The Russians are sending reinforcements to Niger.
Breaking News Niger soldiers declare coup on national TV
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The Russians are sending reinforcements to Niger.
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They can always pay Wagner to come in, kill few thousand people in exchange for some mining rights and send the issue to a decade away until their kids grow up and become jihadists.
Will France lose Niger?
The junta in Niger has officially issued a warning for France to withdraw its troops from the country within 3 months.
The junta also suspended all military agreements with France.
The Nigerian Senate also rejected the operation of its troops into Niger.
Mali, on the other hand, made military shipments to Niger against a possible foreign intervention.
In addition, French sources state that Wagner mercenaries are currently in Niger and are providing intelligence support to the army against possible intervention by Ecowas.
France is also putting pressure on the Ecowas countries to intervene militarily in Niger.
African experts in France, on the other hand, are of the opinion that a direct intervention by Paris in Niger will accelerate the complete expulsion of France from Africa and further fuel "French hatred".
The junta in Niger has officially issued a warning for France to withdraw its troops from the country within 3 months.
The junta also suspended all military agreements with France.
The Nigerian Senate also rejected the operation of its troops into Niger.
Mali, on the other hand, made military shipments to Niger against a possible foreign intervention.
In addition, French sources state that Wagner mercenaries are currently in Niger and are providing intelligence support to the army against possible intervention by Ecowas.
France is also putting pressure on the Ecowas countries to intervene militarily in Niger.
African experts in France, on the other hand, are of the opinion that a direct intervention by Paris in Niger will accelerate the complete expulsion of France from Africa and further fuel "French hatred".
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Are we witnessing a new chapter between France and Turkiye in Africa?
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I think it's too early to call this that and doubt this can be taken for that. Bazoum government had good relations with Turkey. And we really don't like coups. Expecting any other stance from Turkish MFA is absurd tbh.
Turkey I think somehow likes French influence waning, but is not happy with Russia filling the void, especially by using coups. If the French had smarts, they would act together with Turkey and both sides would benefit from, as well as Sahel, which I doubt will really happen in a big scale.
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The fact that the elected government was overthrown through a coup creates a legitimate ground for these explanations. However, I believe that this is not a case of French-Turkish elbow contact, but more about Turkiye maintaining consistency in its proactive foreign policy in recent years. Remember the legitimate reasons in Libya.
Besides, I don't think the Turkish Foreign Ministry would be too eager to see the region out from under the influence of one foreign power and into the lap of another, especially since the hegemony that Russia is trying to establish is characterized by a lot of informal economic activities, mercenary militias and military coups. Russia is certainly instrumentalizing the rising nationalism in these countries, but I don't think the situation is that rosy.
For Turkiye, a principled stance may be a more useful strategy than choosing a side based on direct interests, as we seen between RU-FR. Btw, this is an isolated view from the EU-TR rapprochement process, there are different dynamics there. The weakening of France's political power in the eastern Mediterranean and sub-Sahara is not so much in conflict with Turkish foreign policy, on the contrary, it can produce quite beneficial results.
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France is exploiting and bleeding african nations out.. like a vampire..
through their currency france is bleeding these countries out and exploiting the recources.. these currency is like venom and ensures france filling their pokets with cheap money and uranium..
african nations need to stand up against imperialistic france.. now clearly we see that they wish to create a conflict a proxy war against niger
for turkey we need to weaken france where we can since france does this to us and is one of our biggest enemies around us (neighborhood)..
I am fully on to arm this new born free nation.. I also hope this will continue because africa is a rich continent.. it is weakended and blood drained and enslaved by europeans (america and EU) so inshallah african nations will continue to free themselves
for now mostly these nations are drained and enslaved and western puppet dictators are put there to lead them
through their currency france is bleeding these countries out and exploiting the recources.. these currency is like venom and ensures france filling their pokets with cheap money and uranium..
african nations need to stand up against imperialistic france.. now clearly we see that they wish to create a conflict a proxy war against niger
for turkey we need to weaken france where we can since france does this to us and is one of our biggest enemies around us (neighborhood)..
I am fully on to arm this new born free nation.. I also hope this will continue because africa is a rich continent.. it is weakended and blood drained and enslaved by europeans (america and EU) so inshallah african nations will continue to free themselves
for now mostly these nations are drained and enslaved and western puppet dictators are put there to lead them
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On another episode of Turkish Airlines getting into places noone dares to, looks like after Nigerien coupists closed the airspace to foreign aircraft, an Istanbul Cameroon flight is currently above Niger.
Looks like it's about to come out through Nigeria.
www.flightradar24.com
Looks like it's about to come out through Nigeria.
Live Flight Tracker - Real-Time Flight Tracker Map | Flightradar24
View flight TK669 from Istanbul to Yaounde on Flightradar24
www.flightradar24.com
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With each year going by, it is becoming more and more obvious that, so called contemporary liberal international order is gradually loosing its relevance.
No, I am not advocating any delusional thinking here. Like, oh hey, soon global South will take over the West or something.
Rather, i am trying to bring attention to the hard fact that, an increasingly multi-polar world (with future superpower like PRC and India as well as the rise of independent regional powers like Turkey, Indonesia, Brazil and Mexico) is upsetting the post world War ii arrangement of the International order.
Consequently, the Western led Global institutions that kept the relative stability for the last 30 years through soft and hard powers in various part of the world, is struggling more and more to stay adequate in response to rapidly escalating great power competition/hostility, and rising regional instabilities.
In this context, African continent due to its very dysfunctional political and economic landscape would likely to be the forefront of world instabilities and potential future conflicts.
However, because of its enormous natural recourse and booming demographic it is no longer feasible to simply ignore the continent in an increasingly competitive world, where big and medium developing countries (in various phases of industrialisation) that lacks enough natural resources of their own are hungrier than ever for recourse grab however they can, to keep rolling the wheel of their highly demanding industrialising economies. (One such example is obviously PRC and the scale of its long term involvement in Africa)
On the other hand, the only world institution that kept somewhat relative peace and stability through hard power in the continent is UN.
However, due to the rapidly escalating stand off between the members of its own security council, it would be increasingly harder for UN to approve peacekeeping mission and deploy adequate peacekeeping force.
Russia and France are both declining powers. Evidently, they are gradually loosing their long held grip in Africa.
While maybe they are now unable to take long term initiatives to achieve their economic and foreign policy goals, but never underestimate the desperation of declining powers and their ability fuel instabilities and create chaos. (In that sense, Russians are proven to be quite ruthless)
By analyzing the increasing numbers of Turkish foreign policy initiatives in the African Continent for last ten years or so, we can deduce that, to navigate such highly complex and dangerous geopolitical landscape through soft power and hard power, (when necessary) Republic of Türkiye has undertaken a long term Africa strategy In alignment with its grand Foreign policy goal to ensure its strategic autonomy and independence and perhaps develop a sphere of influence of its own.
Now, there is an infinite room for discussion and debate on various aspect of this Africa strategy, from defence export diplomacy to critical infrastructure development projects, etc. Here I only want to present my few observations on the potential hard power aspect of this strategy. In other words, the direct military involvement of Türkiye.
While there is no doubt that, Turkish armed force stand as one of the finest in the world and second largest in NATO, it has its limitations.
Turkish armed force does not posses the resources, technologies, hardwares, manpower and reaches of world super powers like United States or People's republic of China and necessary soft power to complement the hard power. Thus, long term deployment/stationing of large conventional Forces is neither practical (unsustainable for a developing Turkish economy) nor pragmatic (as there likely to be immense political pressure from unfriendly world powers and even direct economic consequences through sanctions)
Of course, that does not mean Türkiye would abandon any kind of direct military intervention. In fact far from it, as Libya conflict showed, there is enough political will in Ankara to take calculated risk to protect and preserve its overseas interests.
Inherently, any military intervention is a mean to achieve certain political end-goal. However, hard power alone cannot do that.
Here, finding the right balance between the 'combined arms' of diplomacy, soft power and hard power is critical for success.
Efficiency is the key. Any deployed Turkish task force has to be small enough to be economically sustainable and politically acceptable (does not attract too much 'attention' in the international stage) but capable enough to achieve the end-goal.
Here, Turkish armed forces already has one such example of successful direct milItary intervention overseas, the Libyan civil war.
Where the objective of defending the legal and internationally recognised government has been successfully achieved.
However, Turkish military is still new to such geopolitical realities and concept of fighting War stand alone overseas. Thus, there is always room for further improvements.
Drawing from the lessons of Libya intervention and taking into account the nature of potential future conflicts on the soil Africa, (Mostly low intensity but usually long lasting) preferably, a joint Turkish Task force element in support of local allied force could look like this.
Primarily, Composed of three main components.
1. Air component.
2. Special Force component.
3. indirect precision ground fire support component.
The air component.
Thanks to the rapid development and induction of drone technologies, the air power has become cheap and easily accessible. It is no longer needed to field and maintain expensive manned fighter platforms in numbers to project credible air power against non state actors or state actors that lack necessary air defence capabilities.
And Türkiye being one of the pioneer countries in development of UCAVs and perhaps more importantly, being the first country to doctrinally adapt the large scale use of UCAVs in conventional war with unprecedented success, can maximally leverage its wide range of existing unmanned areal capabilities.
For example, MALE platforms like TB-2 and ANKA with their small logistical footprint can be deployed dry quickly in foreign air base/air fields, as they does not requirement majority of the heavy infrastructure that is necessary for manned fighter platform's sustainment.
And even heavier platforms like Akinci (that can pack the punch of manned platform in air to ground missions) can be deployed with relative ease. Perhaps in the long run Turkish Air Force could maintain one or two permanent air bases in Africa. where heavy manned and unmanned platforms can be deployed and sustained in the long run.
One such example could be the Libyan al-Watiya airbase. From there, Akinci or Aksungur (by leveraging their exceptional long range) can perform strike missions thousand miles deep in central African region.
The Special Force component
Turkish special Force command (OKK) is believed to be one of the best in the world. In the long run OKK could broadly adapt the doctrine of 'foreign internal defence' (FID) like US or UK special operation command. And systematically train, equip and consult the host nation forces to effectively fight the adversary.
That would be the primary objective of the Special Force element in the task force.
However, if circumstances demand, some of these special forces units in the task force can directly be deployed for high profile mission to achieve effect at operational and strategic level. For example, if necessary they can perform surgical strikes to take out enemy leadership, command and control, or penetrate deep into the enemy territory to provide speical reconnaissance that maybe beyond capability of local allied forces.
In such scenarios, few element of special aviation group could also be deployed to provide necessary rotary wing support to the command's missions.
The indirect fire support component
To the surprises of many, just a battalion or even a battery of long range 155mm heavy artillery can deliver desirable effect in shaping the battlefield at ranges.
Today, thanks to the development of long range precision guided artillery projectiles, coupled with easily available cheap unmanned areal ISTAR assets, artillery is lethal more than ever.
In international coalition force's fight against ISIS, a single M777 battery of 1st battalion, 10th Marine is allegedly killed more ISIS fighters more any other individual air and ground unit.
Similarly, a single battery of French Caesar howitzer were proven more deadly against ISIS than the Rafale squadron deployed in the region. (which was primarily for political posturing)
Turkish army could leverage its advanced Fritina or future ARPAN howitzers for similar roles in support of allied forces. And in case of further need, even a battery of KAPLAN MLRS could be deployed for deep strikes.
Secondary additional components.
1. A small but dedicated EW and Cyber unit could be added to the Task Force group. By achieving qualitative superiority in the cyber and electromagnetic spectrum, it can provide valuable timely Signal intelligence to help friendly force to stay ahead of enemy’s decision making cycles, as well as it can disrupt and delay adversary’s command and control capabilities by effectively jamming tactical communication. Thus, significantly undermining the adversary’s ability to timely integrate its seperate combat arms.
2. In addition to that, an air defence element could also be added as secondary components to avoid being caught unprepared against unpredictable escalation like we witnessed in 2020 al-Watiya airbase strike.
In this above mentioned operational framework, on average a Turkish Task force's numbers won't exceed more than thousand personal. Economically sustainable, politically acceptable, with minimum effort able to deliver maximum effects.
Also in this context, I believe the flag ship of Turkish navy TCG Anadolu along with its unique first of its kind UCAV air wing has a lot of growth potential for such task force operation.
Moreover, the induction of very long range precision strike capability on surface and subsurface platforms of the Turkish navy in the near future (notably Gezgin cruise missile) would add new dimension in this regard.
And in the long run, as Turkish economy and military capabilities grows, it may become feasible to deploy a division size expeditionary task force (airborne and amphibious) in response to rapidly escalating larger conflicts.
Edit- I just realised this post would be more relevant in Foreign policy and geopolitics thread. However, I think it is not totally irrelevant here. So, I will just leave it here, until any of mods may want to move it in the foreign policy thread.
No, I am not advocating any delusional thinking here. Like, oh hey, soon global South will take over the West or something.
Rather, i am trying to bring attention to the hard fact that, an increasingly multi-polar world (with future superpower like PRC and India as well as the rise of independent regional powers like Turkey, Indonesia, Brazil and Mexico) is upsetting the post world War ii arrangement of the International order.
Consequently, the Western led Global institutions that kept the relative stability for the last 30 years through soft and hard powers in various part of the world, is struggling more and more to stay adequate in response to rapidly escalating great power competition/hostility, and rising regional instabilities.
In this context, African continent due to its very dysfunctional political and economic landscape would likely to be the forefront of world instabilities and potential future conflicts.
However, because of its enormous natural recourse and booming demographic it is no longer feasible to simply ignore the continent in an increasingly competitive world, where big and medium developing countries (in various phases of industrialisation) that lacks enough natural resources of their own are hungrier than ever for recourse grab however they can, to keep rolling the wheel of their highly demanding industrialising economies. (One such example is obviously PRC and the scale of its long term involvement in Africa)
On the other hand, the only world institution that kept somewhat relative peace and stability through hard power in the continent is UN.
However, due to the rapidly escalating stand off between the members of its own security council, it would be increasingly harder for UN to approve peacekeeping mission and deploy adequate peacekeeping force.
Russia and France are both declining powers. Evidently, they are gradually loosing their long held grip in Africa.
While maybe they are now unable to take long term initiatives to achieve their economic and foreign policy goals, but never underestimate the desperation of declining powers and their ability fuel instabilities and create chaos. (In that sense, Russians are proven to be quite ruthless)
By analyzing the increasing numbers of Turkish foreign policy initiatives in the African Continent for last ten years or so, we can deduce that, to navigate such highly complex and dangerous geopolitical landscape through soft power and hard power, (when necessary) Republic of Türkiye has undertaken a long term Africa strategy In alignment with its grand Foreign policy goal to ensure its strategic autonomy and independence and perhaps develop a sphere of influence of its own.
Now, there is an infinite room for discussion and debate on various aspect of this Africa strategy, from defence export diplomacy to critical infrastructure development projects, etc. Here I only want to present my few observations on the potential hard power aspect of this strategy. In other words, the direct military involvement of Türkiye.
While there is no doubt that, Turkish armed force stand as one of the finest in the world and second largest in NATO, it has its limitations.
Turkish armed force does not posses the resources, technologies, hardwares, manpower and reaches of world super powers like United States or People's republic of China and necessary soft power to complement the hard power. Thus, long term deployment/stationing of large conventional Forces is neither practical (unsustainable for a developing Turkish economy) nor pragmatic (as there likely to be immense political pressure from unfriendly world powers and even direct economic consequences through sanctions)
Of course, that does not mean Türkiye would abandon any kind of direct military intervention. In fact far from it, as Libya conflict showed, there is enough political will in Ankara to take calculated risk to protect and preserve its overseas interests.
Inherently, any military intervention is a mean to achieve certain political end-goal. However, hard power alone cannot do that.
Here, finding the right balance between the 'combined arms' of diplomacy, soft power and hard power is critical for success.
Efficiency is the key. Any deployed Turkish task force has to be small enough to be economically sustainable and politically acceptable (does not attract too much 'attention' in the international stage) but capable enough to achieve the end-goal.
Here, Turkish armed forces already has one such example of successful direct milItary intervention overseas, the Libyan civil war.
Where the objective of defending the legal and internationally recognised government has been successfully achieved.
However, Turkish military is still new to such geopolitical realities and concept of fighting War stand alone overseas. Thus, there is always room for further improvements.
Drawing from the lessons of Libya intervention and taking into account the nature of potential future conflicts on the soil Africa, (Mostly low intensity but usually long lasting) preferably, a joint Turkish Task force element in support of local allied force could look like this.
Primarily, Composed of three main components.
1. Air component.
2. Special Force component.
3. indirect precision ground fire support component.
The air component.
Thanks to the rapid development and induction of drone technologies, the air power has become cheap and easily accessible. It is no longer needed to field and maintain expensive manned fighter platforms in numbers to project credible air power against non state actors or state actors that lack necessary air defence capabilities.
And Türkiye being one of the pioneer countries in development of UCAVs and perhaps more importantly, being the first country to doctrinally adapt the large scale use of UCAVs in conventional war with unprecedented success, can maximally leverage its wide range of existing unmanned areal capabilities.
For example, MALE platforms like TB-2 and ANKA with their small logistical footprint can be deployed dry quickly in foreign air base/air fields, as they does not requirement majority of the heavy infrastructure that is necessary for manned fighter platform's sustainment.
And even heavier platforms like Akinci (that can pack the punch of manned platform in air to ground missions) can be deployed with relative ease. Perhaps in the long run Turkish Air Force could maintain one or two permanent air bases in Africa. where heavy manned and unmanned platforms can be deployed and sustained in the long run.
One such example could be the Libyan al-Watiya airbase. From there, Akinci or Aksungur (by leveraging their exceptional long range) can perform strike missions thousand miles deep in central African region.
The Special Force component
Turkish special Force command (OKK) is believed to be one of the best in the world. In the long run OKK could broadly adapt the doctrine of 'foreign internal defence' (FID) like US or UK special operation command. And systematically train, equip and consult the host nation forces to effectively fight the adversary.
That would be the primary objective of the Special Force element in the task force.
However, if circumstances demand, some of these special forces units in the task force can directly be deployed for high profile mission to achieve effect at operational and strategic level. For example, if necessary they can perform surgical strikes to take out enemy leadership, command and control, or penetrate deep into the enemy territory to provide speical reconnaissance that maybe beyond capability of local allied forces.
In such scenarios, few element of special aviation group could also be deployed to provide necessary rotary wing support to the command's missions.
The indirect fire support component
To the surprises of many, just a battalion or even a battery of long range 155mm heavy artillery can deliver desirable effect in shaping the battlefield at ranges.
Today, thanks to the development of long range precision guided artillery projectiles, coupled with easily available cheap unmanned areal ISTAR assets, artillery is lethal more than ever.
In international coalition force's fight against ISIS, a single M777 battery of 1st battalion, 10th Marine is allegedly killed more ISIS fighters more any other individual air and ground unit.
Similarly, a single battery of French Caesar howitzer were proven more deadly against ISIS than the Rafale squadron deployed in the region. (which was primarily for political posturing)
Turkish army could leverage its advanced Fritina or future ARPAN howitzers for similar roles in support of allied forces. And in case of further need, even a battery of KAPLAN MLRS could be deployed for deep strikes.
Secondary additional components.
1. A small but dedicated EW and Cyber unit could be added to the Task Force group. By achieving qualitative superiority in the cyber and electromagnetic spectrum, it can provide valuable timely Signal intelligence to help friendly force to stay ahead of enemy’s decision making cycles, as well as it can disrupt and delay adversary’s command and control capabilities by effectively jamming tactical communication. Thus, significantly undermining the adversary’s ability to timely integrate its seperate combat arms.
2. In addition to that, an air defence element could also be added as secondary components to avoid being caught unprepared against unpredictable escalation like we witnessed in 2020 al-Watiya airbase strike.
In this above mentioned operational framework, on average a Turkish Task force's numbers won't exceed more than thousand personal. Economically sustainable, politically acceptable, with minimum effort able to deliver maximum effects.
Also in this context, I believe the flag ship of Turkish navy TCG Anadolu along with its unique first of its kind UCAV air wing has a lot of growth potential for such task force operation.
Moreover, the induction of very long range precision strike capability on surface and subsurface platforms of the Turkish navy in the near future (notably Gezgin cruise missile) would add new dimension in this regard.
And in the long run, as Turkish economy and military capabilities grows, it may become feasible to deploy a division size expeditionary task force (airborne and amphibious) in response to rapidly escalating larger conflicts.
Edit- I just realised this post would be more relevant in Foreign policy and geopolitics thread. However, I think it is not totally irrelevant here. So, I will just leave it here, until any of mods may want to move it in the foreign policy thread.
Last edited:
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I have a feeling that sooner or later Turkey will get involved
It doesnt make sense to give the whole pie to either Russia or France after all
Just cant stop laughing, lol
It doesnt make sense to give the whole pie to either Russia or France after all
Just cant stop laughing, lol
Last edited:
Ecderha
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may because they saw the newsI have a feeling that sooner or later Turkey will get involved
It doesnt make sense to give the whole pie to either Russia or France after all
Just cant stop laughing, lol
