The American victims of several terror attacks perpetrated by the regime of deposed Libyan leader Muammar al-Qaddafi are asking the State Department to break off some of Qaddafi's frozen assets and give it to them.

There are about $37 billion of frozen Libyan assets in the United States, some of which were Libyan government funds and some of which were the personal fortune of Qaddafi and his family. When Qaddafi made nice with President George W. Bush's administration, he agreed to pay the U.S. victims of his crimes $1.5 billion in restitution. But now, those victims are saying that isn't enough money to cover the cost of what they were promised, and they want the Obama administration to divert more funds to make up the difference.

"The State Department under President Bush didn't get enough money from Qaddafi to pay the awards. They are likely $200 million to $400 million short," Stuart Newberger, the lead attorney for victims of UTA flight 772, told The Cable. UTA 772 exploded in 1989 over the Sahara desert, killing 171 people, including 7 Americans, one of whom was Bonnie Pugh, wife of the U.S. ambassador to Chad, Robert Pugh. High-ranking members of the Qaddafi regime were implicated in the attack.

The families of the UTA 772 victims, like those of several other Qaddafi attacks, were engaged in litigation against Qaddafi before the State Department made a deal to settle all claims for $1.5 billion. The State Department transferred responsibility for doling out the money to a foreign claims settlement commission run by the Treasury Department in 2008, and dozens of victims are still waiting for their payments.

The victims are entitled to specific awards - such as $10 million if a family member died and $3 million if a family member suffered a severe injury - but their advocates always suspected that the $1.5 billion wasn't enough to cover the awards promised. They also said the State Department underestimated the number of victims of Qaddafi's crimes.

"The issue is how to make sure the awards are paid in full, the way the State Department and the Bush administration intended," said Newberger. "What we want is either the president, the secretary of state, or the Congress to use a very small portion of the frozen Qaddafi assets to be applied to make sure there is no shortfall.  Otherwise, these American victims of Qaddafi's terrorism will get much less than was recommended."

Six members of Congress today asked Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to do just that, in a letter obtained exclusively by The Cable.

"We are concerned that the amount of money not yet distributed from the $1.5 billion Libya Claims Program...may be insufficient to fairly compensate some victims," said the letter, spearheaded by Pedro Pierluisi, Puerto Rico's representative in Congress.

Other signers of the letter were Robert Hurt (R-VA), Eliot Engel (D-NY), Michael Grimm (R-NY), Mario Diaz-Balart (R-FL), and Jean Schmidt (R-OH). They want the State Department to confirm that there will be a shortfall, explain what they plan to do about it, and detail any legal obstacles to using the frozen Qaddafi funds.

The victims and their advocates became especially worried when several victims received a letter on Aug. 25 from the Treasury Department stating that some victims would only be given 20 percent of the money they were promised.

"Treasury is prepared to make an initial payment of $1,000. Treasury is further prepared to make a partial, pro-rata distribution totaling 20% of the unpaid balance that remains on your award," stated the letter, also obtained by The Cable.

Newberger said that paying pro-rata portions is a clear indication that the Treasury is aware there is not enough money in the fund to pay the victims. But he also acknowledged that the administration may not be able to peel off Qaddafi funds for the victims without some backing from Capitol Hill.

"The president probably only has limited legal authority for transferring some of this money," he said. "To make his authority stronger under U.S. law, he really needs Congress to pass a law. If the Congress does that, the president is in a much safer and stronger legal position."

In fact, Sens. Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Johnny Isaakson (R-GA) were able to add an amendment to Sen. John Kerry's bill to authorize the Libya war that directed the administration to use the frozen funds to pay victims. But now that the war is mostly over, that bill has little chance of reaching the Senate floor, much less Obama's desk.

For the administration, it's a no-win situation. If it tries to take the money from the frozen funds, it risks upsetting the Libyan National Transitional Council, which thinks it should decide how to spend Qaddafi's money. If it doesn't act, it could appear to be abandoning the victims of Libya terrorism in the United States.

"They've been very careful not to take a position on this," Newberger said.

The State and Treasury Departments did not respond to requests for comment by deadline.

The victims involved in this effort include those who were part of several Qaddafi-inspired attacks in addition to the 1988 bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie and the bombing of UTA flight 772. They include:

• The 1972 Lod Airport attack in Tel Aviv, where 16 Americans were killed, all from Puerto Rico
• The 1983 car bombing in London, which killed one American and injured several others
• The 1984 and 1985 kidnappings and killings of Peter Kilburn and Alec Collett in London
• The 1985 hijacking of Egypt Air flight 648, where two Americans were killed
• The 1986 hijacking of Pan Am flight 73, where 3 Americans were killed and dozens wounded
• The 1987 detention of one American on the yacht Carin II

Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) is calling for a halt to U.S. aid to the new Libyan government if it refuses to re-arrest Abdel Baset al-Megrahi, who was convicted of planning the 1998 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland.

Schumer sent a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton today calling on the State Department not to help the National Transitional Council (NTC) -- which is struggling to stand up a government in the wake of the fall of Muammar al-Qaddafi -- with either direct aid or by giving them access to frozen Qaddafi funds, unless it jails Megrahi.

"If the new Libyan government continues to shield this convicted terrorist from justice, then they should not get one more cent of support from the United States," said Schumer. "We put American lives and money on the line to help the Libyan people secure their freedom. It's time the Libyan government lives up to its commitment to create a free and accountable society by handing over al-Megrahi so that justice can finally be done."

Megrahi was released by the Scottish government in 2009 on compassionate grounds, because he was supposedly dying of cancer. He enjoyed a hero's welcome when he returned to Libya and has since stubbornly refused to die on schedule. Since the fall of Qaddafi, Schumer, along with several other senators and GOP presidential candidates, have been calling on the NTC to lock him up.

Mohammed al-Alagi, the NTC justice minister, said on Monday that the senators' request had "no meaning" and that the new Libyan government had no intention of extraditing Megrahi to the United States or anywhere else.

CNN's Nic Robertson actually found Megrahi and visited him in his Tripoli home this week, where he appeared to be slipping in and out of a coma and near death. But Schumer doesn't believe the video or the NTC's claims that Megrahi really is going to die soon.

"This would not be the first time that Libyan officials claimed al-Megrahi was in a ‘near death' state. The American people deserve more verification than the word of local Libyan officials," he said. "There is no justifiable basis for the rebels' decision to shield this convicted terrorist."

Clinton travels to Paris on Thursday for a ministers-level meeting of the Libya Contact Group. The State Department won't say whether it will press the NTC on the issue but the Justice Department maintains that the Lockerbie investigation is still open and active.

Full text of Schumer's letter after the jump:

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Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) denied that he promised to help Libyan leader Muammar al-Qaddafi buy U.S. weapons in a late-night tent meeting between the two statesmen in 2009, as a WikiLeaked diplomatic cable implied.

"It's just outrageous," McCain told The Cable in an exclusive interview. McCain said that he never indicated to Qaddafi that he would help him get weapons in any way. "Of course not, that would have been ridiculous," he said.

The specific allegation made in the diplomatic cable sent by Joan Polaschik, the top U.S. diplomat at the U.S. Embassy in Tripoli at the time, was that McCain had agreed to push Congress to allow the delivery of eight C-130 Hercules military transport planes that Qaddafi had purchased in 1972 but are still sitting in limbo at Dobbins Air Reserve Base.

Prior to sending her report on the meeting back to Washington, Polaschik said she did not have the opportunity to clear her cable with McCain and the rest of the delegation: Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), Joe Lieberman (I-CT), and Susan Collins (R-ME), as is the custom with such reports.

Polaschik was at the meeting, but McCain denied Polaschik's account and gave a different version of his conversation with Qaddafi on that topic.

"[Qaddafi] asked me, 'Well, we'd like to get our C-130 upgrades.' I said, 'Well, that's what you want,' but I was noncommittal," McCain said. "I said, 'I understand that's your need,' but I never said anything and I never did a single thing to follow up."

"I knew his record and I'm certain that Collins, Lieberman, and Graham would corroborate my version of events," McCain said.

The State Department did not respond to requests for comment on McCain's remarks.

So why would the head of the U.S. Embassy write a cable claiming that progress had been made on selling weapons to Qaddafi?

"At that time, the embassy was very interested in having a relationship with Qaddafi, but I can't imagine why that diplomat said the things they said. It's beyond me," McCain said.

He also said that the embassy asked him not to raise the case of the Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, who was about to be released by Scottish authorities. McCain ignored that request, however, and raised the issue of Megrahi with both Qaddafi and his son, Mutassim al-Qaddafi.

McCain also wanted to explain to The Cable his now infamous Aug. 15, 2009, tweet, in which he wrote, "Late evening with Col. Qadhafi at his 'ranch' in Libya - interesting meeting with an interesting man."

"I thought it was interesting because I thought it was bizarre," McCain explained.

The entire experience was strange, McCain said, because the Libyans had postponed the senators' 4 p.m. meeting until 10 p.m. and then drove them out to the desert, where they spent most of their time interacting with Mutassim.

When Col. Qaddafi finally came out, he looked as if he had been sleeping and said several things that McCain said he found strange.

"One of the things he said to me was, 'If you had pulled all the troops out of Iraq, you would be president of the United States.' I've thought of a lot of reasons why I'm not president, but that wasn't one of them," McCain said.

"Overall, I thought it was a very strange and bizarre experience."

The cable was first released and reported on in May, but resurfaced in several news stories following Qaddafi's fall.

This week's toppling of the Qaddafi regime in Libya shows that the Obama administration's multilateral and light-footprint approach to regime change is more effective than the troop-heavy occupation-style approach used by the George W. Bush administration in Iraq and Afghanistan, a top White House official told Foreign Policy today in a wide-ranging interview.

"The fact that it is Libyans marching into Tripoli not only provides a basis of legitimacy for this but also will provide contrast to situations when the foreign government is the occupier," said Ben Rhodes, deputy national security advisor for communications, in an exclusive interview on Wednesday with FP. "While there will be huge challenges ahead, one of the positive aspects here is that the Libyans are the ones who are undertaking the regime change and the ones leading the transition."

Despite criticism from Congress and elsewhere, President Barack Obama's strategy for the military intervention in Libya will not only result in a better outcome in Libya but also will form the basis of Obama's preferred model for any future military interventions, Rhodes said.

"There are two principles that the president stressed at the outset [of the Libya intervention] that have borne out in our approach. The first is that we believe that it's far more legitimate and effective for regime change to be pursued by an indigenous political movement than by the United States or foreign powers," said Rhodes. "Secondly, we put an emphasis on burden sharing, so that the U.S. wasn't bearing the brunt of the burden and so that you had not just international support for the effort, but also meaningful international contributions."

Rhodes said that the United States is not going to be able to replicate the exact same approach to intervention in other countries, but identified the two core principles of relying on indigenous forces and burden sharing as "characteristics of how the president approaches foreign policy and military intervention."

Rhodes also weighed in on several other aspects of the Libya saga:

• Rhodes confirmed the comments by U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice on Tuesday that the TNC can choose whether to prosecute Muammar al-Qaddafi themselves or hand him over to the International Criminal Court, which has indicted him on war crimes. ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo, however, has argued that the decision is not up to the Libyans.
• "We believe it's something that the Libyans and the [Transitional National Coalition], were they to capture Qaddafi, would then be in charge of, in consultation with the ICC," said Rhodes. "Were he to go to any third country, they would have an obligation to turn him over to the ICC."
• On the role of the NATO operation in Libya, Rhodes said the civilian protection mission continues but that consultation will soon begin in Brussels on the conclusion of the mission. The need for the NATO protection mission is still present for now, Rhodes said, but the White House doesn't anticipate the TNC requesting a peacekeeping force from NATO or the United Nations that involves any foreign boots on the ground. "There's no plan for that type of effort," he said.
• Rhodes said the drive to release between $1 billion and $1.5 billion of Qaddafi's frozen assets to the TNC is moving along quickly. "We think that should be complete in the next few days and we don't foresee an insurmountable problem there," he said. The Obama administration feels confident the TNC can manage the money and prevent it from being stolen or funneled to unsavory actors. The administration will also try to ensure the money goes to the urgent needs identified by the TNC.
• Rhodes also addressed the effects the developments in Libya may have on Syria, saying that "it sends a message to Damascus that a crackdown of the sort that Qaddafi and [Syrian President Bashar al-] Assad have pursued is not a means of maintaining legitimacy and staying in power in the long run."
• Rhodes said that a transition to democracy in Syria is in the U.S. national interest, and would weaken Iran's ability to influence regional events. "The Iranians have suggested that the Arab Spring was somehow a positive development for Tehran, the fact you see their principal ally in the region having completely lost legitimacy... would be a blow to Iran," he said. But he emphasized that the administration does not see a military intervention in Syria as the right step.
• On the fate of Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset Mohmed Ali al-Megrahi, who senior lawmakers and GOP presidential candidates said on Tuesday should be re-arrested and extradited to the United States, Rhodes said the extradition issue was a legal question for the Justice Department, "but the president never thought he should have been released in the first place ... so that continues to be our view."

Good afternoon, everybody. I just completed a call with my National Security Council on the situation in Libya. And earlier today, I spoke to Prime Minister Cameron about the extraordinary events taking place there. The situation is still very fluid. There remains a degree of uncertainty, and there are still regime elements who pose a threat.

But this much is clear: The Gadhafi regime is coming to an end, and the future of Libya is in the hands of its people.

In just six months, the 42-year reign of Moammar Gadhafi has unraveled. Earlier this year, we were inspired by the peaceful protests that broke out across Libya. This basic and joyful longing for human freedom echoed the voices that we had heard all across the region, from Tunis to Cairo.

Read on

Now that the Libyan rebel movement, led by the Transitional National Council (TNC), appears to be taking over Tripoli, their need for access to the frozen billions of dollars of Qaddafi assets is even more urgent, the TNC's top representative in Washington told The Cable today.

Ali Aujali, the former ambassador for Qaddafi who defected in March and now serves as the charge d'affaires at the rebel-controlled embassy in Washington, said that the TNC's long struggle for control over the funds that were frozen by U.N. Security Council resolutions and U.S. executive orders must be overcome for the rebels to assert control in Tripoli.

"The immediate next step is to get Qaddafi, that's number one. Number two, we need money. The third thing is that TNC will move to Tripoli as soon as it's a secure place," Aujali said. "We need this money, because we need to supply food, we need medical treatment for our injured, we need to pay salaries, we need to run facilities."

For more than three weeks, the U.N. sanctions committee has been considering whether to unfreeze some of the estimated tens of billions of dollars in frozen Libya assets. But Aujali said it is the position of the TNC that it does not need the approval of the sanctions committee to access the funds.

"I don't think we need sanctions committee authorization because the TNC will inherit the regime," he said. The U.N. has not officially recognized the TNC as the government of Libya.

But don't expect the TNC to keep the institutions of the Qaddafi regime intact. Aujali said that the institutions of the Libya state were so corrupted and so controlled by the Qaddafi family that they are of little use in the new Libya.

"All the institutions are to serve Qaddafi and his Green Book. We need to build everything from zero: democratic institutions, civil society, government organizations. Everything was controlled by Qaddafi and his sons," he said.

While the exact schedule has not been set, Aujali's understanding is that, after the TNC moves to Tripoli, it will set up a conference to draft a new constitution, which will then be approved or rejected by the Libyan people in a referendum. He said the TNC would then start to organize elections, a process he predicted could take about eight months.

Aujali said the TNC was committed to preventing retribution on the ground in Tripoli and upholding the ideals of inclusiveness and respect for the rule of law. He implored the U.S. government to increase its coordination and support for the rebels.

"I want the administration to unfreeze the frozen money, to commit to support the Libyan people, to interact with the TNC as much as they can, and to keep the NATO mission action until the threat of Qaddafi is no more," he said.

Aujali said that he hasn't been in regular contact with the State Department over the weekend, because he's been focusing on following the events on the ground in Tripoli. But CNN reported that Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Jeffrey Feltman, who is in Cairo and was recently in Benghazi, was contacted by Qaddafi regime officials as recently as Saturday.

"I think they were looking for a way to find a lifeline, buy time, to prevent what was then becoming inevitable, which was the uprising in Tripoli," he said.

In an interview with ABC News Monday morning, Feltman said that it was clear the rebels were winning that that he didn't think a violent unraveling of the security situation was likely in Libya, as happened in Baghdad when Iraqi President Saddam Hussein fell.

"A lot of that sectarian mix that existed in Saddam Hussein's Iraq doesn't exist here in Libya," Feltman said. He also said that "the overwhelming vision that we are hearing" from people across Libya is that "they want a Libya that is moderate, that is secular."

Anthony Cordesman, senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said on Monday that the Obama administration needs to develop an aggressive yet nuanced plan to increase U.S. involvement and aid in Libya to support the TNC, while at the same time not giving the impression that Western ideas were being imposed there.

"Bad as our current economic problems are, it would be incredibly foolish not to offer aid to Libya (and Egypt, Tunisia, and any other states caught up in this wave of change.)," he said. "Failing to provide that aid will not simply be penny wise and pound foolish; the price of such a U.S failure will eventually be paid in U.S. and allied blood."

Only one day after extending diplomatic recognition to the Libyan rebels, three top Obama administration officials met with representatives of the Qaddafi regime in Tunisia, a State Department official confirmed.

Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Jeffrey Feltman, U.S. Ambassador to Libya Gene Cretz, and National Security Staff Senior Director for Strategic Planning Derek Chollet met with as-yet unidentified Qaddafi representatives on Sunday, the official told reporters via e-mail late Monday afternoon but only to make sure they understood the U.S. position that Qaddafi must go.

"We had heard frequently from senior Libyan officials who evinced a sense that U.S. was in different place from others," the official wrote, adding that the officials "wanted to send a crystal clear message face to face" that there was no room for negotiation over that one point.

Because the information was sent to reporters over e-mail, there was no opportunity to ask follow up questions, such as whether any other negotiations regarding the war in Libya were discussed. Several requests for additional comment from the State Department and the National Security Staff were declined.

But, according to the official, if the goal of the meeting really was to convey to that Qaddafi must go, it was a success.

"Based on feedback from others who spoke to the Qadhafi officials, the United States' message was received," the official wrote, adding that other allies as well as the newly-recognized Transitional National Council were consulted about the meeting.

And don't expect this to be the start of a process.

"We support the United Nations channel and there will be no U.S. channel," the official said. "This was a one-time occurrence."

In another statement, delivered to reporters in New Delhi, where Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is traveling, the official elaborated a bit further.

The meeting was held "to deliver a clear and firm message that the only way to move forward is for Gaddafi to step down," the official said. "This was not a negotiation. It was the delivery of a message."

UPDATE: An administration official responded to The Cable's requests late Monday evening and said the meeting was around 3 hours long and was initiated from the U.S. side.

"Did we set it up, sure. We wanted to go deliver this message," the official said. "We decided that it would be a good idea to make clear that it very clear, face to face, in an unambiguous way, that we support the U.N. channel and they won't get another track out of us." 

The Senate indefinitely delayed its plan to debate the war in Libya on Tuesday, with Republicans decrying the very fact that the topic was on the table in the first place.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) cancelled the Senate's July 4 recess after President Barack Obama taunted lawmakers for leaving town while the country careens toward a fiscal crisis due to the lack of a deal over how to raise the debt ceiling. But since there's no progress on that front, Reid brought up the Kerry-McCain resolution to authorize Obama's military intervention in Libya.

But several senior Republicans took to the floor on Tuesday afternoon to object to debating the Libya mission at all and pledged to vote no on moving to debate the war -- arguing that the budget crisis was more pressing. Sensing that the vote was doomed to fail, Reid pulled the measure off the floor.

"Just to speak to how dysfunctional the U.S. senate is, we're here over the debt ceiling, but instead of focusing on the issue at hand, we're going to focus on something that's irrelevant possibly and has nothing to do with why we're here," Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN), said on the Senate floor on Tuesday afternoon. "Let's not take up an issue that will have no effect on and has nothing to do with the debt ceiling, and take on those issues that will."

Corker is a senior member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Several other key Republicans, such as Senate Armed Services Committee members Robert Wicker (R-MS) and Jeff Sessions (R-AL), promised to vote no on cloture, arguing not the merits of the war but rather the need to move immediately to budget matters.

The Senate has avoided a full vote on the Libya war for over three months and the complicated politics of the issue have placed both Republicans and Democrats in an uncomfortable position. For Democrats, they are being pressed by the administration to back the president's decision. Voting no risks the ire of the White House. But if they vote yes, their constituencies may fault them for supporting yet another war with an uncertain timeframe and costs.

For Republicans, voting no would risk ceding the national security high ground to a Democratic president; voting yes would put them on record pledging more American treasure to yet another unpopular and expensive foreign intervention.

Before Reid pulled the measure, several other senators were also set to vote no on debating the Libya war tonight based on their opposition to the mission or their anger at the president for not properly consulting Congress before attacking. Senators opposed to the Libya war overall include Sens. Jim Webb (D-VA), Ron Paul (R-KY), and Senate Foreign Relations Committee ranking Republican Richard Lugar (R-IN).

In his own floor speech on Thursday, Lugar objected to authorizing the Libya mission based on the cost and his dissatisfaction with the administration's justifications.

"American intervention in Libya did not come as a result of a disciplined assessment of our vital interests or an authorization debate in Congress," Lugar said. "A civil war in Libya is not a priority that required American military and economic investments. It is an expensive diversion that leaves the United States and our European allies with fewer assets to respond to other contingencies."

Lugar maintains that the War Powers Resolution does apply to the mission in Libya, despite the administration's claim there are no "hostilities" going on there, and he continues to demand clearer explanations of the mission's objectives, timelines, and costs.

"Even if one believes that the president somehow had the legal authority to initiate and continue U.S. military operations in Libya, it does not mean that going to war without Congress was either wise or helpful to the operation," Lugar said. "There was no good reason why President Obama should have failed to seek congressional authorization to go to war in Libya."

The House already rejected a similar measure to authorize the Libya war by a 123 to 295 vote on June 24. The House also narrowly rejected a motion to largely defund the mission, but that measure would have passed if not for some lawmakers' belief that it constituted a backdoor authorization for the war.

If today's vote had passed with 60 yes votes, a full debate over the war would have immediately followed, setting up a final vote on the Kerry-McCain resolution on Thursday afternoon.

But now, the Libya war debate will be shelved in the Senate until Reid brings it up again, probably after the debt ceiling deadline of Aug. 2, and perhaps much later. Our Hill sources tell us they expect the any further senate debate over Libya to be postponed until after the August congressional recess.

Following the House of Representatives' stunning rebuke of the Obama administration's intervention in Libya last Friday, the Senate will weigh in tomorrow with a host of new proposed restrictions on President Barack Obama's war authorities.

The House voted overwhelmingly Friday not to authorize the Libya intervention and then narrowly rejected a measure that would have cut off most of the funding for the mission. A majority of lawmakers wanted to cut off the funds for Libya, but the vote failed because many congressmen believed that the bill, which left some of the funding in place, amounted to a "back door authorization" for the war.

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee will hold a hearing tomorrow with State Department Counselor Harold Koh to examine the administration's claim that the Libya war does not amount to "hostilities," and therefore does not require congressional authorization under the War Powers Resolution.

After the hearing, the committee will hold a business meeting to consider a bill by Chairman John Kerry (D-MA) and Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) that would authorize the Libya intervention. The committee could very well approve the bill, but not before several changes are made through amendments, most of them coming from ranking Republican Richard Lugar (R-IN).

"In this case, President Obama made a deliberate decision not to seek a Congressional authorization of his action, either before it commenced or during the last three months. This was a fundamental failure of leadership that placed expedience above Constitutional responsibility," Lugar will say at Tuesday's hearing, according to prepared remarks obtained by The Cable.

"At the outset of the conflict, the President asserted that U.S. military operations in Libya would be ‘limited in their nature, duration, and scope.' On this basis, the administration asserted that the actions did not require a declaration of war. Three months later, these assurances ring hollow," Lugar will say. "American and coalition military activities have expanded to an all but declared campaign to drive [Col. Muammar al] Qaddafi from power. The administration is unable to specify any applicable limits to the duration of the operations. And the scope has grown from efforts to protect civilians under imminent threat to obliterating Libya's military arsenal, command and control structure, and leadership apparatus." 

Expect Lugar and other senators to challenge Koh on evidence that he was previously a staunch critic of granting the president unilateral war-making authority before joining the Obama administration. Koh reportedly supported the argument that the Libya intervention fell short of "hostilities" during the intra-administration debate on the topic.

When the committee does take up the Kerry-McCain resolution, Lugar will lead off with five amendments -- to limit the funds to only truly supportive functions like refueling and intelligence support, prevent any funding for ground troops, require the president to report every 60 days on the costs and progress of the Libya war, make sure it's clear Congress won't pay for reconstruction, and finally, to establish that it's the Senate's view that the Libya war does include "hostilities" and does fall under the War Powers Resolution. 

Some or all of these could be approved by the committee, but the last one is almost sure to pass, given widespread congressional rejection of the administration's claim that legislative authorization is not required.

"You'll see overall consensus that their finding on a lack of ‘hostilities' doesn't stand," Lugar spokesman Mark Helmke told The Cable. "The overall mood is that you have to have authorization, and the question then is: Do enough Democrats feel comfortable with the other restrictions?" 

Inside the committee, three Democrats have expressed reservations about the Libya war and could join with Republicans to restrict the president's authorities: Sens. Jim Webb (D-VA), Barbara Boxer (D-CA), and new committee member Richard Durbin (D-IL).

Webb said on Sunday's Meet the Press that he would support Lugar's amendments, and he criticized the Libya mission harshly.

"The president did not come to the Congress, and the reasons that he used for going in defy historical precedent," Webb said. "We weren't under attack, we weren't under an imminent attack, we weren't honoring treaty commitments, we weren't rescuing Americans. So, on the one hand, there's a very serious issue of precedent here."

Boxer pressed Kerry during a back and forth on the Senate floor on June 22, pushing him to confirm that the Libya resolution would not authorize ground troops and would expire in one year. Durbin supports the Kerry-McCain resolution but does not agree with the administration's argument that congressional authorization is unnecessary.

There are several other amendments expected Tuesday. Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) has two amendments: one that would require the administration to seek reimbursement of the expenses of the mission from frozen Libyan assets and one that would require the administration to brief Congress every 15 days. Corker wants the authorization for the Libya war to expire after 6 months, as opposed to the 12 months granted under the Kerry-McCain measure.

Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ) will offer an amendment that would call for further action on the investigation of the bombing of Pan Am 103, which was conducted by members of the Qaddafi regime. Going against the grain, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) will offer three amendments: to require the president to consult Congress before deploying ground troops,  use the frozen assets to pay for U.S. operations, and clarify that Qaddafi's removal is the official policy of the U.S.

If and when SFRC finally approves the Kerry-McCain resolution to authorize the Libya war, that will mark the end of the Libya debate in the Senate for a while. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) is not expected to begin the full Senate floor debate until after the July 4 recess.

The top U.S. admiral involved in the Libya war admitted to a U.S. congressman that NATO forces are trying to kill Libyan leader Muammar al-Qaddafi. The same admiral also said he anticipated the need for ground troops in Libya after Qaddafi falls, according to the lawmaker.

House Armed Services Committee member Mike Turner (R-OH) told The Cable that U.S. Admiral Samuel Locklear, commander of the NATO Joint Operations Command in Naples, Italy, told him last month that NATO forces are actively targeting and trying to kill Qaddafi, despite the fact that the Obama administration continues to insist that "regime change" is not the goal and is not authorized by the U.N. mandate authorizing the war.

"The U.N. authorization had three components: blockade, no fly zone, and civil protection. And Admiral Locklear explained that the scope of civil protection was being interpreted to permit the removal of the chain of command of Qaddafi's military, which includes Qaddafi," Turner said. "He said that currently is the mission as NATO has defined."

"I believed that we were [targeting Qaddafi] but that confirmed it," Turner said. "I believe the scope that NATO is pursuing is beyond what is contemplated in civil protection, so they're exceeding the mission."

Later in the same briefing, Turner said, Locklear maintained that the NATO mission does not include regime change. "Well, certainly if you remove Qaddafi it will affect regime change," Turner said that he replied. "[Locklear] did not have an answer to that."

Locklear also said that, upon Qaddafi's removal, ground troops would be needed during the immediate period of instability, Turner said. In fact, Locklear said publicly that a "small force" might be necessary following the collapse of the Qaddafi regime in a May 30 conference in Varna, Bulgaria.

Turner joined hundreds of other lawmakers in voting against authorizing the Libya war on Friday morning. The authorization resolution was defeated 123 to 297. A subsequent vote on a bill to defund the Libya mission also failed 180-238 .

Turner has been opposed to the Libya war from the start and even introduced a resolution opposing the effort. For him, Friday's chaotic Libya debate was a direct result of the administration's neglect and disrespect of Congress throughout the debate over the mission.

"The president hasn't come to Congress and said any of this, and yet Admiral Locklear is pursuing the targeting of Qaddafi's regime, Qaddafi himself, and contemplating ground troops following Qaddafi's removal," Turner said. "They're not being straightforward with Congress... It's outrageous."

Ignoring Congress allowed the administration to ignore the large, looming questions about the Libya war that congressmen are asking -- especially today, as another vote to defund the mission looms before the House next month, when the defense appropriations bill is set to be debated. But if the House does vote to defund the mission, Turner said, Obama will have nobody to blame but himself.

"I believe that this administration has handled this so badly, that if they had come to Congress, I think they would have done more of their homework. They have not done a full assessment of their mission, its scope, or the consequences if they're successful. Congress would have required that," Turner said. "Now it's a little late."

The Libyan rebels are running out of money, but the Obama administration and Congress can't get their act together to provide urgently needed help to those fighting against Libyan leader Muammar al-Qaddafi, according to the rebel's top envoy in Washington.

In a nondescript office building in northwest Washington, Ali Aujali, the U.S. representative of Libya's Benghazi-based Transitional National Council (TNC), sits behind an empty desk in a bare office. Once Qaddafi's official ambassador, he defected to the rebels in February and stayed in Washington as their liaison with the U.S. government.

His singular mission in Washington is to convince the administration and Congress to give the rebels access to the frozen assets of the Qaddafi regime. Four months into his mission, he is baffled by the lack of progress.

"To tell you the truth, we are very frustrated by this," he said in an exclusive interview with The Cable. "The TNC is facing a challenge, not only from Qaddafi's forces who are killing people every day, but also domestically. They are running out of money, they need finances to help the Libyan people to support their families,"

"Libya is not begging anyone for charity, but they must have access to the Libyan people's money that's frozen in many countries," he said.

Meanwhile, on Capitol Hill, lawmakers debate whether the Libyan intervention is a violation of the War Powers Resolution, whether the president consulted Congress sufficiently, and whether the campaign is in the U.S. national interest. But for Aujali and the TNC, that debate is a distraction from the urgent mission of fighting Qaddafi and helping the Libyan people pursue semi-normal lives.

"Here in the U.S., there is a long debate going on, there are many resolutions coming and going. Time is a factor. We should not get lost in the bureaucracy or in political issues or in the election campaign. Human lives are in danger," he said.

Aujali said that the TNC is grateful for U.S. support, and American leadership in the Libya campaign remains critical. He continues to meet with U.S. officials and lawmakers, but he is not encouraged.

"I have no news, I have no timeframe, I have no promises. Every day we have another resolution, another amendment, and we are getting lost in this," he said. "The people in Libya have a limit to their patience with the TNC and we don't want people to turn against the TNC... This is a serious situation."

It's true that the Obama administration gave $25 million in non-lethal supplies to the rebels, but that's not a lot of money in the grand scheme of things. By way of comparison, it costs about $148 million per year to provide Libyan students enrolled in colleges in the United States and Canada with funds for textbooks and food, Aujali said.

Plus, the MREs, blankets, and other assistance that the United States has provided is not what the rebels need. They need weapons. Barring that, they need money to buy weapons.

"Qaddafi is not fighting the Libyan people with potatoes," Aujali said.

So what's the hold up? The TNC's prime minister, Mahmoud Jibril, came to Washington last month and held extensive discussions with the White House, the State Department, the Treasury Department, and several lawmakers. He pleaded for the administration to recognize the TNC as the official government of Libya, which would give them access to the billions in frozen assets.

But the Obama administration refuses to do that because, despite launching an air campaign targeting Qaddafi's military and command infrastructure, it hasn't actually abandoned recognition of his regime.

The only other way for the TNC to receive the money is for Congress to pass legislation enabling it to be released, but that process is mired in the legislative process, Aujali said.

For example, for the main bill that would allow about $10 billion of the frozen assets to be used for humanitarian assistance in Libya,  Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) offered an amendment that would require the U.S. to pay itself back for military operations first.  The bill also doesn't specify that the TNC would have a say in how the money is spent. Both of these issues are huge problems for the TNC.

"This is what Qaddafi is looking for," Aujali said. "This is very dangerous. This is what Qaddafi is telling people in speeches: ‘the West wants your money and your oil.' If this resolution passes, then Qaddafi has proof."

Aujali wants the United States to increase its involvement, attention, and international leadership in the Libya war, and he said that the international community has gone too far to stop now.

"We are grateful for the support, but we expect more. We need the U.S. to be more involved in the fight against Qaddafi," he said. "Congress has to understand that if this revolution does not succeed, that will be a great disaster.

He framed the Libyan struggle as part of the overall democratic revolution sweeping the Arab world, as President Obama did in his major speech last month.

"Washington must understand that if U.S. foreign policy is to help people to practice democracy, to observe human rights, and to have freedom of speech, than this is one pillar of that foreign policy," he said. "There are people rising against a dictatorship that has ruled them for 42 years and they need your help."

A war of words has erupted over the war in Libya between Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee's newest and most vocal Republican, Marco Rubio (R-FL).

The dispute started on Wednesday, when Rubio sent a letter to Reid regarding the forthcoming Senate resolution supporting President Barack Obama's decision to use force in Libya. In that letter, Reid and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) urged that any Libya resolution should include a clear statement that removing Libyan leader Col. Muammar al-Qaddafi from power is in the U.S. national interest, and that the Senate should authorize Obama to do so. Rubio also said the United States should recognize the Benghazi-based Interim Transitional National Council that represents the Libyan opposition, a step already taken by the French.

"As long as Qaddafi remains in power, he will be in a position to terrorize his own people and potentially the rest of the world," Rubio wrote. "The world is a better place when America is willing to lead. And American leadership is required now more than ever."

Of course, regime change is explicitly not covered in U.N. Security Council Resolution 1973, which authorized the international intervention in Libya, and Obama made it clear in his March 28 speech that he would not use military force to oust Qaddafi.

But Reid spokesman Jon Summers decided to go a few steps further than Obama in an interview with the Washington Post, when he said that Rubio "seems oblivious to the troops' lives his plan would put on the line."

"Moreover, he seems to have forgotten that the Libyan people have made it clear they don't want foreign boots on the ground," Summers said.

Rubio couldn't just let that go, and he fired off a response letter to Reid on Thursday, which stated, "My concern for the well-being of our troops is no less than yours. I am saddened you would suggest otherwise."

Reid's office said in the interview that Rubio's "rash suggestions could commit our troops irrevocably to a regime change and nation-building effort that could take months or years and cost billions of taxpayer dollars."

Rubio responded that the United States has already gone too far to stop now and the current mission to protect civilians is impossible as long as Qaddafi remains in power.

"The reality is that the U.S. has attacked a brutal dictator with a long history of brazen support for terrorism against Americans," Rubio said. "If he survives this international effort against him and remains in power, he will be emboldened and angry, and he will once again act against America's interests."

These two arguments could very well frame the debate when the Senate eventually takes up a resolution to express Congress's support for the war in Libya. Sens. John Kerry (D-MA), John McCain (R-AZ), and Joe Lieberman (I-CT) are working on a draft now.

McCain said he wants to make sure the resolution is made up of "language that can receive an overwhelming vote in the Senate. It would not be a good signal, otherwise."