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This article appears in the June 1, 2012 issue of Executive Intelligence Review.

Obama, British Create Failed States,
as Bases for Assaults on Sovereignty

by Douglas DeGroot

[PDF version]

May 28—The northern part of Mali, an area in the Sahara that is bigger than France, has become a new Afghanistan-style ungoverned zone in the Sahel region of West Africa, that has been turned into a base for attacks on governments in the region by the British-created al-Qaeda apparatus. Mali's President Amadou Toumani Touré was toppled by army rebels in a coup in March.

This transformation of Mali from a sovereign state into an al-Qaeda base for operations against African nations is a direct consequence of the overthrow of the Libyan government last year, which was carried out by the Obama Administration, in tandem with the British, the al-Qaeda apparatus, and other NATO members. That operation deliberately turned Libya into a failed state.

Libya today has no functioning government institutions, and is dominated by internecine conflict among local militias, score-settling between pro- and anti-Qaddafi groups, and attacks on settlements of black refugees. This chaotic situation provides the perfect conditions for the al-Qaeda networks that were deployed into Libya to overthrow Muammar Qaddafi, to now operate from there, to set up northern Mali as a forward base for secure, well-protected desert training camps for terror groups to come for training and prepare for operations to break up nation-states.

The intervention into Mali by Libyan al-Qaeda networks is not the first time after the murder of Qaddafi that Libya has been charged with exporting terrorism. On March 7, Russia's UN Ambassador Vitaly Churkin, at a UN Security Council meeting, accused Libya of running a training center for Syrian rebels and arming the anti-government fighters

According to West African observers, the first group that will be trained will be Boko Haram, which is targetting Africa's most populous country, Nigeria. Later, al-Shabab, the Somalia-based cell of al-Qaeda, is expected to follow, for operations in the Horn of Africa, and then, groups targetting Algeria and other nations in the Sahel region.

Taking advantage of the disappearance of the government in much of Mali, well-equipped members of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) are already recruiting youth who are facing economic destitution, by offering them money to become part of their apparatus.

Scores of armed fighters from Maghreb countries are now in northern Mali, a Malian Defense Ministry official told AFP on May 6. "About 100 north Africans, essentially from Algeria, Tunisia, and Libya, have joined the ranks of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb," the official said.

One of the benefits desired by the British financial empire that will result from the destruction of sovereignty in Africa, is to drive out the Chinese, who won't be able to do business and aid development in Africa if there are ultimately no sovereign nations to deal with.

A Warning from Africa

African leaders are well aware of the international nature of the al-Qaeda deployment into Mali, and are very concerned about the dangerous implications.

In a public statement in Washington May 21, Niger Foreign Minister Mohamed Bazoum reported that:

  • When AQIM had been more confined, before the developments in Mali this year, it had already been able to mount operations elsewhere in the Sahel, giving as an example, Boko Haram in Nigeria.

  • AQIM's capacities have expanded, now that it controls 800,000 square kilometers [over half the country's territory], including towns, which gives them better access to basic supplies, such as food, water, and fuel.

  • AQIM now has has access to thousands of youth who suffer under unprecedented economic distress.

  • A large amount of weapons and ammunition has been seized, which had been abandoned by the national army when it fell apart in March.

  • AQIM has looted all the banks in the territory they now occupy.

  • Under the conditions of complete anarchy throughout the vast territory following the disappearance of the state, the economy has been completely criminalized, and the only winners are those who commit violence.

  • A second Afghanistan is being put in place, conforming to its profile of international Islamic terrorism.

  • AQIM and two other closely allied groups, Ansar al-Dine [a faction allied with AQIM which wants to implement Sharia law in Mali] and MUJAO (Unity Movement for Jihad in West Africa, a splinter faction from AQIM) are basically in charge of the area

  • There were Pakistani operatives active in the area, and the coordination between AQIM and al-Qaeda was carried out by Libyan Salafist networks.

Poverty Aids al-Qaeda

Bazoum concluded that this international operation could only be dealt with by an international response in defense of sovereignty. Niger has already had to divert resources from social needs to support security operations, which will create more of the poverty that al-Qaeda feeds on. He emphasized that this would only worsen.

Already there are reports that in Burkina Faso, across the Niger River from Mali, of people are reduced to eating tree leaves to stay alive. The World Health Organization reports that over 1 million children in the region are "severely malnourished. In Burkina Faso, peasants lucky enough to have a few animals, are selling them off to buy a few pounds of rice, after which they will be destitute.

As a result of the operation carried out in Libya by NATO and al-Qaeda, and the subsequent establishment of an al-Qaeda base of operations in Mali, the stage is now set for prolonged conflicts throughout Africa, ranging from the Horn and eastern Africa, across to the western and northern regions of the continent. Growing numbers of youth, with no sense of a future because of the worsening economic desperation, will be easily lured into joining the al-Qaeda insurgencies and related criminal activities, such as illegal drug trafficking.

As the world economy implodes, ensuring no economic development in Africa, the insurgencies will increase. Outside military interventions will not resolve these conflicts. The Obama Administration's plan to move U.S. special operations forces and counterinsurgency specialists returning from Iraq and Afghanistan into Africa, which is part of Obama's new national security strategy that was released last month, will only play into the perpetual war scenarios. As long as Obama keeps the U.S.A. on the track of carrying his advisor Tony Blair's mission to eliminate the sovereignty of nations, as opposed to defending their sovereignty through efforts to set up conditions for a continent-wide industrial development program, this transfer of U.S. military forces to Africa will only promote perpetual Afghanistan-style conflict, pitting weakened governments against the British-supplied and -run al-Qaeda operation.

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