Why no thread on the French military intervention in Mali?

[MichaeltheGreat]

My money is on the French declaring victory in the next few months then going home while no sooner do they leave then the civil war restarts.

Yep. Insurgents have figured out that the way to win is to take the long view, and outlast external props for a regime.

[Dinner]

It will be interesting to see how do they act in the aftermath, at least retaking the towns was pretty painless, plus locals actually love them for a change.

Retaking the towns painlessly is part of the problem. The rebels still haven't been dealt with and instead they just ran back where they came from and will return as soon as the French leave.

[kentonio]

Maybe or maybe they won't. It's not always necessary to kill them all, making them lose hope can work just as well and at a much lower cost.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Not with radical Islamists. They believe it is their duty to impose their views of Islam and an Islamic caliphate. They can not quit, because that is tantamount to abandoning their faith, becoming apostates, etc. The "hired hands" can be demoralized, but they're usually desperate enough to work if they're still getting paid. The hardcore true believer will not stop until you get him closer to Allah.

[molly bloom]

If it wasn't for that ungrateful teenager, both you and the frogs would be speaking German now.

Mmm hmmm. Seems to me that the new United States relied an awful lot in the early/mid- 19th Century on the goodwill and the mere presence of the Royal Navy to deter any major European ventures in North America...


Have you read 'What If? America: Eminent Historians Imagine What Might Have Been' by Robert Cowley

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/search?index=books&linkCode=qs&keywords=0330427296

It's great fun.

Given English vocabulary in general is very French in origin, how can they be sure that the words are French military in origin and not just French root words.

I'd think they'd have thought of that, but I'd be interested if you have a link.

Erm, I just looked up a few of the terms in the etymological dictionary I have at home. I'm sure there must be a page or website dedicated to military terms and their origins. I suspect the reason that most of them are French in origin (rather than Anglicized Norman French) is the more pressing need for France to have a standing army (not having the security of the Channel) and the protracted combat of the Hundred Years' War with England. Given the off/on nature of the combat, and the presence for protracted periods of English armies in France, new terms could be easily picked up by the aristocrat leaders of the English.

I suspect the major break comes after Chaucer (who endured captivity in France) who preferred to use English rather than French. I know that a contemporary of his, John Gower used Latin, French and English when writing his poetry.

Then you have the invasions of Renaissance Italy, the Religious Wars, the Thirty Years' War, the wars of the reign of Louis XIV- which demand a fairly consistent level of innovation, both in armaments and supply and fortifcation/defensive measures.

Maybe but in both great wars if Germany won the more likely outcome would have been Britain coming to terms with Germany without anhiliation, the "save the silverware" outcome.

Saki wrote this : 'When William Came'

http://www.classicreader.com/book/2528/

about a German victory and a British monarchy ruling the empire from India.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Have you read 'What If? America: Eminent Historians Imagine What Might Have Been' by Robert Cowley

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/search?index=books&linkCode=qs&keywords=0330427296

It's great fun.

I haven't, but the cover illustration is classic, so it's on my must read list now.

[Dr Strangelove]

One that's the very definition of an ungrateful teenager...

IIRC when the doughboys landed in France in 1917 they cheerfully proclaime "Lafayette we are here!" So in a way it's a debt that was repaid. The first installment though came in 1794 in the form of over 100 shiploads of grain given to a republic that had still not recovered from the bad harvests that brought it to power.

[MichaeltheGreat]

[molly bloom]

Religion once again proves how destructive it is in the world.

There's a good little essay by Malise Ruthven called 'Radical Islam's Failure' which appeared in Prospect in July 2002:

The violence in Algeria, on the other hand, has yet to run its course. At
this time of writing, 25 nomads are reported massacred in a village west
of Algiers, a few hours before the incumbent National Liberation Front
(FLN) managed to get itself re-elected in a low turnout poil (46 per
cent), boycotted by the key opposition parties. Kepel traces the Algerian
conflict from the 1970s when the hike in oil revenues following the Yom
Kippur war enabled the FLN to “buy social pacification by subsidising
imported consumer goods.” When oil prices collapsed in 1986, half the
governments budget was wiped out. The gangs of “hittistes” (slang for
unemployed youth) were ripe for recruitment by the radical wing of the
Islamic Salvation Front (FIS), led by the populist preacher, Ali Benhadj.
The bazaar merchants of the “pious middle classes” were cultivated by
Benhadj’s co-leader, Abassi Madani, a university professor who impressed
them with his knowledge and style. Abassi reassured the traders that an
investment in the FIS would be the best guarantee for future business.
The alliance between the two wings of the FIS, however, was fragile, and
when the army intervened to prevent it from winning an outright majority
in the second round of the parliamentary elections in January 1992, the
FIS had already lost im votes compared with its performance in the
municipal elections the previous year, when it won control of a majority
of Algeria’s communes.

In any case, the middle classes were beginning to fear the real
possibility of an FIS regime. In the municipalities controlled by the
FIS, women were forcibly veiled, video stores, liquor shops and other
“immoral” establishments were closed. There was abundant testimony to
“the civic virtue of the elected FIS officials, in contrast to the
corruption, arbitrariness and inefficiency that had formerly prevailed.”
But what really worried the bazaaris was Benhadj’s attacks on France and
Algeria’s Francophone elite. The Islamist programme of Arabisation also
threatened the identity of the Berbers. This allowed the army to imprison
Benhadj and Abassi and to smash the moderate wing of the FIS without
encountering serious resistance from the middle classes.

The Islamic Salvation Army (AIS), the military wing of the FIS, and the
Armed Islamic Group (GIA), led by veterans from the jihad against
communism in Afghanistan, became involved in an increasingly violent war
of attrition against the government. But long before 11th September this
violence proved counter-productive. The fanaticism and brutality of the
“Arab-Afghans” spiralled out of control, with the export of terrorism to
France and racketeering and extortion by armed gangs at home. Torn by
personal and ideological feuds, the GIA eventually dissolved itself,
while the AIS (like most Egyptian jihadists) made a unilateral truce with
the state. The pious middle classes that used to support the FIS have
been appeased by the passage to a market economy.

The Afghan connection was part of the movement’s undoing, not just in
Algeria. With Serb aggression against Bosnia’s Muslims seen throughout
the Muslim world as a new crusade, the extension of the jihad from
Afghanistan to Bosnia was inevitable. But unlike in Afghanistan, the
rhetoric of jihad and the demand for an Islamic state cut no ice amongst
Bosnia’s secularised Muslims. The Dayton Accords integrated Bosnia into
the European sphere and with the forced departure of the Islamist
volunteers, the wider Islamic world lost any influence it might have over
Bosnia’s future.

The “blowback” thesis tracing the spread of Islamist terrorism to the CIA
and Saudi-hacked jihad against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan has been
thoroughly explored by Ahmed Rashid, John Cooley and others, and much of
the ground Kepel covers here is familiar.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/kmnu2000/message/5630

[PLATO]

Looks like the French are being very effective. Maybe we should have asked them to do Afghanostan and just paid them the $88 billion a year we are spending there.

PARIS (Reuters) - French forces searching for al Qaeda-linked militants in the hidden valleys of the remote north of Mali are now deep in the Islamists' sanctuary, France's defence minister said on Friday.

A day after a visit to Mali, Jean-Yves Le Drian said the current phase of the eight-week-old French-led offensive was the hardest, as it required winkling the Islamist fighters out of entrenched positions in the Adrar des Ifoghas mountains.

French soldiers killed about 15 militants this week after discovering a small army of jihadists in the Ametetai valley.

Some 30 French soldiers were wounded in the operation and a French national fighting for the Islamists was taken prisoner, Le Drian told Europe 1 radio on Friday.

"Now it's a bit more difficult because we're in the sanctuary," Le Drian said. "We knew this part of Mali was potentially the sanctuary of AQIM (al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb), and we weren't wrong."

"The search is continuing as of yesterday afternoon in the other valleys, because the whole territory has to be cleaned out completely."

The offensive, which began in January, has driven Islamist rebels from most of the swathe of northern Mali they had held since April, but has failed to eradicate pockets of resistance in mountain hideouts and around Gao, the region's largest town.

Le Drian said French forces had retrieved a "very impressive" weapons cache in the Ametetai valley, including heavy arms and material for improvised explosive devices and suicide bomb belts.

"We found them by the ton," Le Drian said. "I hadn't expected this to such an extent."

He said a Frenchman among prisoners taken during combat would soon be extradited to France.

He said French forces still had to clear out northeastern Mali and secure Gao before they can begin to scale back and hand over operations to African troops.

"We are on the right path but until the entire territory has been freed, I remain cautious," Le Drian said.

http://news.yahoo.com/french-army-mali-now-islamist-sanctuary-defence-minister-122708911.html

[Alexander's Horse]

The French have done good, played strong

The only way to deal with these Islamo-vermin is for everyone with a weak stomach to look away while those who can slaughter them

[DaShi]

The US did do well in Afghanistan until the Iraq War.

[Hauldren Collider]

Kudos to France They really know how to handle this ****.

[Sava]

they should make a fps where real people control robots and go around murdering islamic fundies

[Alfred Mondale]

Civilization,a game of much depth and intrigue. Long hours have I spent leading mynation to glory, long after the sun has gone down in the east. Now Ilook up, and what do I see? The abyss, nothing more can be said. Forwhen the founder Sid created this masterpiece, could even he foretellwhat was to come? I think not. Not even he had the foresight to seewhat he unleashed. My time has been spent and cannot by unspent. Butafter Isee the banners of MansaMasu flying inglory above the lustrous city of Paris,I regret not. For I have achieved my destiny, and my end.