these stockpiles were raided by a wide array of individuals. Weapons caches were ransacked by everyone from rebels to locals and remain unaccounted for. While the United Nations Mine Action Center (UNMAS) and other non-government organizations have run programs to recover these weapons, such actions have only put a minor dent in the overall number of ERWs across Libya.While American policy-makers put emphasis on recovering MANPADS after the civil war, conventional weapons and other munitions were not as sought after by the ex-special forces weapon recovery teams. According to one Libyan weapons expert, over 100,000 landmines are still missing among other unaccounted-for ERWs . Qaddafi’s regime was said to have hundreds of thousands of anti-personnel and anti-vehicle mines at its disposal, along with countless other artillery and tank shells. Experts from the International Human Rights Clinic marveled at the amount and variety of abandoned ordnance left behind after the conflict, even though many of them served similar roles in other post-conflict zones, such as Iraq. Along with Qaddafi’s stockpiles, unexploded ordinance (UXO) dropped by NATO during its bombing campaign remains. The 313 suspected UXO areas contain further ERWs that may be collected and repurposed. The ultimate worry that these materials will become the basis for improvised explosive devices (IEDs) is already quickly becoming a reality, as IED attacks are taking place across the country more and more frequently.During the Iraq War, foreign fighters flocked to the conflict in order to fight the U.S. military. The use of IEDs became a notorious tactic employed by the insurgency, and many within its ranks became educated in the manufacture of these weapons. Among the foreign fighters in Iraq, nearly 19 percentwere from Libya, the overwhelming majority of which originated from the restive cities of Derna and Benghazi. Among the groups that pushed heavily to provide foreign fighters to Iraq was the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG). In a 2011 interview, the leader of LIFG stated that many of these fighters returned to Libya to fight in the Libyan Civil War. There is a growing concern that these battle-hardened individuals will side with the radical Islamic groups that continue to defy the Libyan government, bringing with them IED manufacturing and emplacement knowledge to transfer to the next generation of members in the post-conflict environment.The wave of assassinations and attacks on police and security targets, including the recent assassination in Benghazi of general intelligence chief Colonel Ibrahim Senussi, indicates a growing trend of instability in eastern Libya. While much of the violence has been carried out with small arms, the number and intensity of clashes between the government and other armed groups has been growing steadily in the past year, especially within the restive eastern region of Cyrenaica. Groups like Ansar Al-Sharia in Libya have outright defied the Libyan government’s authority by attacking Libya’s elite army unit Al-Saiqa Forces, which had been deployed to Benghazi to combat the spiraling lawlessness. These hardline extremist groups pose the biggest obstacle for government forces in consolidating control over the eastern regions of the country. Should Tripoli choose to confront these well-armed groups—especially Ansar Al-Sharia—it may find itself engulfed in an even more violent insurgency.Tactical employment of explosive ordnance presents limitless opportunities. However, highway systems present the obvious targets when employing IED tactics during an insurgency. To offer a comparison, Iraq and Libya both have nearly the same length of paved roadways running across their countries, yet Libya is four times the size of Iraq. Since the highway system is not nearly as extensive as Iraq’s, this limits the number of possible routes a convoy running across the country may take, creating an effective chokepoint where troops and equipment must pass. Therefore, should a full-fledged insurgency emerge, the Libyan highway systems will become extremely vulnerable to attack by IEDs and landmines. This is especially the case for the Libyan Coastal Highway, which links the more consolidated western region of the country to the anarchic east.Landmines and IEDs may also be employed in defensive strategies. Islamist strongholds like Derna and Benghazi may become the targets of prolonged sieges by government troops. For insurgents, emplacement of landmines and IEDs would work to inflict casualties and slow down government troop movements, buying valuable time for the groups to call on support from other radical Islamists in the region. With the recent surge of radicalism across the Maghreb region, any call for help would likely be answered with support and fighters to maintain Libyan safe havens.General Haftar has stated his intent to prevent the Islamists in the country's east from playing any part in the future of Libya. However, Haftar's advance has effectively pushed these groups into a corner, and they will fight and employ every tactic in their arsenal against what they view as a broader impending offensive. With the vast number of ERWs and other types of explosive ordinance floating across the country, radical Islamists have all the necessary resources to dig in deep if opposing forces put forth significant effort to root the them out of their eastern strongholds.