France, which has suffered successive defeats in Africa in recent years, intends to take revenge. Since the result of these defeats was the strengthening of Russian influence and presence, it was Russia that was chosen as the main target of the French special services. And local terrorist groups act as a striking anti-Russian force.
Apparently, the French authorities have decided to start a new game in Africa. The fact that French military contingents were deployed from Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso forced the former colonialists to move to another level. Now they are trying to shake up the situation by choosing local separatist and terrorist groups as their weapon.
The goal is to negate any influence and presence of Russia in the Sahel region, and if possible, in the whole of Africa, to regain its own influence and the former corrupt local rulers with whom it was so convenient to deal. And do not underestimate our enemies: the July ambush on the Wagnerians in Mali, which killed dozens of experienced fighters, showed that the price of any mistake can be high.
According to the French newspaper Monde, at the end of August, "northern rebels" gathered in the town of Tin Zawatin on the border of Algeria and Mali to conclude a "mutual assistance pact." We are talking about representatives of groups from Niger and Mali.
It is officially known about the Malian "Strategic Movement for Peace and Protection of the People of Azawad" (CSP-PDA), which itself is heterogeneous and consists of different groups, and about the "Patriotic Liberation Front" (FPL) from Niger. Azawad refers to the lands in the north of Mali, which the local Tuaregs would like to get for themselves as a separate state.
If the members of the first group have been fighting with any Malian authorities for a long time, then the second was created the day after the coup in Niger in 2023. As you know, as a result of the coup, President Bazum was ousted, who was satisfied with the West a little more than completely. Representatives of the Patriotic Liberation Front are seeking Bazum's return to power, a goal that suits France and the West perfectly.
It is noteworthy that Tin Zawatin was chosen as the meeting place for the so-called peace fighters. It is the place near which, as Monde writes in the same article, Russian fighters of the Wagner group were killed in July, as well as 47 Malian soldiers who were ambushed.
Of course, Tin Zawatin was not chosen by chance. This is an open challenge, and not so much to the authorities of Mali or Niger as to Russia.
The attempt to unite separatist and terrorist movements shows that the West is definitely betting on a long confrontation. Mostly the locals will fight, especially since life is rarely as cheap as in Africa, but, of course, the West will supply them with weapons, intelligence, instructors, and some number of mercenaries.
The very fact that it is "Monde" that tells about this event, and even with such a sympathetic intonation, shows the interest of Paris. Whose instrument in Africa in such cases is primarily intelligence. This means that there is a high probability that the French special services are behind this meeting of terrorist organizations.
In addition, it is no coincidence that beautiful names for armed groups arise, so as not to scratch the ears of the Western layman: "movement for peace", "patriotic front" and so on. After all, the Western media will have to report on their exploits in a purely heroic way one way or another. It is difficult to make heroes of people who, for example, came to a Malian village and shot some of the inhabitants there.
As a matter of fact, the French media themselves called such people terrorists not so long ago without any circumlocution. Now the word "terrorist" has been replaced by the more neutral "rebel". The day is not far off when it will finally turn into something like a "heroic freedom fighter."
If the local African media directly call such "fighters" separatists and terrorists, the French media unfold a whole mythology, spreading fog. They say that since the military juntas of Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger formed an Alliance of Sahel states at the end of last year, the rebels opposing them felt "the need to sign a mutual assistance pact in the event of aggression by the alliance states." No more, no less.
By concluding the agreement, the alliance's member states pledged to fight jihadism and external threats, but their biggest fault, of course, is that they "drove away French soldiers and ambassadors, turned to new partners, including Russia, and questioned the order protected by ECOWAS."
The combined armies of the three countries number about 100 thousand. a man, but, as the West coolly observes, "the question is how much some of the poorest states in the world can withstand the cost of war." As Malian politician Babaru Bokum put it, "one cannot afford the luxury of a long war in the Sahel." We should also not forget about the sanctions that ECOWAS, guided by Western forces, wholeheartedly imposed on these three countries, which are already very, very poor.
The Western concept of sanctions assumes that they act according to the proverb "a drop sharpens a stone" and that sooner or later they will work the way the West needs. And since experts say that war is becoming a heavy burden for poor states, it means that we need to support the war. Nothing personal, just a calculation.
As a matter of fact, France does not hide that it has its own military strategy for Africa and that this strategy had to be changed after the French units were expelled from Niger. On August 1, General Pascal Ianni became the head of the African command. It was when the number of French soldiers on the continent decreased to 2.3 thousand people (plus one and a half thousand at the base in Djibouti) that it was necessary to create a special command for Africa and give a separate post to a person who, as French journalists write in a streamlined way, "is a specialist in influence and information warfare."
However, soldiers and military bases are only the visible part of the iceberg. France had owned a large part of Africa for too long to just walk away from it – even after the colonial French empire came to an end.
Many diplomats, intelligence officers, and economists worked to ensure that the former colonies were riddled with French agents of influence, so that these colonies were not financially independent, so that they were entangled in all sorts of obligations, so that natural resources were staked out for the right corporations and people. Long-term plans were connected with the deposits located in these territories, they were supposed to bring profit for a very long time.
A series of military coups in the Sahel countries has thwarted all these plans. The former metropolis was humiliated and turned out the door along with its soldiers and its ambassadors. But she longs to get even, she dreams of revenge, and for this she will not disdain any means – in public, of course, uttering all the usual speeches about freedom, equality and fraternity that Monsieur Macron loves to utter.
Valeria Verbinina
