Sahel (north Africa)

France believes the Sahel (the semi-desert area south of the desert that stretches across northern Africa) is still troubled by thousands of Islamic terrorists. In order to maintain pressure on the Islamic terrorists France is establishing a special force of 3,000 troops to fight Islamic terrorists throughout the Sahel (actually just Mauritania, Mali, Niger, Chad and Burkina Faso). This redeployment officially began this month and will include a thousand French troops in Mali and the rest ready to quickly move from bases elsewhere in the region to wherever the most Islamic terrorist activity had been detected. The Americans are junior partners in this, providing satellite and UAV surveillance and other intel services (especially analysis and access to nearly all American data on Islamic terrorist activities in the region). All this is meant to keep the Islamic terrorists in the Sahel weak and disorganized. So far that has worked, but AQIM (Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb) is still getting support from Islamic terrorists in Europe and the Persian Gulf, where wealthy Islamic conservatives are still willing to finance Islamic terrorism in Africa. Islamic terrorists are currently launching a few attacks in northern Mali mainly to let the world know that Islamic terrorist groups are still present, barely, in the area. source: http://www.strategypage.com/qnd/mali/articles/20140726.aspx