Page 2 - Congressman Ackerman News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

>> well, our new role would be confined to behind the scenes capabilities, which sf code word for intelligence and systems integration. november country is better than putting a lot of different stuff together and weaving together a force structure from component pieces. i think you'll see the united states play the role of a kind of wizard of oz behind the curtain, if you will, without a lot of public exposure, but playing a vital systems teation le. help av in a coordinate and also we're a key part of nato. we're part of the backbone of nato. so we'll be engaged there just in terms of planni...

Here to prevent the massacre en mass of the libyan people, which we've been asked to do specifically by all 21 of the others, excluding libya, states in the -- >> surprisingly, they weren't onboard. >> yeah, they didn't quite go along with that. although if you poll their ambassadors around the world, they might have gone with that. and to enforce a no-fly zone, which is what they wanted us to do. we're going to accomplish that. and you could almost say we've just about accomplished it right now and the secretary might announce that. >> congressman, let me follow up on that real quick. how lon...

Andrea mitchell is already reporting that it appears it's going to be nato. that's a good thing, because that's an alliance we have used many times before. familiar with going to put together something new for this instance, involving the arab league and the british, et cetera. we trust nato a little bit more. it's not an impromptu thing being put together. but we don't know for certain that's what's going to happen. secretary clinton will speak to that in a minute. we're talking to congressman ackerman and e.j. dionne of "the washington post." congressman, i want to talk to you about somethin...

I think gary ackerman has it right. the way these things work is you've got an incredible degree of international consensus today about gadhafi being a bad guy, having to go. you have a kind of unprecedent ed concern about what's happening around the world. what's important to realize, as the calendar goes on, if gadhafi were able to stay in place, other countries don't have the same cost benefit relationship with gadhafi and libya that we do. we can afford to put him in a box and not worry about it. many other countries may not see it that way, and it wouldn't surprise me to see a brazil a tu...

Those places? or is that a loss? or is it somewhere in the middle? >> well, i think the mere fact that we stopped what could have been a horrible situation in benghazi, real mass killings, that is a victory, but more importantly, we just did the right thing, i think, to stop that. now, if this turns into a kind of, you know, a civil war or sort of a country divided, that's going to create problems for us for the nato coalition, assuming -- i'm assuming it's going to come together, and for president obama. we're going to have to make other choices. but having stopped something -- just having st...