Some of my Nigerian friends and I were discussing the
situation in Mali and the apparent lack of good advice, intelligence, strategy,
training, intelligence forecasting and threat analysis that led to the current
situation there. Virtually everything required to make a government strong,
secure the state and protect the populace was sorely lacking. (To the folks who
asked me about Mali, www.beegeagle.wordpress.com will be able to offer a lot of insight into the current efforts in West
Africa and Mali. My friend “Beegeagle” runs this very popular blog - 10 000
visits a day should give an idea of its popularity).
During these discussions, I suggested that it is time
for African governments to begin asking some very hard questions, especially in
terms of some of the “free” advice and training governments and their armed
forces are given. After all, even the SANDF has “benefitted” from some of this
advice and training.
But, back to Mali where a very simplistic background
is as follows:
The geo-political, economical and threat changes,
challenges and developments that have taken place since the so-called Arab
Spring have impacted severely on both North and West Africa. The pre-coup
Malian government was certainly not as pure as the driven snow. As early as
2003, the former President of Mali allegedly allowed extremist control of the
North whilst allegedly raking in huge sums of money from narco-trafficking and
ransom payments. Added to this was the
issue of depleted land resources – one reason for Tuareg discontent with the Malian
government - overgrazing of the
semi-arid lands bordering Mali and Niger and the subsequent desertification of
those lands. Then there was the steady rise of AQIM, MOJWA and others who had
the potential to form hostile anti-government alliances. The collapse of Libya
added to the flow of weapons and combat experience into the conflict areas. It
appears that no-one was able to predict this or even noticed.
Initially the removal from power of President Amadou Toumani Touré by a coup may have appeared to be to the benefit of Mali and the region.
This regime change took place a mere five weeks before a presidential election was to be held with the
outgoing President stating that he was not interested in running for office
again. But then, a poorly foreign-trained army’s discipline
collapsed, opening the door to uncertainty, chaos and an offensive by the
extremists in the North. Whilst the extremist offensive was being planned, we
twice warned the new government of Mali of the threat build-up and the need to
take immediate and drastic action to curb it before the extremist offensive
could gain momentum. (To those who think this was an attempt to gain employment
– don’t let your imagination run away with you). They were either advised not to listen to the
warnings or to simply ignore our “disinformation”.
Poor governance resulted in Mali’s Vital Interests and
National Interests becoming even more threatened as the country’s pillars of
state came under increasing attack. Some of these interests happened to
coincide with the Foreign Interests of France, who arguably had the courage to
intervene to protect their interests and their citizens living in Mali.
Nigeria and its West African allies also committed men
to the conflict as a successful takeover of Mali by the extremists will certainly
pose a threat to West Africa. Extremist success in Mali would only embolden the
enemy and provide other similar groups with a safe haven/springboard from where
to plan and launch their operations into Europe and deeper into Africa. Additionally,
success in Mali will give the extremists a new front from where to launch
operations into Algeria. Perhaps they will do this under the guise of “democratic
forces” and the international community will once again jump in to help “democratic
extremists” as they did in Libya, Syria, Egypt and so forth.
Regardless of the situation, it is the development and
escalation of the crisis in Mali that prompted us to beg whether questions
should not be asked - and answered. These questions included inter alia the
following:
1.
Did the “free” advice given
to Mali not indicate or even hint at the importance of threat analysis and
intelligence forecasting? If so, why not?
2.
What advice and support
were the Malians given by their advisors during the development of their
National Security Strategy?
3.
What did the “free”
military advice and training consist of?
4.
Who trained the Malian
armed forces?
5.
What happened to the Mali
intelligence effort?
6.
Who trained the Malian
intelligence services?
7.
Was no one able to predict
the proliferation of weapons into Mali after the collapse of Libya?
8.
Why were Malian army units
so rapidly overwhelmed by the extremists?
9.
Where was the so-called
Rapid Intervention Unit?
The list of questions goes on and on...
To anyone who doubts my comments – and concerns –
about the level of training given to the Malian armed forces, take a look at
the training of their “Rapid Intervention Force” at http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=01NBUiA3Tjs
I have witnessed the results of a lot of this
so-called “free” advice and training that is given to African armed forces. In
a nutshell, it is pathetic. A look at what happened and is still happening in
CAR, DRC, S Sudan and other states is testimony to poor training, bad advice, incoherent
doctrines, a lack of intelligence, a lack of strategy, poor discipline and a
lack of motivation and will.
African armies have a choice in terms of training,
advice and support: Accept the freebies and suffer the consequences or pay for
it and have someone to hold to account.
But, the answers to many of these questions will be
found in a line in Bob Dylan’s famous song: “The answer my friend, is blowing
in the wind...”
