Whilst rebel leaders were feted in London and Washington, Gaddafi was just holding on to power. The government goons in Tripoli in their Toyota pickups are failing to hold the insurrection down. Open displays of the revolution against the regime are commonplace. Law and order is breaking down with the sound of gunfire frequently heard in the city. It now takes 4 days to queue up for petrol.

And the NATO precision bombing, targeted with superb intelligence, is whittling down the Libyan state’s ability to fight or even to function. Above is a video of a government tank battalion outside Misrata that has been totally destroyed with precision weapons. This is what is happening all day, every day. Gaddafi has been firstly precision bombed to a standstill and now is going backwards on every front.

I have read commentators that said that they thought that NATO didn’t want the rebels to win too quickly, that time was needed for the revolution to put together the new administrative infrastructure to take over and that NATO don’t want a repeat of the disastrous power vacuum that happened in Iraq at the end of Gulf War 2. Maybe, but I don’t see it, when the Gaddafi regime implodes it will happen very suddenly, when nobody expects. It could be today, it could be in a month’s time. It certainly isn’t something that NATO can control.

Syria next?