Ben Schreiner: Hidden Agenda behind America's War on Africa.

Containing China by fighting Al Qaeda. Harnessing Asia's growth and dynamism is central to American economic and strategic interests. Hillary Clinton. Frances military intervention into Mali may at first glance appear to have little to do with the US pivot to Asia. But as a French mission supposedly meant to bolster a UN 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 US Asia pivot. Widening Intervention: The geopolitical posturing over the crisis in Mali, coming as France's intervention fans out across the region, is no more evident, than in the public statements coming from both London and Washington. As British Prime Minister David Cameron declared, the crisis in Mali will require a response that is about years, even decades, rather than months. Backing up such bluster, Britain has reportedly joined France in dispatching special commando teams to Mali, in addition to surveillance drones. In Washington, the talk of a long war to be waged across the entire Sahel region of Africa has also begun. As one US official, speaking on the Western intervention into Mali warned Monday, it is going to take a long time, and time means that it could take several years. Such remarks mirror those made by the outgoing US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton: This is going to be a very serious, ongoing threat, because if you look at the size of northern Mali, if you look at the topography, its not only desert, it's caves, Clinton remarked. Sounds reminiscent. We are in for a struggle, but it is a necessary struggle. We cannot permit northern Mali to become a safe haven. According to the Los Angeles Times, the safe haven refrain is also pulsating through the corridors of the Pentagon. Some top Pentagon officials and military officers warn, that without more aggressive US action, the Times reports, Mali could become a haven for extremists, akin to Afghanistan before the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. As the American public is prepped for the opening of a new front in the unending war on terror, US intervention accelerates. As the Washington Post reports, the US is now offering aerial refueling to French warplanes, along with planes to transport soldiers from other African nations.