Mali: This is What We've Done
This is the consequence of our intervention in Libya:
Mali's junta brushed off calls to give up power on Tuesday as world powers sounded the alarm and Islamists tightened their grip on the north, ordering women to wear veils in storied Timbuktu.
Feeling the bite of mounting sanctions and pressure from all sides, the soldiers who seized power on March 22 proposed a national meeting on Thursday and dispatched a team to Nigeria for talks on an exit from the growing crisis.
Since the coup, ostensibly over the government's failure to stamp out a northern rebellion, the junta has lost over half the country's territory – an area the size of France – in a matter of days to the rebel juggernaut.
Islamists seized control of the ancient trading hub Timbuktu over the weekend alongside Tuareg rebels and have since chased out their allies and declared to residents and religious leaders that they were imposing sharia law.
This is the direct consequence of NATO's intervention in Libya. This shouldn't an afterthought. This should be the top of the news.
We did this.
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Oct '11
Re: Mali: This is What We've Done
Yes, "we" did enable this. I've always leaned toward the view that facilitating the Islamist advance was "our" intent.
Consider the anti-Libyan coalition, led by countries with long-standing ties and alliances with the Arab world, especially economic ties. Remember their politically significant Muslim immigrant communities. Those countries have never hesitated to act counter to what we in the U.S. consider to be the interest of the West, at least when they sensed the cost-benefit balance favored such action.
Many European countries see economic and political power to be gained in weakening politically liberal states in the third world. They often ally themselves with those states' enemies. This tendency goes beyond simple realpolitik. I don't necessarily condemn them for their choices, but I'm not fool enough to overlook them.
Of course, that coalition was abetted by a U.S. administration that seems instinctively opposed to liberal societies, especially those that have traditionally allied with us.
"We", our European allies and our administration, did this. It's indulgence in fantasy to think this wasn't a desired outcome. Our leaders may be many things, but they are not idiots. Look for more of this.
Nov '11
Re: Mali: This is What We've Done
Yes, "we" did this.
All of you who vote for interventionists. All of you who vote for the congressmen and senators who refused to stop the Libya intervention. All of you who vote for larger and larger military budgets.
And all of us who pay federal taxes that fuel the war machine.
If I were a braver man I'd resist coercive taxation, but I'm a coward.
Re: Mali: This is What We've Done
John Murdoch
Might not engagement with the Tuareg, and re-defining some borders to reflect the actual ethnic/tribal areas make more sense? · 2 hours ag
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Engage with the Tuareg? By all means. Engage with AQIM and Ansar Dine, who have promised to commence the stonings and the amputations immediately and from whom from the Christians are already fleeing? I dare say they wouldn't be eager to grasp our outstretched hand.
Re: Mali: This is What We've Done
Barfly:
"We", our European allies and our administration, did this. It's indulgence in fantasy to think this wasn't a desired outcome. Our leaders may be many things, but they are not idiots. Look for more of this. · 3 hours ago
Actually, I think they are idiots. I think that's exactly what they are. I see no evidence that they thought this through at all. They just wanted to avoid the "appearance" of a massacre in Libya. I doubt anyone asked, "So, after Qaddafi falls, what's apt to happen--and what effect will this have on the region?"
Apr '11
Re: Mali: This is What We've Done
Gaby Charing: Algeria have dealt ruthlessly with Islamists over the years. The al-Quaeda group who have moved into Mali are small in number. The Tuareg rebellion has been going on for ages. The men cover their faces because they ride camels in the desert. The women don't, but are also veiled. It doesn't make them Islamists. It makes no sense at all for the Tuareg to roll over and let al-Quaeda control the territory they have been fighting for for so long.
Like Saddam, Gaddafi had to go.
And I don't take at face value *anything* that the French do or say in or about Africa. 'Perfide' is the word for them. ·
Having been fighting for so long seems to me to be precisely why making the territory an AQ stronghold would be appealing to them. 1984 was wrong to suggest that loyalties can be switched easily; they know who the (fairly numerous) enemies are, and they're not AQ. AQ demands compromises, sure, but most of those compromises can be framed in the form of "be better Muslims". After enough oppression, living like the 1990s Taliban seems better than like the Barhaini Shia.
Sep '11
Re: Mali: This is What We've Done
Mea culpa: When I wrote that Mali still had institutionalised slavery, I was confusing Mali with Mauretania - inexcuseable, because I do know the difference between those two countries. My apologies.
The rest of what I said may well be nonsense too.
I do still think it's a good thing Gaddafi has gone.
Oct '11
Re: Mali: This is What We've Done
Claire, I'll grant that there are idiots among the leadership of the West, but Sarkozy is not one. Neither is Obama. (Cameron, well, ok.)
Don't fool yourself. The left does not share your motivations, or your notions of the welfare of individuals or of nations. Not the least little bit.
Oct '11
Re: Mali: This is What We've Done
Claire Berlinski, Ed.
They just wanted to avoid the "appearance" of a massacre in Libya.
Libya, but not Syria? C'mon.
May '10
Re: Mali: This is What We've Done
Claire Berlinski, Ed.
They just wanted to avoid the "appearance" of a massacre in Libya.
Barfly:
Don't fool yourself. The left does not share your motivations, or your notions of the welfare of individuals or of nations. Not the least little bit.
It seems to me that Claire agrees, which is why she said they were trying to avoid the appearance of a massacre, rather than the massacre itself.
Barfly:
Many European countries see economic and political power to be gained in weakening politically liberal states in the third world. They often ally themselves with those states' enemies. This tendency goes beyond simple realpolitik. I don't necessarily condemn them for their choices, but I'm not fool enough to overlook them.
Of course, that coalition was abetted by a U.S. administration that seems instinctively opposed to liberal societies, especially those that have traditionally allied with us.
Is this your estimation of why we intervened in Libya but not in Syria?
Perhaps Western leaders just needed a distraction and knew they were more likely to get away (short-term) with meddling in North Africa than meddling near Israel. Perhaps that rebellion was just more timely.
Apr '11
Re: Mali: This is What We've Done
"The MNLA( Mouvement National de liberation de l’Azawad) fighters are now reportedly making ready for a showdown with AQIM (al-Qaeda in the Maghreb) and Ansar al Din. Mali’s bloodletting may have only just begun."
"Most people, even most Tuareg (Tuareg is an Arabic term meaning abandoned by God. They call themselves Imohag, translated as "free men") , are probably not going to be enthusiastic about the rebels,” he said. “Malians are proud of being a democracy. Trying to turn it into an Islamic state, that is going to be anathema to most people. Gao is a small, conservative town, but it also has bars and hotels and people are pretty tolerant.”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/mali/9191760/Triumphant-Tuareg-rebels-fall-out-over-al-Qaedas-jihad-in-Mali.html
As I said, MNLA and AQIM are not going to get along.
“We, the people of the Azawad,” they said on the rebel Web site, “proclaim the irrevocable independence of the state of the Azawad starting from this day, Friday, April 6, 2012.” WaPo