Word: chadness
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FROLINAT spokesmen in Algiers deny that FROLINAT receives outside support from neighboring countries. In earlier stages of the war, FROLINAT forces were using southern Libya as a base of operations. But Libya recently agreed to stop aiding the guerrillas in Chad as a condition for receiving 100 Mirage jets from France...
...help that Algeria may be giving the guerrillas is strictly unofficial. In compliance with its membership in the Organization of African Unity (OAU), Algeria cannot openly support an insurgent group within another OAU nation, in this case, Chad. It is suspected that the Algerians may have trained Chadian guerrillas in the Sarara desert at one time, but the Algerian government denies it. At the same time, the Algerians refuse to admit FROLINAT has an office in Algiers...
...have the French risked international criticisms of imperialism for their involvement in what appears to be an exceedingly poor country? African specialists point out that there may be two reasons. Chad is of strategic military importance serving as the center of a French communications and military network. Former French Minister of the Armed Forces Pierre Mesmer once boasted that France could dispatch a regiment of paratroopers anywhere in Africa within 24 hours. (The 1963 coup in Gabon was reversed within a day by French paratroopers believed to have been airlifted from Fort Lamy...
...addition, geologists point out that Chad is likely to have untapped oases of oil beneath her burning desert sands. They suspect that a rich uranium belt that underlies the Central African Republic stretches into Chad as well. France may be eyeing such resources for the development of her atomic stockpiles...
This wealth is not visible on the surface, however, where 3.5 million peasants live, most of them working the sandy soils in subsistance farming. Economically, Chad is presently one of the poorest countries in Africa...