By Ben Schreiner, Global Research:
"France’s military intervention into Mali may at first glance appear to have little to do with the U.S. 'pivot' to Asia. But as a French mission supposedly meant to bolster a U.N. sanctioned and African-led intervention has gone from 'a question of weeks' to 'the total re-conquest of Mali,' what may have begun as a French affair has now become a Western intervention. And this in turn has drawn wider strategic interests into the conflict. Strategic interests, it is becoming clearer, shaped by the imperatives of the U.S. Asia pivot."
