BAMAKO/DAKAR — The French or African troops who hunt down the rebel fighters holed up in the mountains and deserts of northeast Mali may find a resilient enemy capable of fighting back with a concealed arsenal of surprising firepower. France's initial success in its three-week old intervention in its former colony has gained Paris plaudits at home and abroad as a welcome blow struck against radicals threatening Africa and the West. Timbuktu and Gao fell to the French at the weekend and French troops also seized the airport at Kidal, the last urban bastion abandoned by the rebels. But the next step in stabilizing Mali and pursuing militants in their remote desert and mountain bolt-holes near Algeria's border looks like a much tougher task. The rebel forces are thought to be sheltering north of Kidal in the Adrar des Ifoghas, a vast, rugged mountain buttress that has given sanctuary before to Al-Qaeda. They are believed to have weapons, fuel and supplies hidden in caves, tunnels and rock strongholds. These were stashed away before their pell-mell retreat from relentless French air strikes that left a trail of rebel charred vehicles and abandoned arms caches in dusty Niger River and Saharan towns. Their preserved arsenal could include heavy machine-guns, hand-held rocket launchers and also possibly one or more Grad multiple rocket launchers mounted on vehicles, according to arms experts who have viewed photos and footage of munitions caches abandoned by the rebels in their hasty withdrawal. “This is pretty heavy ordnance, a level that would achieve parity with or even out gun most West African militaries,” James Bevan, head of Conflict Armament Research, told Reuters after viewing photos of a cache found at Diabaly in central Mali. A Western security source, who asked not to be named, said ground troops will have to go into the mountains and that will lead to casualties. Guinea's President Alpha Conde, whose West African country is offering troops to a UN-backed African intervention, said, “If we don't want the Sahara to become Afghanistan, then we need the world to get involved, not just France and Africa but also the US and the EU.” The African follow-up force intended to take over security from the French is far from being in place as it grapples with shortages of kit and supplies and lack of airlift capacity. Besides Chadians and Nigerians, only around 1,000 other Africans are on the ground in Mali, from Togo, Benin, Nigeria, Senegal and Burkina Faso, out of more than 8,000 soldiers expected to comprise the African force, known as AFISMA. Even as Malian and French leaders celebrate success on the ground, there is concern militants inside and outside Mali could strike back, just as they did in the surprise raid on the In Amenas gas plant in Algeria earlier this month. “The wild card is something completely asymmetrical, like the Algeria gas plant, or an attack in Bamako itself,” Mann said, cautioning the war in the Sahara could be long and hard. — Reuters
