Observers said that foreign military action to halt Gaddafi’s brutal attacks on his people could include no-fly and no-drive zones, a maritime exclusion zone and the jamming of army communications.
Air strikes would almost certainly be launched to knock out Libyan radar and air defences.
Anticipating the UN Security Council’s vote on Thursday night, Gaddafi took to the airwaves to condemn any UN action as an act of “flagrant colonisation”.
He said: “This is craziness, madness, arrogance. If the world gets crazy with us we will get crazy too.
“We will respond. We will make their lives hell because they are making our lives hell. They will never have peace.”
In the House of Commons, the Prime Minister said Britain did not have a formal policy of seeking regime change in Libya.
But warning MPs of the dangers of leaving the dictator in place, Mr Cameron invoked the memory of the Lockerbie atrocity, when a Pan Am jet was bombed over Scotland in 1988, killing 270 people.
He said: “In this country in particular we know what Colonel Gaddafi is capable of, and we should not forget his support for the biggest terrorist atrocity on British soil.
“We simply cannot have a situation where a failed pariah state festers on Europe’s southern border, and that is why we are backing today our words with action.”
In the 1980s and 1990s, the Gaddafi regime was considered one of the most active state sponsors of terrorism in the world.
Following the September 11 attacks on the US in 2001, Gaddafi sought better relations with the West and was believed to have ended his support for terrorist activities.
But William Burns, the US Under-Secretary of State, this week warned the Senate that if Gaddafi survived the current challenge to his position, the West would face “considerable risks” including “the danger of him returning to terrorism”.
Charles Tannock MEP, the Tories’ foreign affairs spokesman in the European Parliament, said: “He cannot be left to revert to type, to support terrorism against the West, and to continue attacks against his own people. He and his sons must go now.”
In a speech to the Scottish Conservative conference in Perth yesterday, Mr Cameron said: “This is why we are acting, not just the moral duty to step in when a dictator starts killing his own people, not just the belief that a movement towards more open and democratic government in the Arab world will be good for the entire world.
“But the clear and hard-headed understanding that a stable Libya, free from Colonel Gaddafi’s brutality, is in Britain’s long-term interests too.”
US President Barack Obama last night said that the international community’s focus was on “protecting innocent civilians in Libya and holding Gaddafi accountable”.
He said the US was ready to take part in the military operation alongside the UK, France and its allies in the Arab world. He added: “Left unchecked, we have every reason to believe Gaddafi would commit atrocities against his people. Many thousands would die, a humanitarian crisis would ensue and the entire region could be destabilised.”
Last night RAF Tornado GR4s, Typhoon F2s and reconnaissance aircraft began leaving their bases in the UK for locations around the Mediterranean, with air strikes in Libya expected imminently.
It came as the Libyan government announced an immediate ceasefire in its offensive against rebels who have seized large areas of the country in a bid to oust Gaddafi from his 41-year rule. But despite the reported ceasefire, heavy fighting was continuing in many areas.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Gaddafi would need to prove he was implementing a ceasefire. “We are going to be not responsive or impressed by words,” she added.
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