August 20–28, 2011
Operation Mermaid Dawn began on the night of August 20 with a coordinated rebel uprising inside Tripoli timed with an assault from the coast. NATO airstrikes pounded command posts while thousands of rebels and Misrata fighters poured into the capital. Within 72 hours, Gaddafi's compound at Bab al-Azizia fell and his sons were captured or fled. The Colonel himself vanished, and 42 years of his rule collapsed in barely a week of street fighting that left Tripoli battered but liberated.
Commanders