Africa Command

On Feb. 6, 2007, the Bush Admin. announced the creation of a new unified combatant command, U.S. Africa Command or AFRICOM, to promote U.S. national security objectives in Africa and its surrounding waters. Prior to AFRICOM¿s establishment, U.S. military involvement on the continent was divided among 3 commands: European Command, Central Command, and Pacific Command. The new command¿s area of responsibility includes all African countries except Egypt. Contents of this report: (1) Issues for Congress; (2) The DoD Proposal for a New Africa Command; (3) U.S. Strategic Interests in Africa; (4) U.S. Mil. Assistance and Security Cooperation in Africa: An Expanding Role; (5) Regional Perspectives; (6) Congressional Interest and Oversight Issues.

After the end of the Cold War and a failed mission in Somalia, the US decided to wash its hands of major military operations in Africa. Within the past few years, however, strategic interests in the region have grown, based largely on the threat of international terrorist group activities there. In 2007, the Bush Administration created a new military presence in Africa, AFRICOM (United States Africa Command), professed to be based not on occupying military or fixed bases, but rather on capacity building for and collaboration with African security forces. Some see AFRICOM as the answer to an African security system crippled by a lack of resources, widespread politicization and institutional weakness. Others claim the program is nothing more than a characteristic attempt by the US to secure its own interests in the region without regard to the actual needs of Africans. A variety of viewpoints on the debate, both from the US and Africa, come together in this collection to examine the objectives and activities of AFRICOM. The result provides the reader with a well-rounded picture of longstanding security challenges in Africa and what might be done to address them. -- Back cover.

This book discusses the systematic expansion of the United States Africa Command (AFRICOM) across the continent of Africa. This book posits that AFRICOM expansion in Africa is part of a broader system of accumulation based on a government-business-media (GBM) complex. Applying the concept at both structural and descriptive levels, the GBM complex is a function of the synergy between the state’s quest for power, businesses’ need for expansion, and the informational and hegemonic functions of media actors. The United States’ GBM complex in Africa is supported—and in some locations spearheaded—by its military, with dispossessing effects on local actors. Drawing from African case studies, analytical accounts and empirical case studies, this book explores AFRICOM’s role within this broader strategy. The volume maps both the methods and the scope of this expansion, as well as local resistance to this process, and comprises perspectives from the five regions of Africa, key sub-regional organizations and voices from Africa’s regional hegemons. This book will be of much interest to students of security studies, strategic studies, African politics and International Relations.

The U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM), newest of the six U.S. Department of Defense geographic combatant commands (CCMDs), was created in 2007 amid great controversy in both Africa and the United States over its location and mission. Over the last 5 years, AFRICOM has matured greatly, overcoming much of the initial resistance from African stakeholders through careful public messaging, and by addressing most of the U.S. interagency concerns about the Command's size and proper role within the U.S. national security/foreign policy community. This Letort Paper describes the geostrategic, operational, and intellectual changes that explain why AFRICOM was created, and debunks three myths about AFRICOM: that it was created to "exploit" Africa's oil and gas riches, "blocks" China's rise in Africa, and that France "opposes" AFRICOM. The author concludes by raising five issues that are important to AFRICOM's future: 1) allocated forces to carry out short-term training engagements in Africa; 2) preference to emerging democracies in the selection of the Command's partner-nations; 3) the desirability of regional approaches in Africa, including helping the African Union and its Regional Economic Communities to establish standby brigades; 4) the location of the Command's headquarters, which should remain in Stuttgart, Germany, for operational efficiency; and, 5) the need to carry out a top-down "right-sizing" exercise at AFRICOM during a time of severe budget constraints and a real risk for the United States of "strategic insolvency."