Terrorist rivals align as US eyes exit
This cancer will spread far beyond.
Groups linked to al-Qaeda and the Islamic State, at war with each other in the Middle East, are working together to take control of territory across a vast stretch of West Africa, US and local officials say, sparking fears the regional threat could grow into a global crisis.
Fighters appear to be co-ordinating attacks and carving out mutually agreed areas of influence in the Sahel, land south of the Sahara desert. The rural territory at risk is so large it could “fit multiple Afghanistans and Iraqs,” said Brigadier General Dagvin Anderson, head of the US military’s Special Operations arm in Africa.
“What we’ve seen is not just random acts of violence under a terrorist banner but a deliberate campaign that is trying to bring these various groups under a common cause,” he said in Nouakchott, Mauritania. “That larger effort then poses a threat to the United States.”
The militants have used sophisticated tactics lately as they root deeper into Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso, ambushing army bases and dominating villages with surprising force, according to more than 12 senior officials and military leaders from the US, France and West Africa.
The groups were not declaring “caliphates” to avoid scrutiny from the West, officials said, buying time to train, gather force and plot attacks that could ultimately reach major international targets.
A coalition of al-Qaeda loyalists called JNIM has as many as 2000 fighters in West Africa, according to a US report released this month. The Islamic State in the Greater Sahara, which staged the 2017 attack that killed four American soldiers in Niger, is also thought to be hundreds strong and recruiting in northeastern Mali.
“This cancer will spread far beyond here if we don’t fight together to end it,” said General Ibrahim Fane, secretary general of Mali’s ministry of defence, whose country has lost more than 100 soldiers in routine clashes since October.
The warnings come as the Pentagon weighs pulling forces from West Africa, where about 1400 troops provide intelligence and drone support, among other forms of military help.
About 4400 American troops are based in East Africa, where the US military advises African forces that are battling against al-Shabab.
At a US-led training exercise last week in coastal Mauritania, officials said the US Defence Department had made no decision as it considered shifting resources to the Asia-Pacific region to counter China and Russia.
France, with about 4500 troops in West Africa — the most of any foreign partner by far — has urged the US to stay and other European powers to step up. (The United Nations has about 13,000 peacekeepers in Mali alone.)
While al-Qaeda and the Islamic State are enemies in Syria and Yemen, allegiances in West Africa tend to be more fluid, bolstered by tribal ties and practical concerns rather than ideology.
The affiliates have common foes — the West and local governments from which they aim to wrest control.