Madness in Mali

No surprise, after their actions in CAR and France being asleep at the wheel in Francophone Africa for at least a year or so now.

Wonder what else is greasing the deal from underneath, though. $10.8 million a month for a deployment of up to a thousand mercs doesn't seem quite right.

I vaguely recall that gold is the major industry of Mali. Might have been a promise for a cut of the mines directly going to the Wagner oligarch.

That or the French are paying them under the table so Macron doesn't have to worry about bad headlines like French troops dying, though that'd be quite the scandal to turn to the Russians for help.

France and Germany are now threatening to withdraw their troops in case the deal goes through.

https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2021-09-15/germany-worried-about-mali-plan-for-russian-mercenaries

The fear seems to be that Russian mercenaries might take a hard stance against civilians, thus further damaging the support for the military in their fight against the insurgency.

Depends. If they act like they do in Daraa, they can become the go between. If not, then yeah.

But also could just be an excuse to leave, either way.

The regime in Mali has so far done everything to delegitimize and sabotage the mission there. A mission that is not really looking promising as it is. If they continue to disregard the concern of its' European allies, then it should live with the consequences.

Those consequences go both ways. France didn't maintain their presence there for charity.

Edited by FFShinra on Sep 15th 2021 at 4:53:18 AM

Yet we did not go to Mali in order to support a military junta that brutalizes its population and does nothijg to regain the support of its' northern population.

I dunno why you are arguing with me. I wasn't disagreeing with you about Europe's actions here. All I was saying is that it wasn't a given that Russia would be unable to interface with civilians just because the regime was brutal, given that they have done that before in recent history.

But then you went on a tangent about consequences for the local regime and I simply argue that those consequences go both ways. As long as France is aware of those consequences, given that Paris wasn't helping them out of charity, then its fine.