House Intel chairman: We shouldn't arm Libyan rebels

The U.S. shouldn't arm Libyan rebels because there's no telling whose hands those weapons could eventually reach, the chairman of the House Select Intelligence Committee said.

“As we publicly debate next steps on Libya, I do not support arming the Libyan rebels at this time," Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.) said in a statement Wednesday. "We need to understand more about the opposition before I would support passing out guns and advanced weapons to them. It’s safe to say what the rebels stand against, but we are a long way from an understanding of what they stand for."

Rogers said the weapons could eventually fall into "the hands of bad actors."

“We don’t have to look very far back in history to find examples of the unintended consequences of passing out advanced weapons to a group of fighters we didn’t know as well as we should have,” he said. “Even if you think you know them, you can’t guarantee that those weapons won’t later fall into the hands of bad actors.”

Obama administration officials have left open the possibility of arming the rebels, who are locked in a pitched battle against Col. Moammar Gadhafi.

"I'm not ruling it out. But I'm also not ruling it in," President Obama said in an interview on NBC News Tuesday night.