Kings of the World

The Intercept website has a story on a secret US base at Garoua in northern Cameroon, near the Nigerian border. Garoua represents the newest expansion of America’s stealth war against Boko Haram jihadists in Africa.

Piloted and unmanned aircraft have flown from bases in Djibouti — the center of U.S. drone operations on the continent — as well as Ethiopia and Kenya, in addition to ships off the coast of East Africa. Predator MQ-1 drones and their larger cousins, MQ-9 Reapers, have been based in Niamey in Niger, N’Djamena in Chad, and Seychelles International Airport. There is plenty more to come. The National Defense Authorization Act for 2016 appropriated $50 million for construction of an “Airfield and Base Camp at Agadez, Niger … to support operations in western Africa.”

A detachment of Gray Eagle MQ-1C drones and their military support team became freed up from other surveillance operations last year, Africom looked for a base in the heart of the combat zone. The U.S. military already had a relationship with the Cameroon military — Special Forces work with Cameroon’s rapid response brigade, known by the French acronym BIR, an elite unit based primarily along the border with Nigeria — and was familiar with Garoua. The newest drone base constitutes a high-cost, high-tech military enterprise plunked down in a poor, under-developed country in Africa. In early February, the base became fully operational, hosting a fleet of four Gray Eagle drones, a successor to the original Predator, manufactured by General Atomics. The four drones, which can carry out surveillance missions in rotation 24 hours a day, allow U.S. intelligence analysts to gather detailed information about Boko Haram’s movements, bomb-making factories, and military camps.

The alliance is with an unsavory African strongman: Cameroonian President Paul Biya, who has clung to power for 33 years, almost as long as Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, and is regarded as a corrupt, remote, and authoritarian leader. A Human Rights Foundation report in 2014 stated that “Biya has built a system of corrupt and autocratic power, using the legal and justice system to imprison and bankrupt dissidents, opposition leaders, and journalists. … The secret police prowl university campuses, the army regularly patrols urban centers, and state permission is required for public assembly.” Biya had reportedly amassed a personal fortune of more than $200 million — compared to the average Cameroonian income of $1,350 a year.

The US drones soaring overhead reminds them of Cameroon’s poverty and powerlessness, and heightened their sense of being pawns in a global game. “You Americans are kings of the world, you have no borders,” Djonga said. “All we can do is go along.”

Full Story Here

Africom Prepares the Ground

US Special Operations Forces will participate in another training exercise in Africa later this month, the US Africa Command (AFRICOM) announced. It is scheduled to take place in Senegal and extend into Mauritania. 1,700 Special Operation Forces from more than 30 nations are expected to participate in the exercise

Later in June another military exercise called Central Accord is planned. The event will be the second Central Accord exercise hosted by the Gabon’s Armed Forces.

Africom’s campaign blueprint is a five-year plan with five lines of effort:

The first is neutralizing the terror group al-Shabab in Somalia, officials said, and transitioning this effort from a mission led by the African Union Mission in Somalia to one in which the Somali government secures its own territory.

The second line of effort centers around the failed state of Libya, officials said, adding that the effort focuses on containing the instability in the country.

The third line of effort is to contain Boko Haram in West Africa.

Fourth, officials said, Africom will focus on disrupting illicit activity in the Gulf of Guinea and in Central Africa.

Fifth, the command looks to build African partners’ peacekeeping and disaster assistance capabilities, officials said.

The only permanent location the United States have is Camp Lemonnier in Djibouti but they do possess “cold bases” that would only be used in the event of an emergency. The bases allow the command to protect American lives and property in the high-risk, high-threat posts. There are 15 of those posts in Africa, US officials said.

Meanwhile, naval personnel from Eastern Africa, Western Indian Ocean island nations, Europe and the US, as well as several international organisations have commenced the multinational maritime exercise Cutlass Express. Cutlass Express tactical commander and Task Force 65/Destroyer Squadron 60 deputy commodore Captain Tate Westbrook said: "Security of commerce, protection of maritime economic assets, and the prevention of piracy and illicit trafficking is a critical mission that directly affects all maritime nations. Once again Djibouti was a key base. 

Africom Again

U.S. AFRICOM (Africa Command) reported that it had carried out 679 activities (missions, programs, and exercises) in 2014. This includes training, advising, intelligence gathering (via UAV, manned aircraft or people on the ground), logistical or technical assistance and so on. That was 23 percent more than in 2013 and four times as many as 2008 the first year AFRICOM was in charge of all American military activities in Africa. The number of activities (many of them classified SOCOM missions) is expected to be more than 20 percent higher in 2015.

So why is Africom HQ located in Stuttgart, Germany?

No country in Africa wanted to risk the political blowback from hosting a major American military headquarters. Locating a HQ in an African country is probably never going to happen.

There is one official U.S. military base in Africa, in Djibouti. France and the United States SOCOM (Special Operations Command) have had special operations forces (commandos and special aircraft) stationed in Djibouti, which is next to northern Somalia, for years. France has had commandos there for over a decade and the U.S. moved in after September 11, 2001. But you don’t hear much about this.

France has been building up their special operations capability in Djibouti since 2006 in anticipation of problems in Eritrea and Somalia, both of which are involved in disputes with Ethiopia. The Addis Ababa (Ethiopia)-Djibouti railroad is pretty lucrative for Djibouti and France (because it is Ethiopia’s main outlet to the sea), and fighting between Ethiopia and either of its neighbors could create problems there.

American Special Forces in Djibouti have a base near the main French one. It’s pretty easy to spot on Google Earth. Less easy to spot is the fact that France and SOCOM also have access to one or more Ethiopian air bases. American UAVs operate from Ethiopia and Djibouti. The UAVs are sometimes armed with missiles. Some of these armed UAVs are believed to have (until early 2015) also operated out of Yemen air bases. When not attacking al Qaeda targets in Yemen, these UAVs are sometimes seen across the water in Somalia. UAVs are now operating out of a new base in Niger, to cover Mali. By 2010 there was even a small, and unofficial, CIA base in Mogadishu, the traditional capital of Somalia. The CIA, and similar outfits from other nations, also work from Djibouti. But most of the effort is directed at monitoring what is going on in the region (mainly Somalia and Yemen but also Eritrea, Nigeria, Kenya, Mali and Ethiopia), not at interfering with the local terrorists. Not much, anyway. The Djibouti base also supports operations throughout the Sahel.

The U.S. also has a number of other airports in central and southern Africa where it has agreements to quietly allow its military and contractor aircraft to operate. American warplanes (especially the very-long range F-15E) operate out of Persian Gulf air bases and have apparently carried out smart bomb attacks in Yemen, Somalia, and perhaps elsewhere in Africa. Throughout the region there are often large explosions at night. If a smart bomb was dropped from a high enough altitude, there would just be the explosion and yet another mystery no one was keen to solve.

From here

http://www.matthewaid.com/post/117507105376/what-is-africom-doing-in-africa

Military Missions Reach Record Levels After U.S. Inks Deal To Remain in Africa For Decades

For three days, wearing a kaleidoscope of camouflage patterns, they huddled together on a military base in Florida. They came from U.S. Special Operations Command (SOCOM) and U.S. Army Special Operations Command, from France and Norway, from Denmark, Germany, and Canada: 13 nations in all. They came to plan a years-long “Special Operations-centric” military campaign supported by conventional forces, a multinational undertaking that -- if carried out -- might cost hundreds of millions, maybe billions, of dollars and who knows how many lives.

Ask the men involved and they'll talk about being mindful of “sensitivities” and “cultural differences,” about the importance of “collaboration and coordination,” about the value of a variety of viewpoints, about “perspectives” and “partnerships.”  Nonetheless, behind closed doors and unbeknownst to most of the people in their own countries, let alone the countries fixed in their sights, a coterie of Western special ops planners were sketching out a possible multinational military future for a troubled region of Africa.

Boko Haram War Hotting up

http://www.globalresearch.ca/us-africom-commander-calls-for-huge-military-campaign-in-west-africa/5429010

US Africa Command (AFRICOM) head General David Rodriguez called for a large-scale US-led “counterinsurgency” campaign against groups in West Africa.

The US should prepare for operations in at least four West African countries as part of a “huge international and multinational” response aimed at forces affiliated with Boko Haram, Rodriguez said. AFRICOM is already preparing an “across the board response to the threat,” Rodriguez said. Rodriguez called on the Nigerian government to “let us help more and more.”

US Secretary of State John Kerry during his visit to Nigera said that the US is ready to “do more” militarily in Nigeria.  Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee Ed Royce is scheduled to meet with the Nigerian ambassador to the US, Ade Adefuye, known to be a strong advocate of US military intervention in Nigeria, according to Nigeria’s the Guardian. Representatives Patrick Meehan and Peter King demanded that the US implement “a comprehensive strategy to address Boko Haram’s growing lethality” in letters to Secretary Kerry posted in mid-January. The Obama administration is also preparing to approve the sale of Cobra jet fighters to Nigerian government, according to the Guardian.

At a the US Army West Point academy last week, US Special Operations Command (SOCOM) chief General Joseph Votel said that US commando teams must prepare for new deployments against Boko Haram and the Islamic State. “[Boko Haram] is creating fertile ground for expansion into other areas,” Votel said. “While it isn’t a direct threat to the homeland, it is impacting indirectly our interests in this particular area and creating another area of instability,” the top US special forces officer said. Votel warned that radical Islamic groups are gaining tens of thousands of new fighters.

Rodriguez and Votel’s statements coincided with plans announced by the African Union last week to deploy a 7,500-strong multinational force in the name of fighting Boko Haram and “other extremist groups.” The AU multinational force will serve as the vehicle for further infiltration of US forces into West Africa, while providing support for and legitimizing the already significant US military presence in the strategically crucial, resource region. The intervention will proceed amidst elaborate war game exercises led by US Special Operations Command (SOCOM), known as Operation Flintlock, to be coordinated with a number of West African and European militaries beginning in mid-February. Last week, Chadian jet fighters and ground troops launched cross-border attacks against the Nigerian towns of Gamboru, Kolfata and Malumfatori, reportedly driving Boko Haram fighters out of the area. Boko Haram launched repeated assaults against northern capital of Maiduguri, home to some 2 million residents, reportedly utilizing heavy weapons including RPGs and artillery. The Nigerian military claims that hundreds of Boko Haram fighters were killed during the attacks.

US Marines set for go

The US Marine Corps' unit responsible for responding to crises in Africa arrived in Spain this weekend for a six-month deployment. More than 1,000 North Carolina-based will become the latest to staff Special Purpose Marine Air-Ground Task Force-Crisis Response-Africa. The unit is manned by infantry, logistics and aviation Marines on a rotating basis.

The units include 2nd Marine Regiment and 2nd Battalion, 8th Marines, from Camp Lejeune; Marine Wing Support Squadron 272 and Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 266 from Marine Corps Air Station New River; and Marine Aerial Refueler Transport Squadron 252from MCAS Cherry Point. The Marines deployed with a dozen MV-22B Ospreys tiltrotor aircraft, four KC-130J Super Hercules aerial refueling tankers and one UC-12 Huron turbo-prop plane, which is a small aircraft often used for passenger and cargo transportation or medical evacuation. The Osprey and Super Hercules team has proven vital for land-based crisis response units. About a year ago, the special purpose MAGTF used KC-130s and MV-22s to slingshot Marines across the continent of Africa from their base in Móron to reach the embassy in Juba, South Sudan. With that country facing violent unrest, the unit led the operation to evacuate embassy personnel. In July, two Ospreys from the crisis response force kept watch on a convoy during a ground evacuation of the U.S. Embassy in Libya as State Department personnel were moved across the border to Tunisia.

While in Spain, the Marines will engage in international military exchanges and training exercises with partner nations. But their top priority is to stand ready to respond to unforeseen crisis on a moment's notice. To prepare for their deployment, the Marines participated in a five-day exercise meant to simulate many of the unpredictable crisis response missions they could be called on to conduct. The exercise, held across North Carolina and Virginia, was meant to test commanders' — and their troops' — ability to operate across a widely dispersed area as they likely will in Africa. Marines were tasked with delivering aid to a fictitious country following a simulated earthquake, according to a Marine news release. That required Marines to respond to instability in the wake of the natural disaster by evacuating a mock embassy.

http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/story/military/careers/2015/01/05/marines-deploy-in-support-of-crisis-response-force-africa/21298641/

Chad - the proxy army of the US

The U.S. military are busy  building something in Chad. Not a huge facility, not a mini-American town, but a small camp. U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) still insists that there is no Chadian base, that the camp serves only as temporary lodgings to support a Special Operations training exercise to be held next year. It also refused to comment about another troop deployment to Chad. It is an U.S. alliance with a regime whose “most significant human rights problems,” according to the most recent country report by the State Department’s Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, “were security force abuse, including torture; harsh prison conditions; and discrimination and violence against women and children,” not to mention the restriction of freedom of speech, press, assembly, and movement, as well as arbitrary arrest and detention, denial of fair public trial, executive influence on the judiciary, property seizures, child labor and forced labor (that also includes children), among other abuses. Amnesty International further found that human rights violations “are committed with almost total impunity by members of the Chadian military, the Presidential Guard, and the state intelligence bureau, the Agence Nationale de Securité.” Chad’s peacekeeping forces were accused of stoking sectarian strife by supporting Muslim militias against Christian fighters. Then, on March 29th, a Chadian military convoy arrived in a crowded marketplace in the capital, Bangui. There, according to a United Nations report, the troops “reportedly opened fire on the population without any provocation. At the time, the market was full of people, including many girls and women buying and selling produce. As panic-stricken people fled in all directions, the soldiers allegedly continued firing indiscriminately.”

In all, 30 civilians were reportedly killed and more than 300 were wounded.

The new American compound is to be located near the capital, N’Djamena. The U.S. has previously employed N’Djamena as a hub for its air operations. What’s striking is the terminology used in the official documents. After years of adamant claims that the U.S. military has just one lonely base in all of Africa -- Camp Lemonnier in the tiny Horn of Africa nation of Djibouti -- Army commercial contracts documents state that it will now have “base camp facilities” in Chad. An Army solicitation from September sought “building materials for use in Chad,” while supporting documents specifically mention an “operations center/multi-use facility.” That same month, the Army awarded a contract for the transport of equipment from Niamey, Niger, the home of another of the growing network of U.S. outposts in Africa, to N’Djamena. The Army also began seeking out contractors capable of supplying close to 600 bunk beds that could support an American-sized weight of 200 to 225 pounds for a facility “in and around the N'Djamena region.” And just last month, the military put out a call for a contractor to supply construction equipment -- a bulldozer, dump truck, excavator, and the like -- for a project in N'Djamena.

Even without a base, the United States has for more than a decade poured copious amounts of money, time, and effort into making Chad a stable regional counterterrorism partner, sending troops there, training and equipping its army, counseling its military leaders, providing tens of millions of dollars in aid, funding its military expeditions, supplying its army with equipment ranging from tents to trucks, donating additional equipment for its domestic security forces, providing a surveillance and security system for its border security agents, and looking the other way when its military employed child soldiers.

This increased U.S. interest in Chad follows on the heels of a push by France, the nation’s former colonial overlord and America’s current premier proxy in Africa, to beef up its military footprint on the continent. In July, following U.S.-backed French military interventions in Mali and the Central African Republic, French President François Hollande announced a new mission, Operation Barkhane (a term for a crescent-shaped sand dune found in the Sahara). Its purpose: a long-term counterterrorism operation involving 3,000 French troops deployed to a special forces outpost in Burkina Faso and forward operating bases in Mali, Niger, and not surprisingly, Chad. In recent years, the U.S. military has been involved in a continual process of expanding its presence in Africa. Out of public earshot, officials have talked about setting up a string of small bases across the northern tier of the continent. Indeed, over the last years, U.S. staging areas, mini-bases, and outposts have popped up in the contiguous nations of Senegal, Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, and, skipping Chad, in the Central African Republic, followed by South Sudan, Uganda, Kenya, Ethiopia, and Djibouti. A staunch American ally with a frequent and perhaps enduring American troop presence, Chad seems like the natural spot for still another military compound -- the only missing link in a long chain of countries stretching from west to east, from one edge of the continent to the other -- even if AFRICOM continues to insist that there’s no American “base” in the works.

In June, according to the State Department, the deputy commander of U.S. Army Africa (USARAF), Brigadier General Kenneth H. Moore, Jr., visited Chad to “celebrate the successful conclusion of a partnership between USARAF and the Chadian Armed Forces.” Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus arrived in that landlocked country at the same time to meet with “top Chadian officials.” His visit, according to an embassy press release, “underscored the importance of bilateral relations between the two countries, as well as military cooperation.” And that cooperation has been ample.

Earlier this year, Chadian troops joined those of the United States, Burkina Faso, Canada, France, Mauritania, the Netherlands, Nigeria, Senegal, the United Kingdom, and host nation Niger for three weeks of military drills as part of Flintlock 2014, an annual Special Ops counterterrorism exercise. Then soldiers from Chad, Cameroon, Burundi, Gabon, Nigeria, the Republic of Congo, the Netherlands, and the United States took part in another annual training exercise, Central Accord 2014. The Army also sent medical personnel to mentor Chadian counterparts in “tactical combat casualty care,” while Marines and Navy personnel traveled to Chad to train that country’s militarized anti-poaching park rangers in small unit tactics and patrolling. A separate contingent of Marines conducted military intelligence training with Chadian officers and non-commissioned officers. The scenario for the final exercise, also involving personnel from Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Mauritania, Senegal, and Tunisia, had a ripped-from-the-headlines quality: “preparing for an unconventional war against an insurgent threat in Mali.”

As for U.S. Army Africa, it sent trainers as part of a separate effort to provide Chadian troops with instruction on patrolling and fixed-site defense as well as live-fire training. “We are ready to begin training in Chad for about 1,300 soldiers -- an 850 man battalion, plus another 450 man battalion,” said Colonel John Ruffing, the Security Cooperation director of U.S. Army Africa, noting that the U.S. was working in tandem with a French private security firm.

In September, AFRICOM reaffirmed its close ties with Chad by renewing an Acquisition Cross Servicing Agreement, which allows both militaries to purchase from each other or trade for basic supplies. The open-ended pact, said Brigadier General James Vechery, AFRICOM’s director for logistics, “will continue to strengthen our bilateral cooperation on international security issues... as well as the interoperability of the armed forces of both nations.”

With Chad, the United States finds itself more deeply involved with yet another authoritarian government and another atrocity-prone proxy force. In this, it continues a long series of mistakes, missteps, and mishaps across Africa. These include an intervention in Libya that transformed the country from an autocracy into a near-failed state, training efforts that produced coup leaders in Mali and Burkina Faso, American nation-building that led to a failed state in South Sudan, anti-piracy measures that flopped in the Gulf of Guinea, the many fiascos of the Trans-Sahara Counterterrorism Partnership, the training of an elite Congolese unit that committed mass rapes and other atrocities, problem-plagued humanitarian efforts in Djibouti and Ethiopia, and the steady rise of terror groups in U.S.-backed countries like Nigeria and Tunisia.

Full story on Countercurrent website

Questions Re US Response To Ebola Outbreak In Liberia

On September 16, President Obama announced a multimillion-dollar U.S. response to the spreading contagion. Obama's announcement comes on the heels of growing international impatience with what critics have called the U.S. government's "infuriatingly" slow response to the outbreak.
Assistance efforts have already stoked controversy, with a noticeable privilege of care being afforded to foreign healthcare workers over Africans.

After two infected American missionaries were administered Zmapp, a life-saving experimental drug, controversy exploded when reports emerged that Doctors Without Borders had previously decided not to administer it to the Sierra Leonean doctor Sheik Umar Khan, who succumbed to Ebola after helping to lead the country's fight against the disease. The World Health Organization similarly refused to evacuate the prominent Sierra Leonean doctor Olivet Buck, who later died of the disease as well.

The Pentagon provoked its own controversy when it announced plans to deploy a $22 million, 25-bed U.S. military field hospital—reportedly for foreign health workers only.
One particular component of the latest assistance package promises to be controversial as well: namely, the deployment of 3,000 U.S. troops to Liberia, where the U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) will establish a joint command operations base to serve as a logistics and training center for medical responders. see earlier post here

Few would oppose a robust U.S. response to the Ebola crisis, but the militarized nature of the White House plan comes in the context of a broader U.S.-led militarization of the region. The soldiers in Liberia, after all, will not be the only American troops on the African continent. In the six years of AFRICOM's existence, the U.S. military has steadily and quietly been building its presence on the continent through drone bases and partnerships with local militaries.

The U.S. operation in Liberia warrants many questions. Will military contractors be used in the construction of facilities and execution of programs? Will the U.S.-built treatment centers be temporary or permanent? Will the treatment centers double as research labs? What is the timeline for exiting the country? And perhaps most significantly for the long term, will the Liberian operation base serve as a staging ground for non-Ebola related military operations?
The use of the U.S. military in this operation should raise red flags for the American public as well. After all, if the military truly is the governmental institution best equipped to handle this outbreak, it speaks worlds about the neglect of civilian programs at home as well as abroad.

whole article here

US - Winning Hearts and Minds In Africa

The U.S. is trying to win a war for the hearts and minds of Africa.  But a Pentagon investigation suggests that those mystery projects somewhere out there in Djibouti or Ethiopia or Kenya or here in Tanzania may well be orphaned, ill-planned, and undocumented failures-in-the-making.  According to the Department of Defense’s watchdog agency, U.S. military officials in Africa “did not adequately plan or execute” missions designed to win over Africans deemed vulnerable to the lures of violent extremism.
This evidence of failure in the earliest stages of the U.S. military’s hearts-and-minds campaign should have an eerie resonance for anyone who has followed its previous efforts to use humanitarian aid and infrastructure projects to sway local populations in Vietnam, Iraq, or Afghanistan.  In each case, the operations failed in spectacular ways, but were only fully acknowledged after years of futility and billions of dollars in waste.

Today, the U.S. military increasingly confronts Africa as a "battlefield" or "battleground" or "war" in the words of the men running its operations.  To that end, it has built a sophisticated logistics network to service a growing number of small outposts, camps, and airfields, while carrying out, on average, more than one mission each day somewhere on the continent.  A significant number of these operations take the form of a textbook hearts-and-minds campaign that harkens back to failed U.S. efforts in Southeast Asia during the 1960s and 1970s and more recently in the Greater Middle East.

In Africa, the sums and scale are smaller, but the efforts are from the same counterinsurgency playbook.  In fact, to the U.S. military, humanitarian assistance -- from medical care to infrastructure projects -- is a form of “security cooperation.”  According to the latest edition of FM 3-24, published earlier this year: 

“When these activities are used to defeat an insurgency, they are part of a counterinsurgency operation. While not all security cooperation activities are in support of counterinsurgency, security cooperation can be an effective counterinsurgency tool.  These activities help the U.S. and the host nation gain credibility and help the host nation build legitimacy. These efforts can help prevent insurgencies...”

U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) and its subordinate command, Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa (CJTF-HOA) based at Camp Lemonnier in Djibouti, have spent years engaged in such COIN-style humanitarian projects.  These have been touted in news releases at their websites in lieu of candid information on the true scale and scope of AFRICOM’s operations, the exponential growth of its activities, its spy operations, and shadowy base-building efforts.  Take a cursory glance at its official news releases and you’ll find them crammed with feel-good stories like an effort by CJTF-HOA personnel to tutor would-be Djiboutian hotel workers in English or a joint effort by the State Department, AFRICOM, and the Army Corps of Engineers to build six new schools in Togo.  Such acts are never framed in the context of counterinsurgency nor with an explicit link to U.S. efforts to win hearts and minds.  And never is there any mention of failings or fiascos. 
However, an investigation by the Department of Defense’s Inspector General (IG), completed last October but never publicly released, found failures in planning, executing, tracking, and documenting such projects.  The restricted report, obtained by TomDispatch, describes a flawed system plagued by a variety of deeply embedded problems.

Across Africa, the U.S. military is engaged in a panoply of aid projects with an eye toward winning a war of ideas in the minds of Africans and so beating back the lure of extremist ideologies -- from that of Boko Haram in Nigeria to Somalia’s al Shabab.  These so-called civil-military operations, or CMOs, include “humanitarian assistance” projects like the construction or repair of schools, water wells and waste treatment systems, and “humanitarian and civic assistance” (HCA) efforts, like offering dental and veterinary care.
Kindness may be its own reward, but in the case of the U.S. military, CMO benevolence is designed to influence foreign governments and civilian populations in order to “facilitate military operations and achieve U.S. objectives.”

 According to the Pentagon, humanitarian assistance efforts are engineered to improve “U.S. visibility, access, and influence with foreign military and civilian counterparts,” while HCA projects are designed to “promote the security and foreign policy interests of the United States.” 
In the bureaucratic world of the U.S. military, these small-scale efforts are further divided into “community relations activities,” like the distribution of sports equipment, and “low-cost activities” such as seminars on solar panel maintenance or English-language discussion groups.  Theoretically at least, add all these projects together and you’ve taken a major step toward winning Africans away from the influence of extremists.  But are these projects working at all?  Has anyone even bothered to check?
The IG did manage to review 49 of 137 identified humanitarian assistance and civic assistance projects, which cost U.S. taxpayers about $9 million, and found that the military officials overseeing CMO “did not adequately plan or execute” them in accordance with AFRICOM’s “objectives.” Examining 66 community relations and low cost activities, investigators found that CJTF-HOA had failed to accurately identify their strategic objectives for, or maintained limited documentation on, 62% of them.
Examining a sample of projects, the Pentagon’s investigators found that 73% of the time CJTF-HOA personnel failed to collect sufficient data 30 days after completion of projects, to assess whether it achieved the stated objectives. 

Winning Hearts and Minds or Losing Money and Influence?

Nearly a year has passed since the drafting of the Inspector General’s report.  During that time, neither AFRICOM nor CJTF-HOA has publicly addressed it or announced any changes based upon its recommendations.  In the meantime, the hearts and minds of allied African military leaders appear unswayed by AFRICOM’s efforts.  Over two days at the “Land Forces East Africa” conference here in Dar es Salaam, I listened to generals and defense analysts from around the region speak on security matters affecting Burundi, Kenya, Somalia, Uganda, and Tanzania.  They touched on the key issues -- extremism, terrorism, and piracy -- that the American hearts-and-minds campaign is meant to counter, but the United States was hardly mentioned.  Tanzanian officers I talked with, for instance, were pleased to be receiving American funds, but less so with direct U.S. interventions of any type on the continent.  None I spoke with seemed aware of AFRICOM’S hearts-and-minds work like clean water projects or school construction in underdeveloped rural areas not so very far from where we’ve been sitting.
Even Egan O’Reilly, an Army officer attached to the U.S. Embassy here, whose job is to facilitate “security cooperation” activities, “We’ve done everything from helping bring down trainers for military intelligence courses to building their own schoolhouse for intelligence work,” he tells me.
What about the building of primary and secondary schools, the humanitarian assistance projects?  “I haven’t seen a whole lot of AFRICOM work myself,” replies the West Point graduate and veteran of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.  "Logistics training and engineering instruction for African militaries, that’s “the important stuff.”  
TomDispatch also sought interviews with U.S. defense attachés in Ethiopia, Djibouti, and Kenya for assessments of the humanitarian projects in those respective countries.  The latter two embassies failed to respond to the requests, while a spokesperson for the U.S. mission in Ethiopia thanked me for my interest but told me that the defense attaché “is not currently available for an interview.”  No one, it appears, is eager to talk about the textbook counterinsurgency campaign being carried out by the U.S. military in Africa, let alone the failures chronicled in an IG report that’s been withheld from the public for almost a year.
For the last decade, we’ve been inundated with disclosures about billions of U.S. tax dollars squandered on counterinsurgency failures in Iraq and Afghanistan, stories of ruined roads and busted buildings, shoddy schoolhouses and wasteful water parks, all in the name of winning hearts and minds.  Below the radar, similar -- if smaller scale -- efforts are well underway in Africa.  Already, the schools are being built, already the water projects are falling to pieces, already the Department of Defense’s Inspector General has identified a plethora of problems.  It’s just been kept under wraps.  But if history is any guide, humanitarian efforts by AFRICOM and Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa will grow larger and ever more expensive, until they join the long list of projects that have become “monuments to U.S. failure” around the world.
 
Nick Turse from here with more and links

US Foreign Policy In Africa

The US-Africa Leaders Summit currently taking place in Washington points to Africa’s growing strategic importance to US interests. The theme of the Summit is “Investing in the Next Generation” and aims to advance the US’s focus on trade and investment in Africa. Historically, the US has always adopted a militarised foreign policy towards Africa. When the Bush administration launched the Defense Unified Combatant Command for Africa (AFRICOM) in 2007, that move was consistent with the US history in Africa.

It was a move that was contested by the Pan-African Parliament. In 2007, the members of the Parliament voted in favour of a motion “not to accede to the request of the Government of the United States of America to host AFRICOM anywhere on the African Continent.” The Parliament highlighted the “far reaching negative implications that this Africa Command will have on the political stability of Africa.”

In response, the US and the AFRICOM staff rolled out a public relations campaign to make the idea of AFRICOM palatable to African leaders. Senior US government officials visited several African countries to explain the project. In September 2007, the US Department of Defense hosted over 35 African governments in Virginia “to further explain its plans for the command and to solicit input from attendees,” according to Lauren Ploch, a researcher with the US Congressional Research Services.

In my view the US-Africa Leaders Summit, which the Obama administration dubs the largest event any US president has held with African heads of state, is a public relations exercise in pomp, ceremony and ritual meant to disguise the militarised foreign policy represented by AFRICOM. It has been shown that ever since the 1998 bombing of US embassies in East Africa, which was followed by the US retaliatory strike against Sudan, the US has regarded Africa as the next front in the war on terrorism. According to Ploch, US Department of Defense officials claim that “Africa has been, is now and will be into the foreseeable future ripe for terrorists and acts of terrorism.”

As far as the US is concerned, civil wars in Africa have created “ungoverned spaces” and “failed states” which terrorists groups may use to operate from. Half century a ago, the US was concerned about “dangerous, pro-Communist” African radicals who were supposedly going to turn to the Soviet Union for political support and military assistance. In 1960, when 16 European colonies in Africa became independent, the US Secretary of State, Christian Herter, told the US National Security Council that Africa had become “a battleground of the first order”, according to Piero Gleijeses, a professor of US foreign policy. Gleijeses shows how the ideological struggle for global dominance during the Cold War expanded to include proxy wars in Africa.

For instance, recently declassified US documents show that from 1960 the US launched a covert operation in the Congo lasting almost seven years, which was initially aimed at eliminating Patrice Lumumba. It was that covert operation that gave political birth to the colonial creature Joseph Mobutu more commonly known as Mobutu Sese Seko. The ripple effects of that covert operation have been devastating for the Congo and the Great Lakes.

The US rationalised its covert operations in African countries such as the Congo, Angola and Mozambique as a legitimate fight against communists. In the words of Henry Kissinger, “I don’t see how we can be faulted on what we are doing. We are not overthrowing any government; we are not subverting anyone. We are helping moderates combat Communist domination.”

That was in the 20th century. The point I am making however is that in this century the US is back in Africa to carry out its Global War on Terror. The US-Africa Leaders Summit signals a slight variation of political tactics on the part of the US. However, the mess in the Horn of Country shows that the US has not totally abandoned its Cold War tactics. US air strikes in Somalia in 2007 and America’s support for the Ethiopian invasion of that country partly led to the creation of al-Shabaab, a fundamentalist religious group which has wreaked havoc in neighbouring countries like Uganda and Kenya.

Naturally, al-Shabaab has become a major security concern in the region. The US has funnelled counter-terrorism funds into East Africa and underwritten a stronger Kenyan military, according to Foreign Affairs Journal. The Journal further points out that “the rise of Islamism in the Horn of Africa put Kenya on the frontlines in the global fight against terrorism.”

The US-Africa Leaders Summit is part and parcel of US counter-terrorism efforts in Africa. The business theme which dominates the Summit is partly meant to counter the Chinese economic presence on the continent. The Chinese presence unsettles the balance of economic power between the US and African countries. Hence, the goal behind the Summit is to counter the Chinese business influence, while simultaneously, cultivating “moderate, pro-Western leaders” who will adopt “a generally pro-Western posture” in their dealings with US administrations. 

by Mandisi Majavu  from here

Militarizing humanitarianism

It is becoming increasingly apparent that Africa is the U.S. military's next frontier.
U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM), the newest of the U.S. military's six regional commands, has rapidly expanded its presence on the African continent.

Emphasising a "3D" approach of "defence, diplomacy, and development," the White House describes AFRICOM's charge as coordinating "low-cost, small-footprint operations" throughout the African continent. Yet despite efforts to market AFRICOM as a small operation, recent reports have revealed that the command is "averaging more than a mission a day" on the continent, and has anywhere from "5,000 to 8,000 U.S. military personnel on the ground" at any given point. The US military has attempted to put a friendly face on its expedition to Africa.

New York Times, Eric Schmitt marveled at AFRICOM's Operation Flintlock, a multinational and multiagency training operation in Niger. Schmitt wrote glowingly about fighting terrorism with mosquito nets: "Instead of launching American airstrikes or commando raids on militants," he wrote, "the latest joint mission between the nations involves something else entirely: American boxes of donated vitamins, prenatal medicines, and mosquito netting to combat malaria."
Humanitarian and development missions like the ones outlined in Schmitt's article are at the forefront of AFRICOM's public relations campaign. But promoting AFRICOM as a humanitarian outfit is misleading at best. To put it simply, these projects are a Trojan Horse: dressed up as gifts, they establish points of entry on the continent when and where they may be needed.

Under the auspice of development and conflict prevention, AFRICOM regularly undertakes humanitarian projects in countries unmarked by permanent war or conflict. AFRICOM relies heavily on social media to showcase these projects and to portray itself as collaborative with African partners, dedicated to humanitarian aid, and trustworthy in the eyes of local peoples.
The command's Facebook and Twitter accounts are updated daily, and include postings on anything from participation in global humanitarian campaigns such as World Malaria Day to reports on medical missions, sound bites from local recipients of AFRICOM aid, and photos of troops distributing toys to children. Less is said about the expansive presence of American military personnel and technology on the ground and in the skies. AFRICOM conducts aerial and ground operations with U.S. troops, private military contractors, and proxy African military operatives trained and equipped by the United States.

Not surprisingly, given the ongoing U.S. interest in securing new fuel sources and growing concerns over China's influence in the region, many of AFRICOM's efforts are located in oil-rich regions – specifically Kenya, Uganda, Ghana, and the Gulf of Guinea. The Gulf of Guinea, which hugs the Western coast of Africa, has received heightened interest of late given its proximity to the Sahel and Mali, an alleged increase in pirating, and notably, both on- and off-shore oil deposits. In Takoradi, Ghana, for example – a place affectionately nicknamed "Oil City" -AFRICOM trains Ghanaian troops, conducts humanitarian missions, and meets with local chiefs, NGOs, and fishing communities. Of course, U.S. spokesmen have attempted to distance the United States from any interest in the region's oil. A recent report from the Army War College dismissed claims that AFRICOM is protecting U.S. oil interests, but nonetheless argued that private American oil companies are the "best corporate citizens that African leaders and their publics could hope for." Its daily operations and talk of "sensitising" West African nations to the idea of a permanent Marines "crisis unit" in the region make clear that a more permanent U.S. presence on the continent is its true intention.

Humanitarian projects allow military personnel to train in new environments, gather local experience and tactical data, and build diplomatic relations with host countries and communities.
As activists with Women for Genuine Security have explained, this use of relief and humanitarian aid to "further larger geopolitical and military goals" – a practice they have dubbed "disaster militarism" – is a general strategy employed by the U.S. military worldwide.
For example, a 2010 report from the Feinstein International Center at Tufts University found that in Kenya, humanitarian projects by the Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa, a multi-branch military operation in East Africa, provided "an entry point" to "facilitate a military intervention, should the need arise."  The U.S. military's "lily pad strategy" of speckling the globe with tiny military installations small-scale troop build-ups allow the United States to establish "goodwill" with local communities, planting the seeds for larger concentrations of troops and activities later on. As Women for Genuine Security puts it, "co-mingling humanitarian relief and military operations" contributes to "civilian confusion, public distrust, and questions of transparency and accountability."

 AFRICOM's humanitarian undertakings are not gestures of goodwill or conflict-deterrence, but rather the militarised U.S. approach to foreign policy in Africa.

From here

The US's New Normal In Africa

Since 9/11, the U.S. military has been ramping up missions on the African continent, funneling money into projects to woo allies, supporting and training proxy forces, conducting humanitarian outreach, carrying out air strikes and commando raids, creating a sophisticated logistics network throughout the region, and building a string of camps, “cooperative security locations,” and bases-by-other-names.

All the while, AFRICOM downplayed the expansion and much of the media, with a few notable exceptions, played along.  With the end of the Iraq War and the drawdown of combat forces in Afghanistan, Washington has, however, visibly “pivoted” to Africa and, in recent weeks, many news organizations, especially those devoted to the military, have begun waking up to the new normal there.
While daily U.S. troop strength continent-wide hovers in the relatively modest range of 5,000 to 8,000 personnel, an under-the-radar expansion has been constant, with the U.S. military now conducting operations alongside almost every African military in almost every African country and averaging more than a mission a day.

This increased engagement has come at a continuing cost.  When the U.S. and other allies intervened in 2011 to aid in the ouster of Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, for instance, it helped set off a chain reaction that led to a security vacuum destabilizing that country as well as neighboring Mali.  The latter saw its elected government overthrown by a U.S.-trained officer.  The former never recovered and has tottered toward failed-state status ever since.  Local militias have been carving out fiefdoms, while killing untold numbers of Libyans -- as well, of course, as U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three other Americans in a September 2012 attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, the “cradle” of the Libyan revolution, whose forces the U.S. had aided with training, materiel, and military might.

Quickly politicized by Congressional Republicans and conservative news outlets, “Benghazi” has become a shorthand for many things, including Obama administration cover-ups and misconduct, as well as White House lies and malfeasance.  Missing, however, has been thoughtful analysis of the implications of American power-projection in Africa or the possibility that blowback might result from it.

Far from being chastened by the Benghazi deaths or chalking them up to a failure to imagine the consequences of armed interventions in situations whose local politics they barely grasp, the Pentagon and the Obama administration have used Benghazi as a growth opportunity, a means to take military efforts on the continent to the next level.  “Benghazi” has provided AFRICOM with a beefed-up mandate and new clout.  It birthed the new normal in Africa.

From Nick Turse, for more read on here



 

US will stay in Djibouti

Obama says American troops will stay at the military base of Camp Lemonnier in the East African nation of Djibouti permanently.

“This is a critical facility that we maintain in Djibouti,” Obama said during a meeting with Djibouti President Ismail Omar Guelleh.

The $63 million per year lease would allow the Pentagon to keep personnel and equipment at the camp for 10 more years. The "long term lease" includes an option to extend the lease for an additional 10 years without renegotiating the terms, as well as a provision to extend for an additional 10 years beyond that at a renegotiated rate.

Camp Lemonnier houses F-15 fighters and there are around 4,000 US troops, civilians and contractors, including 300 special operations personnel, at the military base. The base is also the biggest in a network of airfields in East Africa that the United States uses for drones and other surveillance planes.

US Military - More Than One Mission A Day In Africa

U.S. Military Averaging More Than A Mission A Day In Africa

By Nick Turse

Read full article at TomDispatch.com

The numbers tell the story: 10 exercises, 55 operations, 481 security cooperation activities.

Since its inception, U.S. Africa Command has consistently downplayed its role on the continent. Meanwhile, far from the press or the public, the officers running its secret operations have privately been calling Africa “the battlefield of tomorrow, today.”

After years in the dark, we now know just how “extremely active” -- to use General David Rodriguez’s phrase -- AFRICOM has been and how rapidly the tempo of its missions has increased. It remains to be seen just what else we don't know about U.S. Africa Command’s exponentially expanding operations.

Africom Versus China

The United States, like its allies Britain and France, has long maintained influence and indirect control in Africa through financial institutions such as the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, and African Development Bank. It has exerted political influence using aid organizations such as USAID and NGOs like the National Endowment for Democracy, Freedom House and others.

With programs such as the Pan-Sahel Initiative, later broadened into the Trans-Saharan Counterterrorism Initiative, Washington managed to provide military and financial assistance to compliant countries in North Africa – a policy whose practical application meant that the US military became the dominant force in the Sahel region, supplying the human and material resources for which the governments of the region were starved. Naturally, this meant an implicit subservience to US military command.  In 2013 alone, AFRICOM conducted joint exercises with fourteen African nations, leading land, sea, and air-based operations.

In 2007 the Bush administration created US Africa Command (AFRICOM) to act as the umbrella organization under which all US military activity in Africa would fall. AFRICOM became an officially independent command a year later, and in the seven years its scope of activity has broadened tremendously, with its direct or indirect presence extending into nearly every country on the continent. “AFRICOM advances US national interests and promotes regional security, stability, and prosperity.” Ostensibly, the US military acts to defend ‘democracies’ in Africa for the collective betterment of the people of the continent. As Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Theresa Whelan stated in 2007, “AFRICOM is about helping Africans build greater capacity to assure their own security.”

 However, a more critical analysis would question exactly how Washington defines “security, stability, and prosperity,” and perhaps most importantly, whose prosperity they’re principally interested in. Vice-Admiral Robert Moeller, military deputy to former commander of AFRICOM General William ‘Kip’ Ward, provides the answer when he  told an AFRICOM conference in 2008 that AFRICOM’s goal was “protecting the free flow of natural resources from Africa to the global market.” Furthermore, Moeller wrote in 2010, “Let there be no mistake. AFRICOM’s job is to protect American lives and promote American interests.”

 AFRICOM is to provide a military presence to ensure the continued exploitation of Africa for the enrichment of finance capital, and the maintenance and expansion of US hegemony on the continent. China is rapidly challenging US economic hegemony in Africa. Having invested in a variety of sectors from mining and oil, to telecommunications and banking, China has made itself into a viable alternative to US, World Bank, and IMF investment and aid. Naturally, this has upset the political and corporate establishment in the US who see in China a threat to their power.  Professor and China scholar Deborah Brautigam noted in 2013,“Chinese imports and exports, outbound investment aid, and export finance are all sharply on the rise. For example, trade between China and Africa rose from $10 billion in 2000 to $166.3 billion in 2011… [In 2012] Chinese leaders announced a goal of $20 billion in finance to African countries by 2015. If carried out, an average of between $6 and $7 billion would flow to Africa per year.” Brautigam’s numbers illustrate the fact that it is only slightly below yearly US total investment in the continent ($9 billion) and so US policy in Africa  should be understood within the context of checking China’s growing power and influence.

 One  example is the US-sponsored break up of Sudan and the creation of South Sudan. n order to power its massive industrial sector and population, China has become the world’s leading energy importer, with lucrative contracts all over the world. However, Beijing’s primary oil source in Africa was Sudan, which accounted for 8 percent of China’s total oil imports (China being the recipient of a whopping 78% of total Sudanese exports). With the oilfields being located primarily in the south of the country, the US led the charge to dismantle Sudan and create a South Sudan that would be dependent on US finance and military muscle (provided by AFRICOM and US clients such as Uganda and Rwanda) for its very survival. The continuing violence and bloodshed in South Sudan – a result of internal power struggles between competing US aligned factions – is merely collateral damage in Washington’s growing proxy war with China.

All over Africa, the United States has tried to check the growing influence of China [ who choose to prefer the tactic of money in the banks of those it courts rather than boots on the ground - Socialist  Banner]. From Nigeria to South Africa, Angola to Sudan, the US is engaging in a widespread proxy war with the expressed intention of maintaining its dominant position in Africa. Using its vast military resources, Washington seeks to cement its African hegemony using the same colonial tactics as every other empire that came before it.

From here 

East African Response Force

Recently the Department of Defense announced the formation of an East African Response Force. This new unit is part of the United States Africa Command (AFRICOM).  Prior to the creation of the East African Response Force Washington operated in the region under the framework of the Combined Joint Task Force Horn of Africa (CJTF-HOA).

U.S. Brigadier-General Wayne Grigsby, who is the commander of CJTF-HOA, says that his forces are in East Africa only to assist governments in their military campaigns to defeat the so-called terrorist threat posed by Al-Shabaab. However, Brigadier-General Grigsby does say that “It also enables strategic access and freedom of movement. The purpose is to protect the United States and its interests abroad.”

Consequently, even the military leaders themselves must acknowledge that the underlying reasons for the build-up in Africa are clearly related to the economic and class interests of Washington and Wall Street. East and Central Africa is a vast repository of oil, natural gas and strategic minerals.

The East Africa Response Force has been utilized in the current conflict in the Republic of South Sudan. A contingent of the unit was deployed to the country to evacuate U.S. embassy personnel and to guard their economic interests.

One of the most significant factors in the present outcome of the conflict inside South Sudan has been the intervention of the Ugandan People’s Defense Force (UPDF) which sided with the government of President Salva Kiir. The Ugandan government is a very close ally of the U.S. and its military has benefited for years from Pentagon training programs and direct assistance in the purchase of weapons.

With respect to events in the Central African Republic (CAR), the U.S. has been assisting with the transport of French and African troops into the country.

The growing French, U.S. and EU military involvement in Africa is designed to secure western imperialist dominance over the oil, diamonds, gold and uranium that exist in abundance in both the CAR and South Sudan. These western states are creating the conditions for the deterioration of the societies involved, and consequently through their false propaganda about humanitarian assistance, will only provide a further rationale for an even heavier military occupation. By framing the discussion about their intervention as being “humanitarian”, they are attempting as well to remove these issues from public debate and scrutiny. No discussion or analysis of the impact and effectiveness of U.S. interventions in Africa, the Middle East and Central Asia is conducted. Nonetheless, these military invasions and occupations are not only destroying the lives of people on the ground in these various geo-political regions but are killing and maiming its own soldiers.

From here

US army re-deploying to Africa

The first-of-its-kind program is drawing on troops from a 3,500-member brigade in the US Army’s First Infantry Division, known as the Big Red One, to conduct more than 100 missions in Africa over the next year. The missions range from a two-man sniper team in Burundi to 350 soldiers conducting airborne exercises in South Africa. The brigade has also sent a 150-member rapid-response force to Djibouti in the Horn of Africa to protect embassies. Teams from the brigade here have already helped train forces in Kenya and Tanzania, which are battling fighters from the Shabab militant group in Somalia.

“Our goal is to help Africans solve African problems, without having a big American presence,” said Lt. Col. Robert E. Lee Magee.

Gen. Ray Odierno, the Army chief of staff, said in an interview that the goal was to field an Army that could be “engaged regionally in all the combatant commands to help them shape their theaters, set their theaters, in order to sustain and execute our national security strategy.”

With the United States military out of Iraq and pulling out of Afghanistan, the Army is looking for new missions around the world. “As we reduce the rotational requirement to combat areas, we can use these forces to great effect in Africa,” Gen. David M. Rodriguez, the head of the Africa Command

Africom Again

This article is very informative and instructive about the growing military presence of America in the African continent.

There is U.S. military involvement with no fewer than 49 African nations out of a total of 54. In some, the U.S. maintains bases, even if under other names. In others, it trains local partners and proxies to battle militants ranging from Somalia’s al-Shabab and Nigeria’s Boko Haram to members of Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.  Elsewhere, it is building facilities for its allies or infrastructure for locals. Many African nations are home to multiple U.S. military projects.  Colonel Tom Davis, AFRICOM’s Director of Public Affairs, declares in all earnestnessl: “Other than our base at Camp Lemonnier in Djibouti, we do not have military bases in Africa, nor do we have plans to establish any.” But then  admits that the U.S. has “temporary facilities elsewhere…”

At Entebbe, Uganda, U.S. contractors have flown secret surveillance missions. U.S. Army Africa  plans to build six new gates to the Entebbe compound, 11 new “containerized housing units,” new guard stations, new perimeter and security fencing, enhanced security lighting and new concrete access ramps, among other improvements.

Ouagadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso. An airbase there serves as the home of a Joint Special Operations Air Detachment, as well as the Trans-Sahara Short Take-Off and Landing Airlift Support initiative.

Nzara in South Sudan is one of a string of shadowy forward operating posts on the continent where U.S. Special Operations Forces have been stationed in recent years. Other sites include Obo and Djema in the Central Africa Republic and Dungu in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
 AFRICOM confirmed  that U.S. air operations conducted from Base Aerienne 101 at Diori Hamani International Airport in Niamey, Niger’s capital, were providing “support for intelligence collection with French forces conducting operations in Mali and with other partners in the region.”

Additionally, the U.S. has flown drones out of the Seychelles Islands and Ethiopia’s Arba Minch Airport.

 Since 2004, U.S. troops have been stationed at a Kenyan naval base known as Camp Simba at Manda Bay.  The U.S. military also makes use of six buildings located on Kenyan military bases at the airport and seaport of Mombasa.

The list goes on...

Key to the Map of the U.S. Military’s Pivot to Africa, 2012-2013

Green markers: U.S. military training, advising, or tactical deployments during 2013
Yellow markers: U.S. military training, advising, or tactical deployments during 2012
Purple marker: U.S. "security cooperation"
Red markers: Army National Guard partnerships
Blue markers: U.S. bases, forward operating sites (FOSes), contingency security locations (CSLs), contingency locations (CLs), airports with fueling agreements, and various shared facilities
Green push pins: U.S. military training/advising of indigenous troops carried out in a third country during 2013
Yellow push pins: U.S. military training/advising of indigenous troops carried out in a third country during 2012

Africom and Obama's Africa Trip 2013

Posing as a humanist, president Obama came to Africa to reinforce the exploitation of the natural riches which are now dangerously threatened by Sino-Iranian pressure. He was unable to set up a photo opportunity with the dying Nelson Mandela, who threw him out of South Africa during his 2006 visit.

Obama had his photo taken in the House of Slaves, on the island of Gorée in Senegal, gazing thoughtfully at the Atlantic Ocean, across which millions of Africans were transported in chains to the Americas. He declared that, as an "Afro-American president," he was inspired by the site which " ... gives me even greater motivation to defend human rights throughout the world."

This is the tone that the president used to begin his trip to Africa. But in South Africa, he was confronted by thousands of workers and students who called him a "slave-trader," and accused him of war crimes and the betrayal of his electoral promises. Obama couldn’t even organise a photo-op at Nelson Mandela’s bedside, a symbolic image he had counted on.

So everything didn’t go too well on the "Africa Trip 2013." It was a propaganda tour which cost a hundred million dollars – the president brought with him from the USA hundreds of secret service agents, 56 special vehicles including 14 armoured limousines, and three trucks loaded with bullet-proof windows, plus an aircraft carrier from which fighter planes controlled the air space thoughout the presidential journey.

The real reason for the trip became apparent when Obama declared that " ... China is paying a lot of attention to Africa" and that it is " ... in the interest of the United States to augment and extend its partnerships with the African nations." But there is a problem – the USA can’t compete with China, whose investments are much more useful and advantageous for the African nations than those of the USA, which are aimed at maximum profit, and concentrate their efforts on the exploitation of energy and mineral resources.

To counter Chinese influence and reinforce US presence in Africa, the Obama administration has principally favoured its political and military instruments. Amongst these, " … the Young African Leaders Initiative," whose objective is to " ...develop a prestigious network of young leaders in fundamental sectors, and to forge even stronger links with the United States." Through these "high-level forums," and more than 2000 "youth programmes" which are financed to the tune of millions of dollars, Washington is attempting to create an elite of new pro-USA leaders in Africa.

At the same time, by way of AfriCom, they are reinforcing US military presence on the continent. The main base for this operation is in Sigonella (Sicily). It’s from this base that the Special-Purpose Marine Air-Ground Task Force (MAGTF) of the Marine Corps is deployed, equipped with tilt rotor MV-22 Ospreys and C-130 flying tankers, sending regular squadrons to fly over Africa. Since January, from Sigonella, the MAGTF has been training special African forces in Uganda, Burundi, Cameroon, Ghana, Burkina Faso, the Seychelles, Mozambique, Tanzania, Senegal and Liberia. The Sigonella task force also collaborates with the Military Intelligence Basic Officer Course-Africa, forming officers for the African secret services in Kenya, Ethiopia, Southern Sudan, Nigeria and other countries.

The MIBOC-A course is defined as " … one of hundreds of security operations carried out by US military personnel in Africa." This is how the US military network is extended in Africa, by way of multiple links, recruiting officers and local special forces. The operation is directed by AfriCom, which recently installed its first "advanced command post" on the African continent, with the combined Joint Task Force - Horn of Africa and Djibouti . A new version of the old instruments of colonial domination.
But Obama would do well to pay attention – as he himself stated " … Africa is rising."

Manlio Dinucci

 

US, AFRICOM and AFRICA: Accumulation By Any Other Name

“The countries that cooperate with us get at least a free pass,” acknowledged a senior U.S. official who specializes in Africa but spoke on condition of anonymity to avoid retribution. “Whereas other countries that don’t cooperate, we ream them as best we can.” (ream, N. Amer. clear out or remove (material) from something)
WP

This has been the essence of US foreign policy as it is actually practiced for the past several decades. It has escalated over time, particularly in the 1980s under Reagan, and with the proliferation of pointless wars this century begun by Bush and expanded under Obama. I say pointless, because although there may have been objectives, they were not related to the means used to achieve them, or to the eventual outcomes, in any coherent way. The US has tried to solve political problems with the brute force of military power. US foreign policy appears divorced from the realities of who what when where and why the US is conducting its policy. The result has been destruction without achievement. US policy in Africa continues this pattern. The destruction of Libya is the most aggressive recent example.
AFRICOM – a map of US military presence in Africa, countries where the U.S. has recently, as of spring 2013, conducted exercises, operations, or has bases in Africa.

Map of known US military locations in Africa.

The interactive version of the above map courtesy of John Reed in Foreign Policy.

from here  (crossedcrocodiles)