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US 'invisible' presence in Africa
The United States competes with China for influence in the African continent.
Friday, August 21, 2020

Uriel Araujo, researcher with a focus on international and ethnic conflicts

China's increasing military and economic presence in Africa is widely discussed today. Meanwhile, American presence and operations (clandestine and otherwise) in the continent is not a frequent topic of discussion. The truth is the US diplomacy worldwide seems to be more and more shaped by a competition with China. And the same goes for Africa.

On February, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo completed his first trip to the continent (he visited Senegal, Angola and Ethiopia) and, during the trip, defended a closer US-Africa relationship. Like previous administrations (such as Obama's “Power Africa” or Bush's PEPFAR), Trump does have its own initiative for Africa, albeit a much less high profile one: it's called “Prosper Africa”. It aims to promote trade and private sector investments – Trump's “travel ban”, however (targeting Nigeria, Sudan and other African nations) is not much of an encouragement for businesses. Curiously, the current US administration engagement with Africa is actually quite low: president Trump himself has not visited the continent so far (Chinese president Xi Jinping, in his turn, frequently travels to Africa).

It would appear that the US primary concern right now is Chinese growing military and political influence over African countries. If president Trump never set foot in African soil, US AFRICOM (Africa Command) military officials, on the other hand, are often meeting with African high-ranking political authorities. In fact, one could even say the key diplomatic relations with the US in Africa happen through interactions with US military officials – besides the embassies, of course. The same goes for American humanitarian programs, which are often militarized (for example, US Department of Defense aircrafts are delivering COVID-19 supplies in South Africa).

The aforementioned Prosper Africa initiative was launched in a speech delivered by national security adviser John Bolton, who then mentioned the growing influence of “great power competitors” (Russia and China) who were, according to him, investing in Africa in order to “gain a competitive advantage over the United State”. From an African perspective, there is no evidence that trade deals with the US would turn out to be more advantageous than those with China: the US have a reputation for pushing demands for very strict intellectual property protections and the like (thus often undermining the development priorities of the partner countries, according to a policy paper by Kimberly Elliott, a Center for Global Development scholar). The American initiative does plan to develop African information and communication technology infrastructure, however.

Of course, one cannot underestimate the US soft power: in Aubrey Hruby's word (Africa Center Senior Fellow), NBA and the movie “Black Panther” did more for American influence than any cabinet visit. But “soft” does not quite describe the precise nature of American power in Africa.

The truth is that Prosper Africa probably will not be enough to “counterbalance” China in Africa: Chinese economic presence consists in a variety of grants, loans, aid, and so on. It is already the largest trade partner of several African countries, like Angola, Eritrea, South Sudan etc. Moreover, the Chinese One Belt, One Road initiative (also called the New Silk Road) will fill a major infrastructure gap and will further connect Africa and Asia. It certainly will put China in an even better position in Africa. Chinese military influence in  the Africa continent, on the other hand, although increasing (and worrying the US), is far from matching American military presence there.

Even though the Pentagon claims to have a “light” footprint in the continent, a declassified United States Africa Command (AFRICOM) map – made public in January 2020 –  actually shows a network of 29 military bases in Africa, stretching from coast to coast in 15 countries. The highest concentration of them is in the Horn of Africa and Sahelian region – ironically the very locations where terrorism and conflict have been significantly increasing (the main justification for such military deployment is counter-terrorism). Of course, the actual number of bases must be higher, for certain “cooperative training locations” are not listed. And AFRICOM plans to further expand its presence in African nations. Such presence is “invisible” to many in the West. Sometimes it becomes inevitably visible – for example, in 2017 during the Tongo Tongo ambush in Niger or in June 2019, when American special forces clashed with al-Shabaab terrorists.

Some estimate that the US deploy at least 6,000 military personnel in Africa – a large number of them being in Niger and around 500 Special Operations forces acting in Somalia. In fact, Somalia hosts a very long undeclared American war (on the al-Shabaab jihadist group). Such war can get quite nasty. Since 2007, thousands of people – civilians included – were killed in Somalia by US drone strikes. Those strikes are on the rise – significantly: according to data from AFRICOM's latest “Civilian Casualty Assessment” (July, 28th), this year alone there has been a number of air strikes in Somalia greater than all strikes conducted by the two previously administrations combined.

A recent investigation by Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) has revealed that private US contractors are part of the “kill chain” in East Africa. It goes beyond providing intelligence: these private contractors take part in covert “lethal operations”. And of course there is not much accountability or transparency.

One would do well to keep all that in mind if we are to have a balanced conversation about Chinese presence in Africa. And this goes beyond Somalia, of course. The US fights a covert war in Africa.

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