In reporting on the Fall of Tripoli, Reuters tells the inside story of Abdel Majid Mlegta, a caterer who supplied the victuals for Gaddafi’s regime. Putting key inside information on a series of memory sticks, this man was instrumental in bringing Gaddafi down.
In the days and weeks that followed the August 20th uprising, rebel forces were able to capture or topple many major operation rooms of Gaddafi’s forces. That information was collected by Mlegta, who had built up good relations with his superiors before defecting, and secretly leaked to NATO and rebel leaders on three flash drives. According to Reuters:
After presenting the rebels’ plan “from A to Z”, Mlegta handed NATO officials three memory cards: the one packed with information about regime strongholds in Tripoli; another with updated information on regime sites as well as details of 65 Gaddafi officers sympathetic to the rebels who had been secretly supplied with NATO radiophones; and a third which contained the plot to take Tripoli.
So confident were they in the revolution, that they didn’t even make the plot a secret. That plot would go on to be known as Operation: Mermaid Dawn. And they were ready. Follow Mlegta’s story and how it all went down on Reuters.
Photo: AP Photo/Balint Szlanko