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Area: WoT Operations    WoT Background    Non-WoT        Politix   
Mali and Niger forces retake Ansongo
Today's Headlines
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Page 6: Politix
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Africa North
U.S. military role in Mali not far off
Why, it's just around the corner...
The Obama administration's decision to give non-combat, air support to French forces trying to beat back Islamic militants who are threatening to overrun Mali, so far, hasn't caused much of a ripple among war-weary Americans.

But it should. Mali, a poor, landlocked nation, was considered a model African democracy
Tallest dwarf in the circus...
until its elected government was toppled last year in a coup led by a U.S.-trained Malian army captain.
Of course the U.S. training is to blame...
However, like the civilian leaders he deposed, Capt. Amadou Haya Sanogo failed to uproot the country's jihadists, who now control large swaths of the mostly desert nation.

Only the French intervention in its former colony has turned the tide in the battle for control of Mali, which shares its border with seven fragile African states that could easily be threatened if Mali fails to defeat its Islamic militants.
They could be easily threatened if Mali succeeds in defeating its Islamic militants...
Many of these fighters were once mercenaries in the pay of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi. When Gadhafi's regime was toppled in a popular uprising that received significant military and financial assistance from a U.S.-led coalition, they returned to Mali, heavily armed and champing at the bit to overrun its American-backed government.
Too bad we didn't think that one through and put a premium on whacking Daffy's hard boyz early in that conflict.
Though France has blunted that effort, it doesn't have the military resources to sustain its fight against Mali's jihadists without help from the U.S. military.
This is what happens when you neglect your military in favor of free health care for about four decades or so...
For now, that amounts to the use of giant transport planes to ferry French troops into Mali, and planes to refuel French combat aircrafts that are pummeling the militants' positions.
This point is sad: big transport planes are moderately expensive as far as military equipment goes, but France knows how to build them. It is, after all, the home of the Airbus assembly plant. France could build tanker aircraft. It wouldn't need many for what it might need to do, but it needs a few. They didn't do even that, and now they have to ask us for help. It has to gall them.
But that might not be enough. As recent events have shown, Northern Africa has become an expanding battleground for jihadists groups with links to al-Qaeda. The attack on the U.S. Consulate in the Libyan port city of Benghazi, which took the lives of U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans, was the work of Islamic militants.
Oh, so it wasn't a cheesy video, was it...
So was the botched takeover of a natural gas production plant in the Algerian desert that took the lives of three Americans and 35 other foreign workers.

"Those who sow the wind, reap the whirlwind," said Charles Stith, a former U.S. ambassador to Tanzania, of the widening attacks by Islamic militants in Northern Africa.

"In our exuberance to depose the Libyan despot, Gadhafi, we didn't think through the potential bad consequences," said Stith, director of the African Presidential Center at Boston University, who is in regular contact with African leaders. "Gadhafi was only able to stay in power as long as he did because of the mercenary force he mobilized. It was clear to many folks in Africa that once he was gone, they would go somewhere else on the continent."
That's right, we should have considered that better -- that's one of the reasons why we employ a DIA, CIA, and director of national intelligence, I'm told.
In the end, a multinational air campaign destroyed much of Gadhafi's military hardware and demoralized his troops, who eventually were overrun by rebel forces.
Getting rid of Daffy was still the right thing to do -- he was a thug and a monster, and his kids, especially Seif, were worse.
The U.S. has tried to counter the actions of Islamic militants in Mali by pressing African nations within its sphere of influence to create a multinational military force to combat such threats. And while several of these countries have agreed to send troops to Mali, they lack the military capability to do much more than garrison towns regained by French forces.
It's not like Niger or Benin can build transport aircraft...
The tougher job of hunting down and destroying the Islamic militants will be left to the French -- a fight they cannot sustain without a growing demand for help from the American military. For now, that doesn't involve U.S. combat troops fighter aircraft. But if, as I suspect is likely, other al-Qaeda-linked groups in the region step up their efforts to strike blows in support of their comrades in Mali, the U.S. will not be able to avoid a bigger military involvement.
Remember when the French helped us remove Saddam? Yeah, me too...
Given the large numbers of countries at risk if the conflict in Mali spreads beyond its borders, the demand for the U.S. to do at least as much to save its friends in this region, as it did to topple Gadhafi, will be hard to ignore.
Ev'rybody runs to Uncle Sugar when they need help...
Posted by: Steve White || 01/30/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || [336120 views] Top|| File under:

#1  It looks like USAF and USN will be conducting air strikes in Africa for a while yet. We're about to become the air force of choice for pro-Western African nations.
Posted by: Zhang Fei || 01/30/2013 15:42 Comments || Top||

#2  Please keep in mind, the administration's slaying of non-westerners must be done remotely, or through the use of surrogates.
Posted by: Besoeker || 01/30/2013 16:33 Comments || Top||

#3  through the use of surrogates.

Surrogates work cheap.
Posted by: Zhang Fei || 01/30/2013 21:09 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Culture Wars
Did Baltzer BS?
Anna Baltzer, who I have mentioned on Israellycool before, is not your typical BDShole, for the sole reason that she’s aesthetically pleasing.

And while she looks good in makeup, important parts of her bio are apparently made up.

Lee Kaplan explains (while acknowledging her physical beauty in the first sentence):
Posted by: tipper || 01/30/2013 15:19 || Comments || Link || [336113 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Amalekite whore.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 01/30/2013 16:31 Comments || Top||

#2  Well g(r)om, at least her records appear to have been made available for review.
Posted by: Besoeker || 01/30/2013 16:40 Comments || Top||

#3  Amalekite whore.

There's an insult you don't see every day...
Posted by: Steve White || 01/30/2013 18:12 Comments || Top||

#4  *golf clap*, grom. ;-p
Posted by: Barbara || 01/30/2013 18:21 Comments || Top||

#5  Let this be a warning unto you: if you must falsify your background, keep your lies small and not easily checked.
Posted by: trailing wife || 01/30/2013 21:19 Comments || Top||



Who's in the News
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4Govt of Pakistan
2Salafists
1Govt of Iraq
1al-Shabaab
1Houthis
1Jamaat-e-Islami
1Lashkar-e-Islami

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Two weeks of WOT
Wed 2013-01-30
  Mali and Niger forces retake Ansongo
Tue 2013-01-29
  Sahel jihadist groups splinter
Mon 2013-01-28
  Timbuktu mayor: Mali rebels torched library of historic manuscripts
Sun 2013-01-27
  French and Malian troops begin restoring control in Timbuktu
Sat 2013-01-26
  Green-on-green clash in Khyber tribal region kills 32
Fri 2013-01-25
  AQAP #2 killed for the THIRD time in Yemen
Thu 2013-01-24
  US drone strike near Sanaa kills 7 hard boyz
Wed 2013-01-23
  Nuristan Airstrike Kills 14 Insurgents
Tue 2013-01-22
  French seize control of Diabaly, Douentza
Mon 2013-01-21
  Nigeria: Gunmen attack Kano emir's convoy
Sun 2013-01-20
  Algeria crisis: Hostage-takers 'taken alive' at gas plant
Sat 2013-01-19
  Boko Haram leader Shekau shot, escapes to Mali
Fri 2013-01-18
  1,400 French soldiers in Mali for ground assaults: minister
Thu 2013-01-17
  41 snatched by AQIM in Algeria gas plant attack
Wed 2013-01-16
  France deploys armoured vehicles towards northern Mali

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