Offering an exit strategy for Gaddafi

U.S. officials say no fly zone in Libya is in large part in tact and that next week's London meeting could provide an exit strategy for Gaddafi. Deborah Lutterbeck reports.

Now the US is saying that the no fly zone is in large part in place, but international efforts are not over.

U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates spoke on NBC's Meet the Press.

U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, saying:"We have not seen any of his planes fly since the mission started. We have suppressed his air defenses. I think we have also been successful on the humanitarian side. We have prevented his forces from going to Benghazi and we have taken out a good bit of his armor. We have to a very large extent completed the military mission in terms of getting it set up. The no-fly zone and even the humanitarian side will have to be sustained for a bit of time."

Relinquishing U.S. leadership of the Libya operation is a priority for President Barack Obama, who is trying to extricate Washington from wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and faces doubts at home about the wisdom of the campaign.

U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, saying:

"Eventually this is going to have to be settled by the Libyans themselves. Perhaps the U.N. can mediate. In terms of the military commitment, the president has put some very strict limitation in terms of what we are prepared to do."

On the same program U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that the international coalition on Libya will also explore means for Libyan President Muammar Gadaffi's transition from power, at a meeting in London next week.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, saying:

"We will provide a very clear message to Gaddafi. Do you really want to be a pariah? Do you really want to end up in the international criminal court. Now is your time to get out of this."

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will travel to London for a meeting on Libya Tuesday. The meeting, called by Britain and France, is intended to create a contact group to provide political guidance for the international response to the Libya crisis.

France, which launched the air campaign with Britain and the United States, says NATO should play a technical role in the operation by providing its command structure, while an ad hoc steering group of coalition members, including the Arab League, exercises political control.

Deborah Lutterbeck, Reuters