Award-winning journalist Arnaud de Borchgrave tells Newsmax TV that the United States should not “chase after what our allies should be doing” in battling al-Qaida in the Republic of Mali.
“The US has learned its lesson in Iraq, which turned out to be a disaster — and in Baghdad today, you have a government that is more friendly to Iran than it is to the United States,” de Borchgrave, the longtime Newsweek journalist, tells Newsmax in an exclusive interview. “And that is after spending about a $1 trillion and losing 4,500 U.S. servicemen and women.
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“Afghanistan is not exactly a roaring success,” he added. “That, too, will cost about a $1 trillion by the time we leave at the end of 2014 — and the speculation is that whatever will replace the United States will not be friendly to the United States, and may even be friendlier to al-Qaida.”
He said that France, which is currently leading the assault against al-Qaida in the north African country, “should be left alone, obviously with some assistance, in terms of equipment. But, otherwise, do this with their local friends and not get involved.”
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The United States and Britain are providing logistical assistance in the region, but “this is high time that we minded our own store and rebuilt our own defenses and got ready for the wars of the future rather than chase after what our allies should be doing,” de Borchgrave said.
Besides serving Newsweek for 30 years, de Borchgrave is now director and senior adviser of the Transnational Threats Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, editor at large at United Press International, and a frequent Newsmax contributor.
Al-Qaida “has had a sanctuary in Mali for a long time,” de Borchgrave said, as early as 1991, when the Soviet Union collapsed. Afghanistan’s communist government fell the following year in the Afghan Civil War.
“The Afghan Arabs went back to their home countries, and they were not exactly welcomed. They were treated like pariahs. Some at that point went underground, others went back to Afghanistan to fight with Osama bin Laden — and what you’re seeing in Mali today is something that’s been around a long time. It’s known as al-Qaida in the Maghreb, being in northern Africa.
“They’ve been heavily implanted in Mali, but apparently they were getting close to taking over the whole country, and that is when France decided to intervene.”
Not only are the Malian militants being helped by al-Qaida, they’re also using weapons stolen from the toppling of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.
"Tons and tons of equipment — including SAM-7 missiles, anti-aircraft missiles — were abandoned during the coups in Libya," de Borchgrave said. .
"In fact, we saw pictures in our own newspapers and magazines and on television of these huge, open-aired depots of various kinds of ammunition. Much of that, of course, was taken over by al-Qaida and moved south into Mali. The al-Qaida types in Mali have been in charge of about two thirds of the country for several years."
And the Algerian hostage crisis — which left 30 hostages and at least 11 Islamic militants dead on Thursday after Algerian forces moved to free dozens of Western and local captives — proves that al-Qaida has moved its base from South Asia to northern and western Africa.
“It’s a geographical mouthful, but one has to remember that the Algerians fought the French when they were a colony of France — and that lasted eight years,” de Borchgrave said. “They then took control and decided finally to have free elections, and that’s when the al-Qaida ties won.
“These Islamist fundamentalists won a majority, and they were going to take over the government — but then the military changed its mind, and that led to civil war that produced almost one million killed between 1991 and 1999.”
It, further, underscores the underlying savviness of al-Qaida,” de Borchgrave added.
“Everybody at this point who’s involved in the fight against al-Qaida realizes what they really are. They’re not just a bunch of terrorists wandering around to kill and steal. It’s something far more sophisticated. It does have a global dimension.”
Turning his attention to two of President Barack Obama’s nominees to his national security team — Massachusetts Democratic Sen. John Kerry for Secretary of State and former GOP Sen. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska for Defense Secretary — de Borchgrave said they would be embraced by our allies.
“Our friends would regard them very well, because they realize that the United States has to get ready for the future — and for the past few years, we have been looking at the past and fighting the wars of the past rather than looking forward to how to defend ourselves in the wars of the future.”
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This includes Israel, who needs the US in any standoff with Iran, de Borchgrave said.
“They can’t really go after Iran or bomb Iran, as the speculation has been saying to us the past several years. They cannot do that on their own. They would need the United States — and that is not about to happen.
“So in Iran, I would imagine they will go towards some kind of a deal,” de Borchgrave surmised. “I’ve heard three former heads of intelligence in Israel say that it would be madness to bomb Iran. One bomb in Iran would trigger retaliatory capabilities that would have us all spinning all over the Middle East.”
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