Mali: AFRICOM, and the New
War on "Terror"
I wanted to start
a thread on the ominous developments going on in Africa, being closer to Europe
we can expect some "terror attacks", real or False Flags, followed by
more of our rights being taken away.
This seemed a good
one to get the ball rolling....
As French soldiers pour into Mali in the fight to push
back the advancing Islamist militants, questions have been raised as to the
motives behind the intervention. Author F. William Engdahl told RT the US was
using France as a scapegoat to save face.
RT: At a time when
France and the rest of the Eurozone are trying to weather the economic crisis,
what's Paris seeking to gain by getting involved in another conflict overseas?
F. William
Engdahl: Well, I think the intervention in Mali is another follow-up to the
French role in other destabilizations that we've seen, especially in Libya last
year with the toppling of the Gadhafi regime. In a sense this is French
neocolonialism in action.
But, interestingly
enough, I think behind the French intervention is the very strong hand of the
US Pentagon which has been preparing this partitioning of Mali, which it is now
looming to be, between northern Mali, where al-Qaeda and other terrorists are
supposedly the cause for French military intervention, andsouthern Mali, which
is a more agricultural region. Because in northern Mali recently there have
been huge finds of oil discovered, so that leads one to think that it's very
convenient that these armed rebels spill over the border from Libya last year
and just at the same time a US-trained military captain creates a coup d'�tat
in the Southern capital of Mali and installs a dictatorial regime against one
of Africa's few democratically elected presidents.
So this whole
thing bears the imprint of US AFRICOM [US Africa Command] and an attempt to
militarize the whole region and its resources. Mali is a strategic lynchpin in
that. It borders Algeria which is one of the top goals of these various NATO
interventions from France, the US and other sides. Mauritania, the Ivory Coast,
Guinea, Burkina Faso. All of this area is just swimming in untapped resources,
whether it be gold, manganese, copper.
RT: Why was France
the first Western country to get involved to such an extent? And what sort of
message is this military initiative sending to its allies?
FWE: Well I think
that's the Obama Administration's strategy -- let France take the hit on this
as they did in Libya and other places in the past year and-a-half and the US
will try and play a more discrete role in the background rather than being
upfront as they were in Iraq and Afghanistan which cost the US huge amounts of
credibility around the world. They're playing a little bit more of a sly game
here, but the rush for the US to announce its support the French military
intervention and the actions of AFRICOM over the past year and-a-half, two
years, in Mali make clear that this is a US operation with the French as a
junior partner.
RT: How far could
this conflict potentially escalate? Could the French get bogged down, and who
else is likely to get involved?
FWE: The other
European countries are loath to get involved in an Afghan-type ground situation
with their troops. The Germans are providing humanitarian aid and some special
forces training so far, but, frankly, I think al-Qaeda in northern Maghreb is a
very suspicious operation and the timing of its activities coming over the
border suggests that perhaps some NATO countries might be helping the al-Qaeda
group to get military weapons and create the casus belli that justifies NATO
intervention. I think we're seeing a very cynical game being played out here in
Mali and it's a very dangerous one when Africa is suddenly becoming a continent
that's been discovered by China, by the US and Europe and the rest of the world
as the next place where untold wealth and resources can be captured.
Originally aired
on RT, January 19, 2013
http://rt.com/news/mali-intervention...-conflict-303/
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