This
article does indicate what might be in store for 2013.
Al-Qaida
never owned Afghanistan ... They do own northern Mali'
I
can't think of a single conflict where the United States has come out
strengthened and with its goals largely achieved.
Iran
is strong despite threats of war and crippling sanctions; the Taliban
is as strong as ever; Pakistan is a basket case; Libya has been
handed over to Jihadists and Syria looks as if it is on the way to
becoming a fragmented country dominated by warlords.
America
has a preponderance of weapons and is capable of bombing countries
back to the stone age while helping to strengthen fundamentalism and
Jihadism while destroying regimes that have historically helped to
maintain some stability in the region.
The
West is about to confront, in Africa, the very forces they have aided
and funded in Libya and Syria.
Will
the next headlines for 2013 be the destruction of Timbuktu?
--- Seemorerocks
Al-Qaida
in Africa
31
Deecember, 2012
Deep
inside caves, in remote desert bases, in the escarpments and cliff
faces of northern Mali, Islamic fighters are burrowing into the
earth, erecting a formidable set of defenses to protect what has
essentially become al-Qaida's new country.
They
have used the bulldozers, earth movers and Caterpillar machines left
behind by fleeing construction crews to dig what residents and local
officials describe as an elaborate network of tunnels, trenches,
shafts and ramparts. In just one case, inside a cave large enough to
drive trucks into, they have stored up to 100 drums of gasoline,
guaranteeing their fuel supply in the face of a foreign intervention,
according to experts.
Northern
Mali is now the biggest territory held by al-Qaida and its allies.
And as the world hesitates, delaying a military intervention, the
extremists who seized control of the area earlier this year are
preparing for a war they boast will be worse than the decade-old
struggle in Afghanistan.
"Al-Qaida
never owned Afghanistan," said former United Nations diplomat
Robert Fowler, a Canadian kidnapped and held for 130 days by
al-Qaida's local chapter, whose fighters now control the main cities
in the north. "They do own northern Mali."
Al-Qaida's
affiliate in Africa has been a shadowy presence for years in the
forests and deserts of Mali, a country hobbled by poverty and a
relentless cycle of hunger. In recent months, the terror syndicate
and its allies have taken advantage of political instability within
the country to push out of their hiding place and into the towns,
taking over an enormous territory which they are using to stock arms,
train forces and prepare for global jihad.
The
catalyst for the Islamic fighters was a military coup nine months ago
that transformed Mali from a once-stable nation to the failed state
it is today. On March 21, disgruntled soldiers invaded the
presidential palace. The fall of the nation's democratically elected
government at the hands of junior officers destroyed the military's
command-and-control structure, creating the vacuum which allowed a
mix of rebel groups to move in.
With
no clear instructions from their higher-ups, the humiliated soldiers
left to defend those towns tore off their uniforms, piled into trucks
and beat a retreat as far as Mopti, roughly in the center of Mali.
They abandoned everything north of this town to the advancing rebels,
handing them an area that stretches over more than 620,000 square
kilometers (240,000 square miles). It's a territory larger than Texas
or France — and it's almost exactly the size of Afghanistan.
Turbaned
fighters now control all the major towns in the north, carrying out
amputations in public squares like the Taliban did. Just as in
Afghanistan, they are flogging women for not covering up. Since
taking control of Timbuktu, they have destroyed seven of the 16
mausoleums listed as world heritage sites.
Al-Qaida
never owned Afghanistan ... They do own northern Mali
The
area under their rule is mostly desert and sparsely populated, but
analysts say that due to its size and the hostile nature of the
terrain, rooting out the extremists here could prove even more
difficult than it did in Afghanistan. Mali's former president has
acknowledged, diplomatic cables show, that the country cannot patrol
a frontier twice the length of the border between the United States
and Mexico.
Al-Qaida
in the Islamic Maghreb, known as AQIM, operates not just in Mali, but
in a corridor along much of the northern Sahel. This 7,000-kilometer
(4,300-mile) long ribbon of land runs across the widest part of
Africa, and includes sections of Mauritania, Niger, Algeria, Libya,
Burkina Faso and Chad.
"One
could come up with a conceivable containment strategy for the Swat
Valley," said Africa expert Peter Pham, an adviser to the U.S.
military's African command center, referring to the region of
Pakistan where the Pakistan Taliban have been based. "There's no
containment strategy for the Sahel, which runs from the Atlantic
Ocean to the Red Sea."
Earlier
this year, the 15 nations in West Africa, including Mali, agreed on a
proposal for the military to take back the north, and sought backing
from the United Nations. Earlier this month, the Security Council
authorized the intervention but imposed certain conditions, including
training Mali's military, which is accused of serious human rights
abuses since the coup. Diplomats say the intervention will likely not
happen before September of 2013.
In
the meantime, the Islamists are getting ready, according to elected
officials and residents in Kidal, Timbuktu and Gao, including a day
laborer hired by al-Qaida's local chapter to clear rocks and debris
for one of their defenses. They spoke on condition of anonymity out
of fear for their safety at the hands of the Islamists, who have
previously accused those who speak to reporters of espionage.
The
al-Qaida affiliate, which became part of the terror network in 2006,
is one of three Islamist groups in northern Mali. The others are the
Movement for the Unity and Jihad in West Africa, or MUJAO, based in
Gao, and Ansar Dine, based in Kidal. Analysts agree that there is
considerable overlap between the groups, and that all three can be
considered sympathizers, even extensions, of al-Qaida.
The
Islamic fighters have stolen equipment from construction companies,
including more than $11 million worth from a French company called
SOGEA-SATOM, according to Elie Arama, who works with the European
Development Fund. The company had been contracted to build a European
Union-financed highway in the north between Timbuktu and the village
of Goma Coura. An employee of SOGEA-SATOM in Bamako declined to
comment.
The
official from Kidal said his constituents have reported seeing
Islamic fighters with construction equipment riding in convoys behind
4-by-4 trucks draped with their signature black flag. His contacts
among the fighters, including friends from secondary school, have
told him they have created two bases, around 200 to 300 kilometers
(120 and 180 miles) north of Kidal, in the austere, rocky desert.
The
first base is occupied by al-Qaida's local fighters in the hills of
Teghergharte, a region the official compared to Afghanistan's Tora
Bora.
"The
Islamists have dug tunnels, made roads, they've brought in
generators, and solar panels in order to have electricity," he
said. "They live inside the rocks."
Still
further north, near Boghassa, is the second base, created by fighters
from Ansar Dine. They too have used seized explosives, bulldozers and
sledgehammers to make passages in the hills, he said.
In
addition to creating defenses, the fighters are amassing supplies,
experts said. A local who was taken by Islamists into a cave in the
region of Kidal described an enormous room, where several cars were
parked. Along the walls, he counted up to 100 barrels of gasoline,
according to the man's testimony to New York-based Human Rights
Watch.
In
Timbuktu, the fighters are becoming more entrenched with each passing
day, warned Mayor Ousmane Halle. Earlier in the year, he said, the
Islamists left his city in a hurry after France called for an
imminent military intervention. They returned when the U.N. released
a report arguing for a more cautious approach.
"At
first you could see that they were anxious," said Halle by
telephone. "The more the date is pushed back, the more
reinforcements they are able to get, the more prepared they become."
In
the regional capital of Gao, a young man told The Associated Press
that he and several others were offered 10,000 francs a day by
al-Qaida's local commanders (around $20), a rate several times the
normal wage, to clear rocks and debris, and dig trenches. The youth
said he saw Caterpillars and earth movers inside an Islamist camp at
a former Malian military base 7 kilometers (4 miles) from Gao.
The
fighters are piling mountains of sand from the ground along the dirt
roads to force cars onto the pavement, where they have checkpoints
everywhere, he said. In addition, they are modifying their
all-terrain vehicles to mount them with arms.
"On
the backs of their cars, it looks like they are mounting pipes,"
he said, describing a shape he thinks might be a rocket or missile
launcher. "They are preparing themselves. Everyone is scared."
A
university student from Gao confirmed seeing the modified cars. He
said he also saw deep holes dug on the sides of the highway, possibly
to give protection to fighters shooting at cars, along with cement
barriers with small holes for guns.
In
Gao, residents routinely see Moktar Belmoktar, the one-eyed emir of
the al-Qaida-linked cell that grabbed Fowler in 2008. Belmoktar, a
native Algerian, traveled to Afghanistan in the 1980s and trained in
Osama bin Laden's camp in Jalalabad, according to research by the
Jamestown Foundation. His lieutenant Oumar Ould Hamaha, whom Fowler
identified as one of his captors, brushed off questions about the
tunnels and caves but said the fighters are prepared.
"We
consider this land our land. It's an Islamic territory," he
said, reached by telephone in an undisclosed location. "Right
now our field of operation is Mali. If they bomb us, we are going to
hit back everywhere."
He
added that the threat of military intervention has helped recruit new
fighters, including from Western countries.
In
December, two U.S. citizens from Alabama were arrested on terrorism
charges, accused of planning to fly to Morocco and travel by land to
Mali to wage jihad, or holy war. Two French nationals have also been
detained on suspicion of trying to travel to northern Mali to join
the Islamists. Hamaha himself said he spent a month in France
preaching his fundamentalist version of Islam in Parisian mosques
after receiving a visa for all European Union countries in 2001.
Hamaha
indicated the Islamists have inherited stores of Russian-made arms
from former Malian army bases, as well as from the arsenal of toppled
Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi, a claim that military experts have
confirmed.
Those
weapons include the SA-7 and SA-2 surface-to-air missiles, according
to Hamaha, which can shoot down aircrafts. His claim could not be
verified, but Rudolph Atallah, the former counterterrorism director
for Africa in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, said it makes
sense.
"Gadhafi
bought everything under the sun," said Atallah, a retired U.S.
Air Force lieutenant colonel, who was a defense attache at the U.S.
Embassy in Mali. "His weapons depots were packed with all kinds
of stuff, so it's plausible that AQIM now has surface-to-air
missiles."
Right
now our field of operation is Mali. If they bomb us, we are going to
hit back everywhere.
Depending
on the model, these missiles can range far enough to bring down
planes used by ill-equipped African air forces, although not those
used by U.S. and other Western forces, he said. There is significant
disagreement in the international community on whether Western
countries will carry out the planned bombardments.
The
Islamists' recent advances draw on al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb's
near decade of experience in Mali's northern desert, where Fowler and
his fellow U.N. colleague were held captive for four months in 2008,
an experience he recounts in his recent book, "A Season in
Hell."
Originally
from Algeria, the fighters fled across the border into Mali in 2003,
after kidnapping 32 European tourists. Over the next decade, they
used the country's vast northern desert to hold French, Spanish,
Swiss, German, British, Austrian, Italian and Canadian hostages,
raising an estimated $89 million in ransom payments, according to
Stratfor, a global intelligence company.
During
this time, they also established relationships with local clans,
nurturing the ties that now protect them. Several commanders have
taken local wives, and Hamaha, whose family is from Kidal, confirmed
that Belmoktar is married to his niece.
Fowler
described being driven for days by jihadists who knew Mali's
featureless terrain by heart, navigating valleys of identical dunes
with nothing more than the direction of the sun as their map. He saw
them drive up to a thorn tree in the middle of nowhere to find
barrels of diesel fuel. Elsewhere, he saw them dig a pit in the sand
and bury a bag of boots, marking the spot on a GPS for future use.
In
his four-month-long captivity, Fowler never saw his captors refill at
a gas station, or shop in a market. Yet they never ran out of gas.
And although their diet was meager, they never ran out of food, a
testament to the extensive supply network which they set up and are
now refining and expanding.
Among
the many challenges an invading army will face is the inhospitable
terrain, Fowler said, which is so hot that at times "it was
difficult to draw breath." A cable published by WikiLeaks from
the U.S. Embassy in Bamako described how even the Malian troops
deployed in the north before the coup could only work from 4 a.m. to
10 a.m., and spent the sunlight hours in the shade of their vehicles.
Yet
Fowler said he saw al-Qaida fighters chant Quranic verses under the
Sahara sun for hours, just one sign of their deep, ideological
commitment.
"I
have never seen a more focused group of young men," said Fowler,
who now lives in Ottawa, Canada. "No one is sneaking off for
R&R. They have left their wives and children behind. They believe
they are on their way to paradise."
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