Commentary by Russian military journalist Boris Rozhin
[ColonelCassad] In retaliation for the ambush on the convoy of the Malian Armed Forces and the Wagner PMC,
| …the work of the CSP-DPA alliance— the latest name of the Azawad (Tuareg) separatists… |
The strikes were carried out not by the Malian or Wagner PMC air forces, but by the Burkina Faso Air Force, which used Turkish Bayraktar reconnaissance and strike UAVs, which feel at ease in this theater of operations with virtually no air defense (unlike in Ukraine).
| Ouch. That was not delicately said. |
In general, this is a kind of retaliation for the recent ambush.
It is worth noting that Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger have recently formed a military defense alliance that provides for the possibility of military operations by members of the bloc on each other's territory in the interests of combating terrorism.
So it can be confirmed that the air force of Burkina Faso has already been involved in joint operations of the Armed Forces of Mali and the Wagner PMC near the border with Algeria.
According to a number of reports, additional reinforcements have been transferred from Libya and Syria to Mali. Negotiations are also underway with the Tauregs on the ransom of captured Wagner PMC fighters.
More from regnum.ru
Mali's retaliatory strike sets up Tuareg militant camp in Tinhavatin
Fierce battles with terrorists continue in Mali — combat aircraft have retaliated by striking the location of a Tuareg group and foreign mercenaries in Tinhavatin. It is preliminarily known that at least 40 militants have been eliminated and up to 70 more wounded. The details were reported by Voyennoye Obozreniye.
FRENCH TROOPS IN MALI
The second blow to the group's camp was dealt when the militants tried to start transporting "three hundredths" across the border. The publication assumes that they are foreign mercenaries, including Ukrainian ones.
If earlier the Ukrainian media wrote about the successes of mercenaries in Mali, now they have fallen silent, the authors noted.
| Eerily silent. Except for the ominous music building in the background, which is a signal of what’s to come… |
“The joy of the ‘victory’ on the part of the terrorist group, which was supported by Ukrainian militants with funds and under the supervision of Western intelligence services, turned out to be short-lived,” the experts noted.
The Malian army has already published statements that drone operators tracked the movements of militants, after which the data was transmitted to the command post. Then the order to destroy them was received.
Unofficial sources indicate that two surviving Wagner employees are in captivity, and their condition is still unknown.
As reported by the Regnum news agency, joint forces of the Wagner PMC and the Malian Armed Forces fought fierce battles with rebels and Al-Qaeda (a terrorist organization banned in the Russian Federation) in the vicinity of the town of Tinzauten on July 22–27.
On July 28, the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Mali reported that the army was launching massive strikes on terrorist and smuggler concentration sites, the statement noted.
The bodies of the dead Wagner Group fighters, as well as those captured during the clashes with the Tuaregs, must be returned to Russia, Dmitry Rogozin, a member of the Federation Council from the Zaporozhye region, called on July 29.