France, which Saturday spearheaded the UN-mandated Operation "Odyssey Dawn" with air strikes on Libya, Sunday also sent its aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle to join the campaign.

Meanwhile aircraft from the United Arab Emirates were due to arrive Sunday at the Decimomannu air force base on the Italian island of Sardinia, which is already hosting four Spanish F-18 fighter jets that arrived on Saturday.

In the West's biggest intervention in the Arab world since the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq, mounted exactly eight years earlier, US warships and a British submarine fired more than 120 Tomahawk cruise missiles into Libya on Saturday.

This prompted Kadhafi to warn Sunday of a long war in the Mediterranean "battlefield" as Tripoli reported dozens of deaths.

Italy is providing seven air bases as key staging points for strikes by Western-led coalition forces to destroy Libya's air defences and impose a no-fly zone.

The United Arab Emirates, along with Jordan, Morocco and Qatar, was among Arab nations that took part in a summit in Paris on Saturday on the Libyan crisis.

Qatar has decided to supply four planes, a French defence ministry spokesman said Sunday.

Three AWACS radar planes are stationed at the Trapani base in western Sicily along with Italian ECR Tornado jets specialising in destroying anti-missile and radar defences.

Tornado IDS attack jets were deployed at the Ghedi air base in northern Italy along with Eurofighter jets at Grosseto air base in central Italy.

Sunday, four Danish F-16 fighter jets took off from Italy's Sigonella Air Force base in Sicily for Libyan airspace, Danish public radio DR reported.

Denmark's contribution to the international military action -- four F-16 fighter jets, two reserve planes (also F-16 fighter jets) and a transport plane -- arrived at Sigonella Saturday.

US F-15 and F-16 jets are also deployed at Sigonella.

Coalition forces are coordinating their actions but there is no central command organising the attacks, a source in the French defence ministry said Sunday.

"There is no centralised headquarters, and at this stage everyone is using their own headquarters in a coordinated manner," the source said.

The French are operating out of Mont Verdun, near Lyon in the east of the country, where the air force has its chief air defence control centre.

The British headquarters are at Northwood, in the suburbs of London, and those of the United States at Ramstein in southwest Germany.

The American headquarters has the "greater planning capacity", the source said.

Allied forces have ruled out any ground operations inside Libya.

Italian Defence Minister Ignazio La Russa said Sunday that Rome assigned eight combat aircraft, including four Tornado jets, for the operation that could be used "at any time", while Belgium said six of its F-16 fighter-bombers would be operational Monday.

Six Italian fighter aircraft including four Tornado bombers took off from western Sicily late Sunday but their destination was not revealed.

London said British Typhoon and Tornado jets flew to the Gioia del Colle air base in southern Italy.

In Saturday's raids, British Tornado jets flew directly to Libya from England, but British Defence Secretary Liam Fox told the BBC: "It's obviously easier if we have access to bases closer to where the targets are and where the no-fly zone is."

Support aircraft such as the VC10 air-to-air refuelling aircraft and the Sentinel surveillance aircraft are at Akrotiri, Britain's base in Cyprus.

Two British frigates are also in the region -- HMS Westminster was off the coast of Libya, and HMS Cumberland was in the region ready to support operations.

The United States has two US missile-launching destroyers -- the Barry and the Stout -- stationed in the Mediterranean and will on Wednesday send its helicopter carrier Bataan and two support vessels to replace other ships in the area.

In addition to its four F-18 fighter jets, Spain sent a refueling aircraft to Italy and said it would also deploy an F-100 frigate, an S-74 submarine and a CN-235 maritime surveillance plane to help enforce an arms embargo on Libya, once parliamentary approval has been received.

Spain had already announced on Friday it would allow NATO to use two military bases, at Rota and at Moron de la Frontera in the south of the country.

Canada is deploying six CF-18 fighter jets, along with up to 150 pilots, ground crews and other support staff.

The first of the six F-16 fighter jets Norway will contribute to the international air campaign will leave on Monday, military officials told reporters.

"We are also sending 120 pilots, technicians, security personnel and press officers," brigadier Per Egil Rygg told reporters, according to public broadcaster NRK.

earlier related report
West pounds Libya, Kadhafi vows retaliation
Tripoli (AFP) March 20, 2011 - The US, Britain and France pounded Libya with Tomahawk missiles and air strikes into the early hours of Sunday, sparking fury from Moamer Kadhafi who declared the Mediterranean to be a "battlefield."

In the West's biggest intervention in the Arab world since the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq, launched exactly eight years earlier, US warships and a British submarine fired at least 110 Tomahawk cruise missiles into Libya on Saturday, the US military said.

A defiant Kadhafi said on Sunday in a radio address that all Libyans were armed and ready to fight until victory to defeat what Libya has branded a "barbaric aggression."

US President Barack Obama said the "Odyssey Dawn" operation launched under a UN Security Council resolution was a "limited military action," unlike the regime change carried out in the war against Iraqi president Saddam Hussein.

With the resolution backed by the Arab League, Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassem al-Thani defended his country's participation in the strikes on member state Libya, saying the sole aim was to "stop the bloodbath."

The air strikes came to a halt in both Tripoli and around the rebel bastion of Benghazi came to a halt early on Sunday, AFP journalists in the cities said. Residents who had fled were seen returning to the rebels' capital of Benghazi.

The Mediterranean city, where a semblance of normality returned with cars out on the road and street markets reopened, was still in rebel hands and Kadhafi forces were believed to be stationed on the outskirts.

Admiral William Gortney told reporters at the Pentagon that the cruise missiles "struck more than 20 integrated air defence systems and other air defence facilities ashore."

The barrage came two days after Security Council Resolution 1973 passed with Arab backing authorised military action to prevent Kadhafi's forces from attacking civilians amid an uprising against his 41-year autocratic rule.

An AFP correspondent said bombs were dropped earlier Sunday near Bab al-Aziziyah, Kadhafi's Tripoli headquarters, prompting barrages of anti-aircraft fire from Libyan forces that lasted about 40 minutes.

State television showed footage of hundreds of Kadhafi supporters who it said had gathered earlier to serve as human shields at Bab al-Aziziyah and at the capital's international airport.

A Libyan official told AFP at least 48 people had died and 150 were hurt -- mainly women and children -- in the assaults, which began with a strike at 1645 GMT on Saturday by a French warplane on a vehicle which the French military said belonged to pro-Kadhafi forces.

Libyan state media said Western warplanes had on Saturday night bombed civilian targets in Tripoli, causing casualties while an army spokesman said strikes also hit fuel tanks feeding the rebel-held city of Misrata, east of Tripoli.

Kadhafi, in a brief audio message on Saturday night also broadcast on state television, fiercely denounced the attacks as a "barbaric, unjustified Crusaders' aggression."

He vowed retaliatory strikes on military and civilian targets in the Mediterranean, which he said had been turned into a "real battlefield."

"Now the arms depots have been opened and all the Libyan people are being armed," to fight against Western forces, the veteran leader warned.

Libya's foreign ministry said that following the attacks, it regarded as invalid the UN resolution ordering a ceasefire by its forces and demanded an urgent meeting of the Security Council.

The attacks on Libya "threaten international peace and security," the ministry said.

"Libya demands an urgent meeting of the UN Security Council after the French-American-British aggression against Libya, an independent state member of the United Nations," it said.

On Thursday, the Security Council passed Resolution 1973, which authorised the use of "all necessary means" to protect civilians and enforce a ceasefire and no-fly zone against Kadhafi's forces.

The following day, Libya declared a ceasefire in its battle to crush an armed revolt against Kadhafi's regime which began on February 15 and said it had grounded its warplanes.

As a result of the Western attacks, however, "the effect of resolution 1973 imposing a no-fly zone are over," the ministry statement said.

State television, quoting a security official, said Libya had also decided to suspend cooperation with Europe in the fight against illegal immigration due to the attacks.

Boats carrying thousands of undocumented migrants, mainly Tunisians, have landed on the Italian island of Lampedusa in recent weeks putting a heavy strain on Italy's immigration infrastructure.

President Barack Obama, on a visit to Brazil, said the US operation dubbed "Odyssey Dawn" would exclude the use of American troops on the ground in Libya.

The first Tomahawk missile struck at 1900 GMT on Saturday after air strikes carried out earlier by French warplanes, said Admiral Gortney, director of the US joint staff.

"It's a first phase of a multi-phase operation" to enforce the UN resolution and prevent the Libyan regime from using force "against its own people," he said.

One British submarine joined with two American guided-missile destroyers, the USS Stout and the USS Barry, and three US subs, the USS Providence, the USS Scranton and USS Florida.

Gortney indicated the military would only be able to check on the effectiveness of the Tomahawk strikes at daylight on Sunday.

Russia expressed regret over the attacks and said Resolution 1973 was "adopted in haste," while the African Union, which opposed military action, on Sunday called for an "immediate stop" to all attacks.

China also voiced regret over the air strikes, saying it opposed the use of force in international relations.

Japan, however, said it backed the multinational action, urging Kadhafi to make a "prudent decision".

British Prime Minister David Cameron said he held Kadhafi responsible for the situation in his country.

"Tonight, British forces are in action over Libya. They are part of an international coalition that has come together to enforce the will of the United Nations and to protect the Libyan people," Cameron said in London late Saturday.

"We have all seen the appalling brutality that Colonel Kadhafi has meted out against his own people and far from introducing the ceasefire he spoke about he has actually stepped up the attacks and the brutality."

In the rebel camp, celebratory gunfire and honking of car horns broke out in Al-Marj, 100 kilometres (60 miles) from Benghazi, to welcome the start of military operations against Kadhafi, correspondents said.

Since Friday, Libya's has insisted it was observing a self-declared ceasefire. It said its armed forces had come under attack on Saturday west of Benghazi, including by rebel aircraft, and had responded in self-defence.

But the rebels, who have been trying to overthrow the Libyan leader for more than a month, said government troops had continued to bombard cities, violating the ceasefire continuously.

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