The international effort against Libyan leader Muammar Gadafy is aimed at ousting him but will move "one step at a time", US secretary of state Hillary Clinton said today.
Mrs Clinton, facing doubts in Washington over new US involvement in a conflict shaking the Arab world, said the world had been left no choice but to take action and the first priority was to protect citizens.
"Colonel Gadafy's refusal to hear the repeated calls (and) up until now to halt violence against his own people has left us with no other choice but to pursue this course of action," she told reporters in Washington after a meeting with Minister for Foreign Affairs Eamon Gilmore.
The shift toward a tougher US stance in favour of military action followed an extended internal debate within the Obama administration over how to stop the Libyan leader from routing rebels fighting to end his four-decade rule.
Mrs Clinton poured cold water on Libya's ceasefire announcement after the UN Security Council authorised tough new actions against Col Gadafy's forces, and said the Libyan strongman should see the writing on the wall.
"We are going to be not responsive or impressed by words, we would have to see actions on the ground and that is not yet at all clear," Mrs Clinton said. "We will continue to work with our partners in the international community to press Gadafy to leave and to support the legitimate aspirations of the Libyan people."
President Barack Obama is to meet Democratic and Republican congressional leaders at the White House before making a statement this evening.
Mrs Clinton said the US and its partners would push first to secure the situation in the east of the country, where opposition forces headquartered in Benghazi have appealed for international help.
"The first and overwhelmingly urgent action is to end the violence," Mrs Clinton said.
But Mrs Clinton repeated that the overall goal was to remove Col Gadafy from power - a much trickier proposition that could involve politically difficult decisions regarding the scope of US military intervention. "It is important that we take this one step at a time," she said.