Tripoli, Libya (CNN) -- Coalition airstrikes brought a day of respite for residents of the besieged rebel-held city of Misrata Wednesday, but Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi showed no signs of backing off attacks on civilians.
In the last 24 hours, the international coalition has flown 175 sorties over Libya -- 113 of them by U.S. planes and the remainder from other nations participating in the U.N.-backed mission, U.S. Navy Rear Adm. Gerard Hueber told reporters Wednesday.
The Libyan air force has been crippled and the no-fly zone spans Libya from east to west along its coastline, said Hueber, the chief of staff for U.S. operations. But the coalition has had no indication that Gadhafi was complying with a United Nations mandate to stop attacks against civilians.
With Gadhafi's air power rendered ineffective, coalition airstrikes are now focusing on his ground forces in Ajdabiya and Misrata.
Coalition jets are using smart bombs to target mechanized forces and mobile surface-to-air missile sites and interdict supply lines for their "beans and bullets," Hueber said. The targets include Libya's premier 32nd Brigade, commanded by one of Gadhafi's sons and fully engaged in the fighting.
"It's an extremely complex and difficult environment," Hueber said about going after forces in populated areas.
"And our primary focus is to interdict those forces before they enter the city ... cut off their lines of communication and cut off their command and control," he said. "There have been no reports of civilian casualties. Our mission here is to protect the civilian populace and we choose our targets and plan our actions with that as our top priority."
After the coalition bombardment Tuesday night into Wednesday, Misrata residents reported the first calm in a week.
"It is relatively quiet today -- this is the first time we feel that way in weeks," said Mohammed, an opposition spokesman in the city who would only give his first name. "We want to express our gratitude to the international community since there were airstrikes this morning."
He and a Misrata Central Hospital doctor said the situation was dramatically improved Wednesday, after overnight and early morning airstrikes that they said targeted at least two pro-Gadhafi positions.
Gadhafi's forces have been stationed on the outskirts of the city, from where they have been providing support and supplies to loyalists fighting rebels in Misrata proper.
Many grocery stores and other shops opened in the city, two hours east of Tripoli, which has been inaccessible for journalists.
The doctor, Khaled Mansouri, told CNN that five more people were killed in the last 24 hours, raising the death toll to at least 95 in the last seven days. A man who died Wednesday morning was shot by a pro-Gadhafi sniper, the doctor said.
Gen. Abdul Fatah Younis, a former interior minister who quit to lead opposition forces, said they have requested weapons from several nations to help the embattled city.
"Misrata is destroyed and they need weapons," Younis told CNN. "We try to send them weapons, but of course they were all light weapons. There were no heavy weapons."
In Ajdabiya, parts of the city fell to opposition forces even though Gadhafi's men, who have been pounding the area with artillery and heavy tank bombardments, retained control of the northern and western gates, opposition fighters and witnesses told CNN.
A hospital staffer and opposition fighters said that nine people were killed Wednesday in fighting near the northern gate.
The international airstrikes against Libyan military positions began over the weekend after Gadhafi defied a United Nations-mandated cease-fire in attacks against civilians. The strikes are intended to help establish a no-fly zone.
The campaign was in its fifth day as Sweden announced it has frozen more $1.53 billion in Libyan assets in response to EU sanctions imposed on the northern African country.
France launched the air campaign in Libya and Britain and the United States followed. Germany is not participating in the military action, though it agrees with the United Nations resolution in principle, and moved Wednesday to ensure that its ships were far removed from the Libyan campaign.
A German navy spokesman said Wednesday that all German ships previously under NATO command in the Mediterranean Sea were reassigned to operate under national command and are returning to previously scheduled port stops in Europe to await further instructions. German crew members of NATO fighter jets were also now under German command.
Britain announced an international meeting next Tuesday called to assess successes and needs in Libya.
Late Monday, coalition forces suffered a minor setback when a U.S. fighter jet malfunctioned and crashed near Benghazi in eastern Libya.
The two crew members parachuted out and landed in different places. U.S. rescue teams, picking up the pilot, dropped two 500-pound laser-guided bombs after they saw an armored vehicle approaching the pilot and feared for his safety, said Capt. Richard Ulsh, spokesman for the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit.
An investigation of the incident is underway after reports surfaced that some Libyans were injured by shrapnel.
Capt. Becky Massey, the pilot of one of the two Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft involved in the rescue, said the bombs were dropped three miles from the location of the downed pilot. One of the Ospreys then landed and picked up the pilot.
A U.S. aircraft later dropped precision-guided munitions on the F-15E wreckage to fully destroy it, a U.S. military official told CNN.
Rebels had already recovered the second crew member, a weapons officer, and treated him with "respect and dignity" until coalition forces reached him, U.S. Navy Adm. Samuel Locklear III said Tuesday. It was not immediately clear how the weapons officer was retrieved by U.S. authorities.
The Libyan war was sparked in February by protests demanding an end to Gadhafi's almost 42-year rule. The Libyan strongman responded with force, prompting the international community to take action.
However, a Johns Hopkins University professor said the coalition can only achieve so much through aerial strikes.
"We have to understand the limits of what air power can do," Fouad Ajami told CNN's "AC360."
"This is a recipe for a stalemate," he said. "(Gadhafi) stays in his bunker. The people in Benghazi stay behind the line. Otherwise, this will go on for quite a long time."
Criticism and questions persist about the international campaign, with no clear answer on who will take over command of the mission and what the endgame or exit strategy will be.
U.S. President Barack Obama said the timetable for a transition of military leadership will be coming in days, not weeks.
NATO said Wednesday it will decide shortly what its role in the operation will be. A spokesman added the alliance is well prepared.
"This is the bread and butter of NATO," an official said.
French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe has voiced his opposition to NATO taking political leadership over the Libya campaign. He suggested that a commission composed of foreign ministers from the participating states play that role.
Ajami, however, said the Arab world would welcome NATO involvement.
"They know that the calamity is unfolding in Libya, and they know that no help is going to come other than from the West and from the United States."
British Prime Minister David Cameron said Wednesday that Kuwait and Jordan have agreed to provide logistical support to the Libyan effort. Qatar has already contributed planes to mission.
The United Arab Emirates said Tuesday it will participate -- but only in providing humanitarian assistance.
Toward that end, the country has sent a ship and two planes with basic relief supplies, the country's news agency said.
In the last 24 hours, the international coalition has flown 175 sorties over Libya -- 113 of them by U.S. planes and the remainder from other nations participating in the U.N.-backed mission, U.S. Navy Rear Adm. Gerard Hueber told reporters Wednesday.
The Libyan air force has been crippled and the no-fly zone spans Libya from east to west along its coastline, said Hueber, the chief of staff for U.S. operations. But the coalition has had no indication that Gadhafi was complying with a United Nations mandate to stop attacks against civilians.
With Gadhafi's air power rendered ineffective, coalition airstrikes are now focusing on his ground forces in Ajdabiya and Misrata.
Coalition jets are using smart bombs to target mechanized forces and mobile surface-to-air missile sites and interdict supply lines for their "beans and bullets," Hueber said. The targets include Libya's premier 32nd Brigade, commanded by one of Gadhafi's sons and fully engaged in the fighting.
"It's an extremely complex and difficult environment," Hueber said about going after forces in populated areas.
"And our primary focus is to interdict those forces before they enter the city ... cut off their lines of communication and cut off their command and control," he said. "There have been no reports of civilian casualties. Our mission here is to protect the civilian populace and we choose our targets and plan our actions with that as our top priority."
After the coalition bombardment Tuesday night into Wednesday, Misrata residents reported the first calm in a week.
"It is relatively quiet today -- this is the first time we feel that way in weeks," said Mohammed, an opposition spokesman in the city who would only give his first name. "We want to express our gratitude to the international community since there were airstrikes this morning."
He and a Misrata Central Hospital doctor said the situation was dramatically improved Wednesday, after overnight and early morning airstrikes that they said targeted at least two pro-Gadhafi positions.
Gadhafi's forces have been stationed on the outskirts of the city, from where they have been providing support and supplies to loyalists fighting rebels in Misrata proper.
Many grocery stores and other shops opened in the city, two hours east of Tripoli, which has been inaccessible for journalists.
The doctor, Khaled Mansouri, told CNN that five more people were killed in the last 24 hours, raising the death toll to at least 95 in the last seven days. A man who died Wednesday morning was shot by a pro-Gadhafi sniper, the doctor said.
Gen. Abdul Fatah Younis, a former interior minister who quit to lead opposition forces, said they have requested weapons from several nations to help the embattled city.
"Misrata is destroyed and they need weapons," Younis told CNN. "We try to send them weapons, but of course they were all light weapons. There were no heavy weapons."
In Ajdabiya, parts of the city fell to opposition forces even though Gadhafi's men, who have been pounding the area with artillery and heavy tank bombardments, retained control of the northern and western gates, opposition fighters and witnesses told CNN.
A hospital staffer and opposition fighters said that nine people were killed Wednesday in fighting near the northern gate.
The international airstrikes against Libyan military positions began over the weekend after Gadhafi defied a United Nations-mandated cease-fire in attacks against civilians. The strikes are intended to help establish a no-fly zone.
The campaign was in its fifth day as Sweden announced it has frozen more $1.53 billion in Libyan assets in response to EU sanctions imposed on the northern African country.
France launched the air campaign in Libya and Britain and the United States followed. Germany is not participating in the military action, though it agrees with the United Nations resolution in principle, and moved Wednesday to ensure that its ships were far removed from the Libyan campaign.
A German navy spokesman said Wednesday that all German ships previously under NATO command in the Mediterranean Sea were reassigned to operate under national command and are returning to previously scheduled port stops in Europe to await further instructions. German crew members of NATO fighter jets were also now under German command.
Britain announced an international meeting next Tuesday called to assess successes and needs in Libya.
Late Monday, coalition forces suffered a minor setback when a U.S. fighter jet malfunctioned and crashed near Benghazi in eastern Libya.
The two crew members parachuted out and landed in different places. U.S. rescue teams, picking up the pilot, dropped two 500-pound laser-guided bombs after they saw an armored vehicle approaching the pilot and feared for his safety, said Capt. Richard Ulsh, spokesman for the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit.
An investigation of the incident is underway after reports surfaced that some Libyans were injured by shrapnel.
Capt. Becky Massey, the pilot of one of the two Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft involved in the rescue, said the bombs were dropped three miles from the location of the downed pilot. One of the Ospreys then landed and picked up the pilot.
A U.S. aircraft later dropped precision-guided munitions on the F-15E wreckage to fully destroy it, a U.S. military official told CNN.
Rebels had already recovered the second crew member, a weapons officer, and treated him with "respect and dignity" until coalition forces reached him, U.S. Navy Adm. Samuel Locklear III said Tuesday. It was not immediately clear how the weapons officer was retrieved by U.S. authorities.
The Libyan war was sparked in February by protests demanding an end to Gadhafi's almost 42-year rule. The Libyan strongman responded with force, prompting the international community to take action.
However, a Johns Hopkins University professor said the coalition can only achieve so much through aerial strikes.
"We have to understand the limits of what air power can do," Fouad Ajami told CNN's "AC360."
"This is a recipe for a stalemate," he said. "(Gadhafi) stays in his bunker. The people in Benghazi stay behind the line. Otherwise, this will go on for quite a long time."
Criticism and questions persist about the international campaign, with no clear answer on who will take over command of the mission and what the endgame or exit strategy will be.
U.S. President Barack Obama said the timetable for a transition of military leadership will be coming in days, not weeks.
NATO said Wednesday it will decide shortly what its role in the operation will be. A spokesman added the alliance is well prepared.
"This is the bread and butter of NATO," an official said.
French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe has voiced his opposition to NATO taking political leadership over the Libya campaign. He suggested that a commission composed of foreign ministers from the participating states play that role.
Ajami, however, said the Arab world would welcome NATO involvement.
"They know that the calamity is unfolding in Libya, and they know that no help is going to come other than from the West and from the United States."
British Prime Minister David Cameron said Wednesday that Kuwait and Jordan have agreed to provide logistical support to the Libyan effort. Qatar has already contributed planes to mission.
The United Arab Emirates said Tuesday it will participate -- but only in providing humanitarian assistance.
Toward that end, the country has sent a ship and two planes with basic relief supplies, the country's news agency said.
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