Shadow armies: Unseen, but real US war in Africa

THERE is a real, but largely concealed, war which is taking place throughout the African continent. It involves the United States, an invigorated Russia and a rising China. The outcome of the war is likely to define the future of the continent and its global outlook.

It is easy to pin the blame on US President Donald Trump, his erratic agenda and impulsive statements. But the truth is, the current US military expansion in Africa is just another step in the wrong direction.

It is part of a strategy that had been implemented a decade ago, during the administration of president George W. Bush and actively pursued by president Barack Obama.

In 2007, under the pretext of the “war on terror”, the US consolidated its various military operations in Africa to establish the United States Africa Command (AFRICOM).

With a starting budget of half a billion dollars, AFRICOM was supposedly launched to engage with African countries in terms of diplomacy and aid. But, over the course of the last 10 years, AFRICOM has been transformed into a central command for military incursions and interventions.

However, that violent role has rapidly worsened during the first year of Trump’s term in office. Indeed, there is a hidden US war in Africa, and it is fought in the name of “counter-terrorism”.

According to a VICE News special investigation, US troops are now conducting 3 500 exercises and military engagements throughout Africa per year, an average of 10 per day. US mainstream media rarely discusses this ongoing war, thus giving the military ample space to destabilize any of the continent’s 54 countries as it pleases.

“Today’s figure of 3 500 marks an astounding 1 900 percent increase since the command was activated less than a decade ago and suggests a major expansion of US military activities on the African continent,” VICE reported.

Following the death of four US Special Forces soldiers in Niger on October 4 last year, US secretary of Defence, James Mattis, made an ominous declaration to a Senate committee: these numbers are likely to increase as the US is expanding its military activities in Africa.

Mattis, like other defence officials in the previous two administrations, justifies the US military transgressions as part of ongoing “counter-terrorism” efforts. But such coded reference has served as a pretence for the US to intervene in and exploit, a massive region with a great economic potential.

The old colonial “Scramble for Africa” is being reinvented by global powers that fully fathom the extent of the untapped economic largesse of the continent. While China, India and Russia are each developing a unique approach to wooing Africa, the US is invested mostly in the military option, which promises to inflict untold harm and destabilise many nations.

The 2012 coup in Mali, carried out by a US-trained army captain, Amadou Haya Sanogo, is only one example.

In a 2013 speech, then US secretary of State Hillary Clinton cautioned against a “new colonialism in Africa (in which it is) easy to come in, take out natural resources, pay off leaders and leave.”

While Clinton is, of course, correct, she was disingenuously referring to China, not her own country. China’s increasing influence in Africa is obvious, and Beijing’s practices can be unfair.

However, China’s policy towards Africa is far more civil and trade-focused than the military-centred US approach.

The growth in the China-Africa trade figures is, as per a UN News report in 2013, happening at a truly “breathtaking pace”, as they jumped from around $10,5 billion per year in 2000 to $166 billion in 2011. Since then, it has continued at the same impressive pace.

But that growth was coupled with many initiatives, entailing many billions of dollars in Chinese credit to African countries to develop badly needed infrastructure. More went to finance the “African Talents Programme”, which is designed to train 30 000 African professionals in various sectors.

It should come as no surprise, then, that China surpassed the US as Africa’s largest trading partner in 2009.

The real colonialism, which Clinton referred to in her speech, is, however, underway in the US’ own perception and behaviour towards Africa.

This is not a hyperbole, but in fact, a statement that echoes the words of US President Trump himself.

During a lunch with nine African leaders last September at the UN, Trump spoke with the kind of mindset that inspired western leaders’ colonial approach to Africa for centuries.

Soon after he invented the non-existent country of “Nambia”, Trump boasted his “many friends (who are) going to your (African) countries trying to get rich.”

“I congratulate you,” he said, “they are spending a lot of money.”

The following month, Trump added Chad, his country’s devoted “counter-terrorism” partner to the list of countries whose citizens are banned from entering the US.

Keeping in mind that Africa has 22 Muslim majority countries, the US government is divesting from any long-term diplomatic vision in Africa, and is, instead increasingly thrusting further into the military path.

The US military push does not seem to be part of a comprehensive policy approach, either. — Trinicentre. ◆ Full article on www.herald.

co.zw