Alliance with jihadis gave most Tuaregs second thoughts about teaming up with the Islamist nutballs. So they worked with the French when their offensive rolled north. Tuaregs continue to work with the French to hunt down jihadis.
But that cooperation won't last if this keeps up:
President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita won power with a pledge to resurrect a "strong and united" Mali from the ashes of a war against Islamists militants yet six months later he has done little to heal the wounds of the conflict.
Elected with a reputation as a strongman, Keita has focused on restoring control over Mali's army after a March 2012 coup. The putsch plunged Mali into chaos that allowed Islamists to seize the north, forcing France to intervene in its ex-colony.
But the conservative 69-year-old, known by his initials IBK, has not addressed the grievances of Tuareg separatists whose uprising sparked the conflict nor to salve the ethnic hatred it left behind.
While I can't accept Tuareg cooperation with jihadis as an answer to their grievances, the Tuaregs do have a lot of grievances. Some level of autonomy seems in order to keep the Tuaregs happy
And given the inability of the Mali army to force Tuaregs to sit there and take it, what choice does Mali's southern-dominated government have? Their army broke and fled, which is why France and other nations have troops there now.
Given this attitude, all the French-led effort has achieved--other than a bunch of dead jihadis, which is always a good thing, who massed during their period of dominance--is a pause between revolts.
