US officials claim black African fighters completely useless

I'm paraphrasing here; the exact words were "completely incapable."

That's from Mike Sheehan, Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Ops, testifying before the Senate  Armed Services Committee. I'm sure Mike was just trying to be polite.

Mike even went so far as to acknowledge that those useless African troops have been trained by the US and NATO for many years. Speaks volumes about the efficacy of our "training" doesn't it?

That's the thing about our many training missions. It's not about training anybody. It's about maintaining control over the armed forces in those countries where we're the trainers. Think about it for a minute; do the Afghans need us to train them?

Hell no! After putting the run to the Red Army twenty-five years ago, the sandal-clad locals with their WW II era arsenal have put the run to the most technologically advanced armies in the history of history. And we think we need to train them?

They should be hired to train our military!

But back to Sheehan. Mike is one of those versatile guys who has served his country well. Even did a spell of "counter-insurgency" in Central America back in the day, and you know what that means. He's not squeamish. He knows how to rub out insurgency and he knows when our African client states are falling down on the job.

He's also versatile enough to slip back and forth between "public service" and helping himself as a player in the private sector, specifically as a partner in an investment group that specializes in defense industries. He's got the kind of inside knowledge that will keep America safe and himself rich, which is pretty much the apex of the American Dream!

Reading between the lines, I'm going to speculate that with the impending flight of the French and the shocking ineptitude of the Africans, there is but one hope for free Africa, for America, and for freedom and democracy and liberty and capitalism worldwide....

Look for AFRICOM to step up to the plate!

African allies demand $450 millions for Mali junket

So they're stupid enough to sign up for Hollande's grand African adventure.

But they're smart enough not to pay for it out of their own pockets!

Frankly, that's a pretty robust number. The five thousand African troops now envisioned are going to cost somebody $90,000 per man. Who that "somebody" will be remains up in the air.

That's a lot of money to pour into a part of the world where folks are used to living on less than two dollars a day. You know the fellows on the ground won't be putting that money in their pockets. Looks to me like another shakedown by the kleptocrats who run those not-yet-quite-failed ECOWAS states.

Who should be coughing up that money? France and whoever else signs on to this folly are doing this to preserve the economic interests of their corporations; maybe those corporations should foot the tab.

Not bloody likely! This $450m will come from general revenues in the "rich" countries. Unfortunately it's not the corporations or their owners who pay those taxes; the rich are invariably able to shirk their share of the tax burden no matter where you go.

So tighten up your belts there, working people of France. On top of what austerity you are enduring, be prepared to deliver up another half billion to pay for Hollande's delusions of Empire.

But even Hollande must have lucid moments wherein he questions the purpose of this exercise. There is no question that the French military can drive rebels out of any village in Mali. The African allies may then be able to keep them out.

And then what?

A perpetual occupation of Mali? And when the rebels take refuge in neighbor states, will those be invaded and occupied too?

Will Hollande's first triumph also be his Waterloo?

Hollande's African allies bogged down by meetings

Hollande the Conqueror's desperate wait for African allies is going rather off the rails.

There have been promises aplenty from the ECOWAS consortium for well over a week. They were going to be there last weekend, then in a few days, then, maybe in a few weeks...

Thus far the actual number of troops who have made it to Mali seems to be no more than a few dozen.

The Nigerian contingent has suffered a setback. Nigeria has variously promised anywhere between 500 and 2000 troops to Operation Spurs for Hollande. Lacking the the transport to airlift themselves to Mali the Nigerian commanders ordered their troops to walk.

Unfortunately they were ambushed by Islamic radicals before they even made it out of Nigeria.

Meanwhile the leaders of the ECOWAS countries are busy having meetings. Every Western Africa country sees these meetings as a rare chance to fill their best hotels on Hollande's tab, so you can be sure they will be meeting as often as possible. This weekend it was in Abidjan.

Before Abidjan they had this meeting, at which it was decided to have another meeting in Addis Ababa next weekend. That will be the "donors meeting" at which it will be determined which Western countries will be footing what part of the bill.

Don't expect to see too many African boots on the ground in Mali until that is sorted out.

Not that anybody seriously expects the arrival of the African troops to make a difference on the ground in Mali. Their main purpose is to disguise Hollande's neocolonialist vanity project in black-face.

Imaginary ECOWAS troop deployment to Mali delayed again

Mali's neighbors in ECOWAS don't seem in any great hurry to come to her aid.

On Friday it was reported that the troop deployment had been approved. At various points over the weekend numerous sources reported that Nigerian and Senegalese troops were already in Mali, and that more troops would arrive Monday.

Monday arrived but the troops didn't. Instead we got the news that there is to be an ECOWAS summit tomorrow at which last Friday's decision is to be discussed.

None of which is particularly relevant to the situation on the ground. A mere three thousand  ECOWAS troops are little more than window dressing for what is fundamentally a French war.