2 U.S. warships approach Libya through Suez Canal

CAIRO - Two U.S. warships have passed through the Suez Canal on their way to the Mediterranean Sea and closer to Libyan shores after orders from Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Egyptian officials said Wednesday.

The amphibious assault ships USS Kearsarge and USS Ponce entered the canal earlier in the day from the Red Sea. The officials said the USS Kearsarge is carrying 42 helicopters.

The two officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to talk to the media.

Gates said he ordered two Navy amphibious warships into the Mediterranean, along with an extra 400 Marines, in case they are needed to evacuate civilians or provide humanitarian relief.

And while he did not rule out other options, such as providing air cover for Libyan rebels, he made clear he has little enthusiasm for direct military intervention.

Complete coverage: Anger in the Arab world

The Obama administration is weighing its military options for Libya, conscious that it may need to flex U.S. muscle to help usher Muammar Qaddafi out of power but fearful of provoking even deadlier violence from a regime that has shown little restraint in attacking its own people.

Meanwhile, some NATO countries are drawing up contingency plans modeled on the no-fly zones over the Balkans in the 1990s in case the international community decides to impose an air embargo over Libya, diplomats said Wednesday.

NATO has already said that any such move would require a clear mandate from the U.N. Security Council. This is unlikely because Russia, which has veto power in the council, has already rejected the idea.

Still, diplomats at NATO and the European Union said some countries, including United States and Britain, are already drawing up contingency plans to prevent Libyan leader Qaddafi's air force from carrying out air strikes against the rebels.

But Germany warned that the military alliance should not play into Qaddafi's claims that the West was again meddling in Arab affairs by fomenting the revolt.

"I would advise that we conduct the debate ... about military options with all the appropriate caution and reserve," Germany's Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said Wednesday in Berlin.

Qaddafi has warned "thousands of Libyans" will die if the U.S. or NATO intervene in his country.

Qaddafi was addressing supporters and foreign media on Wednesday in a conference hall in the capital Tripoli as his forces were launching a counteroffensive against parts of the rebel-held eastern half of the country.

""We will not accept an intervention like that of the Italians that lasted decades," Qaddafi said, referring to Italy's colonial rule early in the 20th Century. "We will not accept a similar American intervention. This will lead to a bloody war and thousands of Libyans will die if America and NATO enter Libya."

Qaddafi also lashed out at international moves against his regime, including the freezing of his and other Libyan assets abroad -- an act he called "piracy" -- and efforts by Europe to send aid to opposition-held Benghazi. He said any Libyan who accepts international aid was guilty of "high treason" because it "opens Libya to colonialism."

In a pointed message to Europe, he warned, "There will be no stability in the Mediterranean if there is no stability in Libya."

"Africans will march to Europe without anyone to stop them. The Mediterranean will become a center for piracy like Somalia," he said. Qaddafi's regime has worked closely with Italy and other European countries to stop African migrants who use Libya as a launching point to slip into Europe.

"The puzzle for the West is to support Africa and Asian block requests, as well as the interests of the Libyan opposition, to protect civilians, but to leave Qaddafi a way to step down as Mubarak did in Egypt," said CBS News foreign affairs analyst Pam Falk.

Libyan troops, rebels battle for key oil town

Libyan warplanes bombed on Wednesday an ammunition depot on the outskirts of the rebel-held eastern town of Ajdabiya, 85 miles south of Benghazi. The air force has launched repeated airstrikes during the two-week revolt, but all of them appear to have targeted weapons depots in areas controlled by the rebellion.

The diplomats, who could not be named due to the sensitivity of the issue, said the options being looked into are modeled on the no-fly zone which the Western military alliance imposed over Bosnia in 1993 that had a U.N. mandate.

They also cited NATO's aerial offensive against Yugoslavia in 1999 -- which did not have the U.N. Security Council mandate -- in response to the crackdown on ethnic Albanian nationalists in Kosovo. The onslaught ended after 78 days with Serbian strongman Slobodan Milosevic agreeing to withdraw his forces from Kosovo.

"Very clearly there are such discussions going on and contingency plans are being worked on, but there is no decision yet," said a senior EU official who also declined to be identified.

But he noted that taking control of the airspace over Libya would more likely be modeled on Operation Deny Flight, a 1993-95 NATO mission in which its warplanes patrolled the skies over Bosnia as a civil war raged between government forces and Serb secessionists.

NATO planes mostly operated from air bases in Italy and from carriers in the Adriatic Sea and the Mediterranean. Many of those bases, and those in Spain, Crete and Cyprus, could be used for a potential air mission over Libya.

During Deny Flight's 33-month duration, NATO flew over 100,000 sorties. Roughly half were carried out by fighters and attack jets, and the others by transports, reconnaissance planes and aerial tankers. Four Serbian fighter-bombers were shot down during the operation.

The best-known incident of the operation occurred the same year, when Serb anti-aircraft fire downed a U.S. Air Force F-16. The pilot, Capt. Scott F. O'Grady, was rescued six days later.

"In the Balkans, (the operation) had important results: it prevented Milosevic's planes from bombing unarmed populations," Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini told the Il Messaggero newspaper in Rome. "I believe it could be successful also in Libya, because it would prevent bombing ... areas taken from Gadhafi's control."

If the international community imposes a no-fly zone over Libya it would pit the country's disintegrating air force against the vastly superior air fleets of Western nations.

Although Libya has over 400 fighter-bombers and helicopter gunships, analysts say the number of airworthy aircraft is much smaller. The Libyan military has been in disarray for a long time, and the air force in particular is said to suffer from low morale, declining training standards and poor maintenance.

In contrast, NATO's air assets in the region are extensive and robust. The several hundred fighter jets available in NATO's southern nations and on the U.S. carriers could quickly establish air dominance over Libya, experts say.

"Setting up a no-fly zone would be fairly easy, it's the kind of thing NATO could put together in a few hours," said Robert Hunter, who was U.S. ambassador to NATO at the time of the Balkan wars.

"The only real question is whether the people of Arab countries will oppose the intervention of Western powers. Will the operation backfire, will it provoke accusations of neocolonialism?" he said.