If treacherous Africa leaders allow this to happpen,
then let's hope that it will result in Africa becoming
the final grave yard for U.S. interventionism as well
for those treacherous African leaders. The new
word/praise for direct U.S. intervention is "robust
presence". The idea of designating the Gulf of Guinea
as "srategic" to U.S. national security interest comes
from the jewish think thank the; Institute for
Advanced Strategic & Political Studies
(http://antiwar. com/deliso/ ?articleid= 3658). If they
go through with this, there is certainly going to be
hell to pay.

Harold Green

http://us.f532. mail.yahoo. com/ym/Compose? YY=77650

http://www.atimes. com/atimes/ Front_Page/ HI21Aa01. html

America's Africa Corps
By Jason Motlagh

The United States is moving closer to setting up an
Africa Command to secure the rear flank of its global
"war on terrorism", with eyes trained on vital oil
reserves and lawless areas where terrorists have
sought safe haven to regroup and strike against its
interests.

At a Monday briefing on plans to restructure US
defense policy, Under Secretary of Defense Eric
Edelmen disclosed that Defense Secretary Donald
Rumsfeld and top military brass were close to a
decision over a proposal to anchor US forces on the
African continent, creating a new command to encompass
all security operations.

Analysts said the move would herald a fundamental
shift in US policy that champions an active approach
toward fledgling states prone to breed extremism,
though more tangible needs are also at stake.

A Pentagon spokesman tempered the announcement with
the caveat that such a move required an official
process that would take time and had yet to begin. But
one official noted that talks were "intense" and
another stressed that internal debate was stronger
than it was six months ago and appeared to be on the
verge of a positive verdict.

The United States at present oversees five separate
military commands worldwide, and Africa remains
divided among three of them: European Command covers
operations spanning 43 countries across North and
sub-Saharan Africa; Central Command oversees the
restive Horn of Africa; and Pacific Command looks
after Madagascar. All three maintain a low-key
presence, largely employing elite special operations
forces to train, equip and work alongside national
militaries. A perceived vulnerability to al-Qaeda and
other transnational terrorist organizations, however,
has fueled calls for a more aggressive security
posture in Africa.

"We do have a strategic interest in Africa, and we
have been attacked," a leading US government Africa
specialist told Asia Times Online on condition of
anonymity. "Whether you have 1,000 people or 10,000,
what we're doing requires our active presence both
from training special forces, coordination and
tracking down some of the extremist elements ... That
requires really having a physical presence and the
ability to deploy."

CentCom commander General John Abizaid last March
spelled out to the Senate Armed Services Committee the
burgeoning security threats facing Horn of Africa and
the dire need for robust action. Emblematic of most of
the continent at large, they include extreme poverty,
corruption, internal conflicts, uncontrolled borders
and territorial waters, weak internal security, broken
infrastructure and natural disasters, among others.
"The combination of these serious challenges," he
said, "creates an environment that is ripe for
exploitation by extremists and criminal
organizations. "

Just months later, the decision was made to raise the
military profile in Africa in what may prove a
precursor to an all-encompassing command. Washington
has committed to spend US$500 million on the
Trans-Saharan Counter-Terrorism Initiative (TSCTI ),
an expanded program headed by EuCom that provides
military and development aid to nine Saharan countries
deemed to be fertile ground for groups - such as the
deadly Algeria-based Salafist Group for Call and
Combat (GSPC) - looking to establish Afghanistan- style
training grounds and carry out other illicit
activities. The TSCTI represents a colossal upgrade
from the Pan-Sahel Initiative, its $7 million
forerunner.

But critics counter that military-centric policies
could backfire and breed radicalism where it hardly
exists by sustaining despotic regimes that usurp
funding and military hardware to tighten their grip on
power. A report by the International Crisis Group, a
Brussels-based think-tank, said the Saharan region is
"not a terrorist hotbed" and warned that certain
Saharan governments try to elicit US aid while using
the "war on terror" to justify human-rights abuses.

CentCom, for its part, operates the Djibouti-based
Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa, a discreet
hub formed in the aftermath of the August 1998
bombings of the US embassies in Nairobi and Dar es
Salaam that killed at least 301 people and put Osama
bin Laden's al-Qaeda network on the map.

A number of al-Qaeda operatives are said to be hiding
in the Horn, Somalia specifically, and they continue
to pose a grave threat to US interests in the region,
which demands the presence of some 1,800 troops tasked
with detecting and disrupting terrorist schemes. US
intelligence has also used the base to coordinate
activities around the Horn; the Central Intelligence
Agency allegedly bankrolled an alliance of warlords
that were driven out of the capital, Mogadishu, by
Islamist militia this summer.

Somalia, a special case, has been without a
functioning government for the past 14 years and is
known beyond a doubt to have harbored members of
al-Qaeda. Still, the unnamed government analyst, who
just returned from an extensive fact-finding mission
to the failed state, insists that the vast majority of
Somalis are not hostile toward the United States
despite the infamous Black Hawk Down disaster of 1993
and the recent Islamist takeover. "Somalis are not
anti-American by nature, they are pro-West," he said.
"Engagement is vital as it helps gather better
intelligence, understand people, and it's cheaper."

Other observers say that thirst for another kind of
security is the driving force behind a probable Africa
Command: energy.

Nigeria already stands as the fifth-largest supplier
of oil to the United States, and energy officials say
the Gulf of Guinea will provide a quarter of US crude
by 2010, placing the region ahead of Saudi Arabia
(other major producers include Equatorial Guinea,
Angola, Gabon and the Congo Republic). A surging
demand for fossil fuels in Asia and an unpredictable
political climate in the Middle East prompted the
administration of US President George W Bush four
years ago to call West African oil a "strategic
national interest" - a designation that reserves the
use of force to secure and defend such interests if
necessary.

The question then arises as to where exactly the new
command would be best headquartered. The answer may be
Sao Tome and Principe, one of Africa's smallest
countries, consisting mainly of two islands at the
western bend of the continent. Concerns over fanning
anti-Americanism, proximity to oil reserves - some of
which are said to be untapped beneath its own waters -
and overall security make this the obvious choice,
John Pike, director of military studies group
GlobalSecurity. org, told Asia Times Online. "This
island seems destined to be America's unsinkable
aircraft carrier in the Gulf of Guinea, much like
Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean and Guam in the
Pacific."

Military planners like the idea of an offshore
presence since its reduces the impression of a
neo-colonial maneuver, Pike said, adding that so far
there has been a clear preference within EuCom and
CentCom to lie low and work through African
institutions to train troops and strengthen security.
According to Pike, the coup-wary Sao Tome government
likes the idea of a US presence, and the two sides
have been "playing footsie for a number of years now".
The Defense Department declined comment.

While odds are against the price of oil ever going
back down significantly, today it remains a freely
traded commodity on the international market with no
strings attached as to who owns concessions. But some
experts are convinced this arrangement will come to an
end in the not so distant future, making military
power and leverage paramount.

"We can see how the US would want to move and make
preparations for that day when it matters whom states
will turn to for protection," Pike said. "When that
day comes, the US wants to ensure key states are
looking its way."

Jason Motlagh is deputy foreign editor at United Press
International in Washington, DC. He has reported
freelance from Saharan Africa, Asia and the Caribbean
for various US and European news media.

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