OT - Anyone been to Mali?
 

Just kidding!

But seriously, **** is ****ed up over there right now. The US is most likely going to build a new drone base in Niger to go after all these islamists. The war on terror has moved.

http://www.theatlanticwire.com/topics/mali/

We are drone bombing Africa yet we can't even secure our own borders.

Lets see if I can get this straight... It's a former French Colony... The government is rotten to the core with corruption... the rebels are hell bent on world conquest... there are ancient cities of former greatness... the French are sending in troops to stabilize the area... we are providing material support... where have we heard this story before???

Oh and for and extra bonus - Bien Dien Phu rhymes with Timbucktu.

We're only sending in "advisers." :puff:

I've heard that the diving is great...


or is that Bali?


One of those.

Advisers in Bali must be advising how best to serve your coconut with your rum. That place is a tourist spot that unfortunately saw some big terrorism over 10 years ago (killed much of the adult rugby team for a local club when I was playing back in HK).

Anyways as regards Mali is the government corrupt? I haven't read that. I've heard this has happened because the government was WEAK, poorly run, but not corrupt. The tuaregs and the AQIM (al qaeda in the islamic maghreb) guys bounded together after a lot of fighters left Libya post Ghaddafi and saw a power vacuum.

A new drone base WHERE? That's racist, sir.

http://www.transparency.org/cpi2012/results

Mali ranks 105 on the list. And that was before the coup.

Pretty much Bush's fault. What a War-Monger.

Been to Gao, Bamako and Timbuktu about two yrs ago. Stayed overnight. Yes it sucks. Another entire level of poverty and desolation. Crazy business right there...trust me.

Holy **** I've always wanted to go to Timbuktu. Did you see the library and the mausoleums?

No...just a quick cargo drop off. Timbuktu is a genuinely scary place and has been for a while. Lots of bad guys there who dont take kindly to outsiders. As great a place as the history books say it was, it definitely NOT at the top of my awesome places to see list. Thank the Touregs for that.

Interesting I always think of the photos with tourists walking through it. Have you been to Gabon by any chance? I'd love to check out their jungle at some point in my life.

Just read an article from a National Geographic about a guy and his buddies who were conservationists who went 2,000 miles through the jungles of Gabon and ended making a bunch of 'em into protected lands. Walking through swamps chest high. Baller as **** brother! Lets go do that.

OM Gabon trip 2015?

I have. Went to Timbuktu and walked the dogon escarpment as well.

Only if lonestar goes.

Great place to get kidnapped now.

That whole Arab Spring thingy has ushered in all this peace and understanding and flowers and sunshine and now that Egypt is a model of peace for all the other islamic countries to look at it's just well, filling my heart with a warm fuzzy feeling of.... oh wait.

Why again did Bush send troops into Iraq at the cost of trillions of dollars? Weapons of mass destruction wasn't it?

Right now this is a huge threat for Europe. There are many Immigrants in England and France from this part of Africa. It is very good that the U.S. goes in there and helps France with this before there is nothing can be done without great expense. The War on Terror never ends.

Bacchus.

Take a seat.

LOL.. I agree Democracy can be a messy thing. I hope the military steps-in in Egypt. The Arab world does not know how to function democratically. As soon as the guy was elected he started over-stepping his power and the people there are smart enough to understand this.

I look at the uprising in Egypt as a good thing because the people there want their rights that they have and do not want to be ruled by a dictator and they do not want to be under strict Islamic Law.

Every American should look at this uprising in Egypt as good and hope that it all turns out.

yes dad, I am sorry

So. . . what are you doing here?

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-tUQyBgxKzZ...+dateline.jpeg

I agree for the most part I'm just saying that the Arab Spring wasn't quite all some people made it out to be, that is, it wasn't all good. I think what you are seeing now is many Egyptian people figuring out that just because they went through a mock democratic process does not mean they are anywhere close to being "free", not with radical islamic factions strong arming the supposed democratic process.

From the article I read, the uprisings in the port towns are not being suppressed by the military because they know they are between a rock and a hard place, that is, if Egypt is really a democracy then these people have a right to voice their opinion. They don't have a right to just randomly destroy stuff, but they do have a right to say "hey, this sucks and we aren't benefitting from 'democracy!'". I think these military leaders see the situation for what it is, a bunch of BS.

JMHO of course. :thumbs: