Robert Farley points out that it's not as if there was no US military involvement in Africa before the creation of a new Africa Command, it's just that responsibility for Africa was divided up in a pretty nonsensical way between different theater commands. AFRICOM organizes things more sensibly, and sets up a situation where the military officers making decisions about Africa have some incentive to develop meaningful knowledge of the continent.
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In Defense of AFRICOM
24 Jul 2007 02:00 pm
Comments (6)
The critique is not that a dedicated command covering Africa is a bad thing, as opposed to the previous situation of splitting Africa between 3 commands. The critique is that the reorganization represents a shift in US foreign policy towards Africa that puts the Pentagon in charge of development and diplomacy as well as defense.
In addition to the concern that DOD lacks the bearing or expertise of USAID or State with respect to development policy and diplomacy in Africa, the reorganization also raises questions about the ability of Congress to exercise effective oversight when the military rather than the diplomats or development experts are in charge of policy implementation.
UN Plaza,
I'm sure the military would love to have more USAID and other State employees in theater with them, but hasn't that been an issue in Iraq, that State hasn't fully staffed its end of the effort?
The issue is, is it effective to achive United States foreign policy goals in Africa to have the Defense Department become the primary actor in developing, coordinating, and implementing US actions there, not just in defense affairs but in foreign relations and development promotion efforts as well?
It's not that the reorg doesn't come with potential benefits: the military's regional perspective, for example, as opposed to diplomatic efforts that are typically centered in embassys in national capitals.
The point is, people who are concerned about the implications of AFRICOM worry that it represents a shift to privileging military decisionmaking and a military strategic perspective over a diplomatic or development-focused approach to Africa, to the ultimate detriment of American interests as well as the Africans.
These are valid concerns, particularly in light of Iraq.
1) I think the transfer of power to DOD and creation of African Command is driven in part by
a need to deny Al Qaeda sanctuaries in areas of mass poverty.
2) Al Qaeda does subversion in the same way the CIA used to: infiltrate a poor, neglected area under the guise of being a charity, show concern about the well-being of the locals, provide desperately needed medical services, loan money, sponsor education,etc. Gain the deep, unyielding loyalty of the locals.
3) Use all this a Cover for transfers of money, reason for covert operatives and couriers to travel ,etc.
Gradually recruit locals into small ,low risk operations -- couriers,etc. They have NO files in the security databases and will not cause hits on watchlists.
4) Then slowly recruit some carefully chosen people for real operations -- pointing out, truthfully, that the US government is the richest in the world, that it supports dictatorships and stealing of national resources whereever convenient, and that the richest, most powerful nation on earth is ,at best, indifferent to genocides like Rwanda and Darfur, to starvation and to AIDs pandemics in Africa.
In the case of AIDS, the US could probably have saved millions of children from becoming orphans by distributing a few million condoms --but our religious nuts show their understanding of Jesus by banning such a policy.
There is deep poverty , death and misery everywhere. It is easy to convince people to hate the US government -- in some cases because deep hatred is justified , in some cases because it can be rationalized. Just look at what we let happen in Western Sahara for the oil deposits.
5) Even if Al Qaeda does not recruit terrorists, it will have a safe haven where no local will betray it or cooperate with the police/CIA. It can strongly influence the government by infiltrating worker groups in order to pose the threat of widespread strikes, industrial sabotage.
It can infiltrate student organizations --because students can travel freely, are not tied to a 9-5 job 6 days per week, and can disappear for many hours during the day without having to account for their actions.
Al Qaeda does not even have to reveal itself. It can masquerade as some other covert organization -- fly a false flag.
6) DOD's Proconsuls are taking over diplomacy for the same reason they are taking over Intelligence. Bush/Cheney are creating a global Empire -- and the profits of such an Empire are strongly vulnerable to disorder. Hence, the need for a global instrument to watch , detect, and kill.
But Empire needs a global instrument which is unquestioning obedient -- unlike CIA civilian officers and State Department officers who are under the illusion that they are working for the American people --and not for the Fortune 500.
By and large, the military is designed to be unquestioning obedient -- even when they are deeply unhappy with the White House policy -- because a soldier can be sent to very uncomfortable prisons for decades for not following orders or for revealing "classifed" information to the press.
Or can lose his pension while only 5 years from retirement -- a drastic blow since military pay does not allow the creation of much savings and military experience does not set one up to find a job in the civilian marketplace.
BTW just out of curiosity, how is it that AFRICOM comes by the presumption to "make decisions about Africa?"
Are they African?
Comments closed August 07, 2007.
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Heads in the Sand
As I wrote in the previous thread:
Posted by Fred | July 24, 2007 2:10 PM