It is not surprising that Washington’s war-spreaders do not supply information to the American public concerning the location of soldiers, sailors, marines and airmen involved in clandestine operations around the globe, because this might bring to light the lack of justification for such deployments. Concurrent with denial of information, however, is an energetic campaign aimed at convincing Americans that everything to do with military strength is laudable and that those who voice the slightest criticism of the armed forces are unpatriotic or even traitorous.

The American public, including the many who maintain a sane and even-handed approach to military expansion, are in general (if one may use that word in this context) much in favour of the military. For example, they love seeing and hearing marching musicians at public functions, but it is not the love of music that has motivated the Pentagon’s conductors to allocate over 400 million dollars a year on 130 military bands.

Don’t get me wrong: as a former soldier I am much in favour of these bands. There are few things more rousing and toe-tapping than a drumming, thumping, immaculately dressed, triple ranked, step-perfect batch of hooters and tooters. They’re marvellous. And they’re one of the best psychological operations weapons that the Pentagon has got to convince the citizens of America that their military is perfect.

The bands draw vast crowds at sports events and all sorts of community gatherings, and even the most kind-hearted, sweet tempered pacifist citizen can hardly fail to be moved to ecstatic flag-happiness by the joyful tunes of unbridled patriotism.

Then across the sky roar some superbly-piloted military airplanes, flashing, twisting, turning at unbelievable speed with immaculate precision and wonderful professional technique. The twelve aerial display teams of the US military services are astonishing in their skilfulness and, for example, the USAF Air Combat Command F-16 Demonstration Team performs no fewer than 25 times this year, while the Blue Angels, the Navy’s wonderful aerobatic artists appear at 35 airshows, of which I was at the first in 2017, after their winter training, on March 11 at the Naval Air Facility El Centro in California. It was a classic display of aerial mastery. Their virtuosity is breathtaking.

And so is the expense to US taxpayers, of course, because the military services are giving 290 aerial displays in 2017, all attended by thousands of people who leave them, understandably, with memories of wonderful pilots performing amazing feats of dexterity.

Bands and aerobatics have the effect of pumping up the public’s already high regard for the armed forces, but even then there’s secrecy. In a telephone interview from Doha, Qatar, the leader of the Air Force rock band, Max Impact, Senior Master Sergeant Ryan Carson, said that “Until you see what we do, it’s hard to really understand the impact music can have,” which is certainly true, but then he told the interviewer that his band had played in Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait — and a number of what he called “undisclosed locations.” Now why should the US public be denied information about where Max Impact performs? By definition, it’s difficult to keep bands quiet about where they are, and their whereabouts must have been known to their audiences.

It’s difficult to believe that Max Impact has an undercover mission, but perhaps they are tasked with playing to some of the 37,813 troops deployed “on presumably secret assignment in places listed simply as ‘unknown’.” You could compose a song about it, but it’s a great deal more serious than that.

Following the debacle in Niger on October 4 in which four American special forces soldiers were killed by unknown assailants there were questions asked concerning numbers and locations of US troops engaged in combat in Africa and elsewhere. The Secretary of Defence, General James Mattis, declared that the soldiers in Niger were there because the US is involved “in the campaign to throw ISIS and the terrorists, the radicals, those who foment instability and murder and mayhem, off their stride.” It is questionable whether this is consistent with the general’s insistence that “any time we commit our troops anywhere it’s based on answering a simple first question. And that is ‘Is the well-being of the American people sufficiently enhanced by putting our troops there?’ [where] we put our troops in a position to die.”

To judge from the mainstream media’s cover of the Niger tragedy the citizens of the United States do not appear overly concerned about soldiers dying. The magic of marching bands and swooping wings have gone far in persuading citizens that wherever their armed forces are fighting, there is a good sound patriotic rationale for their operations, as made clear by Senator Lindsey Graham who announced that in regard to the US confrontation with North Korea, “If we have to, we'll go to war. I don’t want to, but if we have to, we’ll go to war. And I’ll tell you who’ll win that war: We will” which is fairly typical of the mood in Congress, just as it was in the quagmire years of the catastrophic Vietnam War.

Graham had to admit that “I didn't know there was 1,000 troops in Niger,” although he quickly added that after he “got a little insight on why they were there and what they were doing. I can say this to the families: They were there to defend America. They were there to help allies. They were there to prevent another platform to attack America and our allies.” But even he had to confess that “We don't know exactly where we’re at in the world, militarily, and what we're doing” which is the most open acknowledgement of confusion to emanate from Congress in some time.

US forces are engaged in open warfare in Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan, in addition to carrying out offensive military operations — mainly drone and other airstrikes, but also involving special forces and CIA crash and bash raids — in many other countries, including Libya, the Philippines, Somalia, Pakistan and Yemen. There will continue to be an increase in the numbers of troops, ships, drones and strike aircraft based in and around the 172 countries in which the New York Times tells us they are already present, and Washington’s wars will expand in complexity and purpose.

Unfortunately, the American public appears unconcerned about the spread of war around the world, and it has to be remembered that two days after the US invaded Iraq on March 20, 2003, a Gallup poll showed that 72 percent of Americans supported war. In November 2001, as Afghanistan was being attacked by US forces, Gallup indicated “that Americans favour the use of ground troops in Afghanistan by more than a four-to-one margin, 80% to 18%.”

When the Vietnam War ended in 1975 with the fall of Saigon, after countless Vietnamese and over 58,000 Americans had been killed, the NBC reporter David Brinkley stood among the rows of gravestones in Arlington Cemetery in Washington DC, and delivered a most pungent warning. Clearly and impassively he said “When some future politician for some reason feels the need to drag this country into war, he might come out here to Arlington and stand right over there somewhere to make his announcement and tell what he has in mind. If he can attract public support speaking from a place like this, then his reasons for starting a new war would have to be good ones.”

Are there good reasons for all of the troops and planes and ships that are based all over the world? Good reasons for all the airstrikes and drone attacks and clandestine special forces operations? Were there good reasons for the deaths of the four special forces soldiers in Niger and the Navy Seal in Yemen on January 29 and the special forces soldier in Afghanistan on November 4?

The marching bands play on, although often the buglers play ‘Taps’ at military funerals, and most American citizens seem content to accept expansion of Washington’s wars, which will continue to destabilise the regions in which they are waged. 

The tragic loss of four American fighters in Niger reminds one that the United States has learned little from the wars in Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq. It still believes that it can send its troops into a faraway country, in this case a particularly underdeveloped one, and that they will be able to stop ISIS from spreading. This is to be achieved not by the United States doing the fighting, but—the magic formula goes—by advising and training. The main problem with this idea is that all too often the locals would much rather have the Americans do the fighting. Thus, in Niger we learned from a Nigerien involved in the ambush that “the Americans had more sophisticated weapons and so we let them confront the enemy while we took cover.” The Guardian noted that “US special forces 'fought Niger ambush alone after local troops fled.’”

In Mosul less than one thousand ISIS insurgents got thirty thousand Iraqi troops to flee—this after they had been trained and advised for a decade and a half. One may say that these days the Iraqi army is finally doing better. Still, most of the fighting is done by Kurds and Iranian-led militias.

In response, the military contingent the United States is sending to these countries is supposed to not only train and advise the troops, but also to reform the local governments. The term of art is “capacity building.” That is, once the United States has built up local institutions and forces, they will be able to fight terrorism on their own. Advocates of this approach believe that  small investments from the United States could go a long way toward stabilization: “The U.S. can build on this fragile progress and make a significant contribution to its counterterrorism and humanitarian agendas in Africa with relatively modest effort,” according to Michael O’Hanlon, a leading military analyst at Brookings. Actually, I suggest that the opposite is the bitter sociological truth. Even very large investments—see the $700 billion the United States sunk into Afghanistan—will not do the trick. Capacity building, a form of nation-building, is a very slow, difficult and costly process and must be led by locals for it to have a chance to succeed. And when it does, it cannot be led by the military, which is trained to fight and kill and not to engage in institution building, let alone a civic society.

The record shows though that (a) while the United States has assassinated a large number of Al Qaeda and ISIS leaders—their ranks are increasing. Indeed, ISIS is spreading into more countries. Additionally, it is inspiring lone-wolf attacks in many parts of the world, including the United States. (b) As ISIS is losing territory in Syria and Iraq, it is working hard to increase their attacks in Europe and, it is feared, in the United States. (c) Also, one must worry that the United States makes two terrorists for each one it kills because of the anger caused by the killing of civilians. As Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld wondered: “Are we creating more terrorists than we’re killing?” (d) Last but not least, ISIS is an ideology that needs to be fought with—ideas, a campaign the United States has yet to get off the ground.

The United States cannot do much capacity building in nations such as Niger. The country’s military forces will fight ISIS once they have a firsthand experience of what that is like, in their own ways. The United States can help here and there with sharing intelligence and military supplies. However, the notion that the United States can stabilize and democratize scores of developing nations in Africa and Asia, and that this is an effective way to protect itself from terrorism, is a theory so often disproven one wonders how many Niger-like tragedies it would take before we get the message.

nationalinterest.org

There is a very good reason why the Trump administration is doing its very best to cover up the reason for an ambush that killed Staff Sgt. Bryan C. Black, Staff Sgt. Jeremiah W. Johnson, Sgt. La David Johnson, and Staff Sgt. Dustin M. Wright in the Tillabéri region of Niger. The Pentagon first hauled out the usual bogeyman of “Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb” (AQIM) as the culprit. When that notion was debunked, the Trump White House, in coordination with Secretary of Defense James Mattis, created a new Islamist organization out of whole cloth.

What the Pentagon pulled out of its hat was the Islamic State in the Sahel, conveniently abbreviated as "ISIS." With the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, the original ISIS, on the run in the Middle East, the Pentagon saw an opportunity to give the terrorist group a rebirth in West Africa, while also blaming it for the deaths of the US servicemen. But the actual reason for the obfuscation from the Oval Office was to avoid having one of the Pentagon’s most fraudulent and discredited programs making it back on to the front pages of the newspapers.

There is every indication that what transpired near the village of Tongo Tongo in Niger was the result of a decision by the Trump administration to bolster the costly and dubious Pentagon program called the Human Terrain System (HTS).

Using anthropologists, sociologists, and linguists possessing higher degrees, the Pentagon created HTS to conduct ethnographic surveys of conflict zones in order to take advantage of inter-tribal conflicts to achieve quick military dominance over a targeted region. HTS has been charged with exacerbating tensions between various indigenous groups and tribes to create intelligence "opportunities" for the US military. In 2012, the Pentagon announced that HTS would be extended from South Asia and the Middle East to Latin America and Africa.

The Army supposedly ended HTS in 2014. However, in March 2016, the Army announced that the program was not only still in operation but was expanding. The Pentagon deceived the Congress into believing HTS was dead, but the program was simply given a new name, the Global Cultural Knowledge Network (GCKN). The new HTS has been particularly active in the Niger Delta of Nigeria and western Cameroon, where secessionists are trying to break free from Nigeria and Cameroon, respectively. AFRICOM and HTS appear to be a neo-colonialist enforcement operation whose primary mission is to protect US oil and mining companies in Africa.

The clue of HTS involvement in the Niger attack by irregulars armed with machine guns and grenade launchers came in a statement by Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Marine General Joseph Dunford. In revealing that the joint US-Nigerien patrol, consisting of 12 US Army and 30 Nigerien army personnel, was attacked by 40 armed men shortly after meeting with village leaders in Tongo Tongo. Under the HTS program, it is routine for US military personnel deployed to a targeted country to meet with village leaders and tribal elders. US military teams are often accompanied by US civilian sociocultural personnel, called Human Terrain Teams, for "intelligence support" purposes.

After questions were raised about the presence of the Green Berets in Tongo Tongo, the Pentagon indicated that someone in Tongo Tongo must have tipped off nearby AQIM guerrillas that an American military unit was in the village. After it was determined that AQIM was nowhere near Tongo Tongo, a village that does not even have roads, the Pentagon quickly created a decoy in the Islamic State in the Sahel (ISIS). Rather than walking into an Islamist terrorist group’s trap, it is more likely that the US Africa Command (AFRICOM) failed to adequately brief the Niger government and military on a mission that involved the HTS.

It is quite possible that the U.S-Nigerien patrol ran into armed opposition from smugglers who ply a region that includes Niger, nearby Mali, Burkina Faso, Benin, and Nigeria. In one of the poorest places on the planet, illicit commerce is the only way for some tribes to survive. These include the Zarma people who populate the Tillabéri region of Niger and neighboring Mali and Benin. The Zarma once rented their cattle, sheep, goats and dromedaries out to Tuareg and Fulani tribesmen. Today, it is more lucrative for the people of the Sahel to deal in weapons — including those looted from Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi's massive arms warehouses after the overthrow of his government — and drugs. Add smuggling to a Tuareg secessionist rebellion in northern Niger and Mali, uranium mining in Niger, and increased oil exploration in Niger, Chad, and northern Nigeria and a perfect toxic brew emerges. It is in this environment that AFRICOM is now wading with a discredited HTS playbook.

The Tuaregs who populate northern Niger and have been agitating for independence have long memories about what they consider to be US meddling in their affairs. In 1995, Niger's Tuareg leader Mano Dayak was killed in a suspicious plane crash in Niger. The Cessna 337 carrying Dayak and his Tuareg delegation crashed shortly after taking off from Agadez airport. Dayak was engaged in peace negotiations with the central Niger government and he and his party were on their way to Niamey for peace talks. An autonomous Tuareg government threatened to undermine the plans of Exxon and other US oil and mineral companies to have a free hand in exploiting oil and mineral resources around Lake Chad. Some Tuareg leaders suspected CIA involvement in the crash that killed their leader. Ironically, the same runway from which Dayak took off has been improved and expanded in order to handle Pentagon and CIA drone missions over the Sahel region. Google’s problematic search engine, when queried for Dayak and the plane crash is hampered by the fact that Agadez airport was re-named Mano Dayak International Airport. Therefore, search results provide flight and airline information but little on the suspicious plane crash.

With little congressional oversight, there will be more incidents like that which saw the deaths of four Green Berets and 30 Nigerien military personnel. In Afghanistan and Iraq, where US military commanders like General David Petraeus placed a high degree of confidence in HTS, the program resulted in massive numbers of civilian deaths. Rather than report on the failures of HTS, the media, including The New York Times and the New Yorker, gave the program high praise. Today, the media is falling for the "ISIS did it" canard when many corporate reporters had to locate Niger on a map when the first reports emerged about the ambush on the Green Berets.

HTS predecessor programs used in Southeast Asia, the Pentagon's Civil Operations and Rural Development Support (CORDS) and the CIA’s counterpart, the Phoenix Program, were responsible for some of the worst genocide carried out by the United States during the Vietnam War. Before Phoenix, the CIA dabbled in anthropological operations in Latin America with Project CAMELOT.

In 2007, the Network of Concerned Anthropologists called HTS "dangerous and reckless," as well as an unethical use of anthropologists by the Pentagon. Professor David Price of Saint Martin's University, a leading critic of HTS, called the program a neo-colonial "mission to occupy and destroy opposition to US goals and objectives." Professor Hugh Gusterson of George Mason University said HTS was akin to "asking an anthropologist to gather intelligence that may lead to someone's death or imprisonment . . . it's like asking an Army doctor to kill a wounded insurgent." Members of the American Anthropological Association (AAA) have, as they did with the CIA's projects CAMELOT and PHOENIX, condemned HTS for its reliance on what the AAA has described as “mercenary anthropology."

While the Army and its special operations forces, including the Green Berets, continue to value the program, it has met strong opposition from the Marine Corps. In 2009, one Marine Corps officer, Major Ben Connable, wrote that HTS undermined the Army's "cultural competence." The ambush in Niger appears to be more and more the result of "cultural incompetence."

Roughly, 8-11 thousand jihadi fighters come from Maghreb countries. The numbers vary according to different estimates. Some of the militants will lose lives on the battlefield, some will lay down their arms, but a large part will continue the efforts to reach the coveted goal of establishing a caliphate. With the battle experience received in Syria and Iraq, these seasoned fighters will pose a great threat to the stability of their respective homelands.

It has already started. Algeria faces a security challenge. The war against jihadism has turned Algeria into one of Africa’s top military powerhouses. In the past 20 years, Algeria has spent more on its military than all three of its immediate neighbors — Mo­rocco, Libya and Tunisia — com­bined.

Algeria is a country with a 1,200 km coastline. If waves of asylum seekers hit Europe from there, the Old Continent will be in real trouble. Besides, the country is a key supplier of oil and gas to the West. The implications of internal conflict in Algeria could be a real nightmare. Russia helps to prevent it and, thus, save Western Europe.

At least 6 thousand of IS fighters are Tunisians. Some of them hold prominent positions in the IS and the Nusra Front (Jabhat Fatah al-Sham) in Syria. Many Tunisian extremists are affiliated with Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, which is active in a half-dozen countries across North Africa. Tunisia is at odds over what to do if and when they come home. These fighters would have the capabilities and cultural familiarity to potentially create a formidable and sustained destabilizing force in Tunisia. Meanwhile, Tunisian security forces break up one IS recruiting cell after another.

Algeria, Tunisia and Morocco face threats from the East as well as from the South, where they have to counter the emerging «Sahara-Sahel Front». Islamists from Mali, Niger and Mauritania are regrouping to expand the zone of influence. For instance, Al-Qaeda militants have recently attacked a Malian army post near the border of Burkina Faso.

In North and West Africa, Al Qaeda is on the rise again. Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) has withstood the chokehold of the Algerian security services, US drones, and the French-led intervention in Mali, to launch a range of attacks in recent years, whether storming a beach resort in Ivory Coast or conducting a low-level insurgency in northern Mali.

A number of terrorist groups operating in Mali and neighboring areas – Ansar Dine, al-Mourabitoun, the Massina Brigades, the Sahara Emirate – united this February into one organization called Nusrat-ul-Islam. The newly formed group pledged allegiance to Taliban leader Mullah Haibatullah, al-Qaida leader Ayman Al-Zawahiri and the leader of al-Qaida's North African franchise Abu Musab Abdul Wadud.

Al-Qaeda and its affiliates are challenged by the IS. In November 2016, the Islamic State in Greater Sahara was formed, led by Adnan Abu Walid al-Sahrawi.

The IS militants may regroup in the war-torn Libya. This country is probably the weakest link among Maghreb states. Defense officials have said the hardline Sunni Muslim militants are considering moving their headquarters to that country. A US military intervention is an option. According to Gen. Thomas D. Waldhauser, head of the Pentagon’s Africa Command, «The instability in Libya and North Africa may be the most significant near-term threat to U.S. and allies’ interests on the continent». Russia has been asked to intervene by Libyan political and military leaders.

The armed forces of Maghreb countries are getting prepared. The Moroccan military has just held exercises Flintlock-2017 with the US. Weapons systems, like, for instance, Russian Mi-28N Night Hunter attack helicopters, are procured to make the counterterrorist operations more effective. On March 15th, 2016, King Mohamed VI visited Moscow to sign several important agreements, including the agreement on mutual protection of classified information on military and military-technical matters and the declaration on the fight against international terrorism. Morocco is interested in strengthening its military capabilities with Russian weapons.

Last year, Russia provided Algerian and Tunisian authorities with intelligence and military aid to strengthen counterterrorism efforts. The package included Russian high-resolution satellite imagery of key Algerian border crossings with Tunisia, Libya, Chad and Mali. The imagery has enabled Algerian authorities to thwart several attempts by terrorists and insurgents to infiltrate Algerian borders. Algeria has shared this data with Tunisia.

Russia has close military cooperation with the states of the region. A country with a significant Muslim minority, about 10% of its popula­tion, it has been battling jihadists in the Caucasus for a number of years. It understands the problem and has vast experience to share. Unlike the US and other Western powers, Russia does not accompany its aid with lectures about human rights or political demands pushing for «democra­tic reforms». As Rus­sian armaments have proven themselves on the battlefield, it seems likely that Maghreb governments under terrorist threat will increasingly turn towards Moscow.

Today, Islamists of all kinds, especially the IS, are emerging as a very serious threat for the United States, its NATO allies and Russia. Despite the existing differences on Ukraine and a host of other issues where Russia and the West are on opposite side of the barricades, cooperation on fighting the threat is possible and necessary. After all, the enemy is common and its deadly activities go far beyond the scope of a regional threat.

Russia and the West could coordinate activities in Libya. Sharing intelligence and cooperating in joint special operations against key targets could be a start of a broader process. Russia and the US-led West could launch preliminary talks on the wording of a hypothetical UN Security Council resolution to make it approved if an international effort will be required to keep the region from abyss.

North Africa should not become a divisive issue to complicate the relations between Russia and the West. The situation calls for cooperation and dialogue. The IS will soon become a thing of the past if Russia and the West set aside what divides them and concentrate on what brings them together. This approach will benefit all. 

It is the fourth such crisis to wrack the West African country in recent years, when famines struck similarly in 2012, 2010 and 2005. The immediate cause is extreme climate that has hit crop harvests. But the root cause is the deliberate underdevelopment of Niger under France’s parasitical neo-colonialism. 

Ironically, this chronic underdevelopment and poverty in Niger, and Africa generally, is a cornerstone for France’s own national development and wealth creation. 

Niger has a land area twice the size of France, with a population of only 17 million – a quarter of France’s. Much of the Sahelian country is arid and hostile to agriculture. But given its relatively small population, Niger should be a wealthy nation owing to its other vast natural resources. 

It is the world’s fifth top producer of uranium ore – after Kazakhstan, Canada, Australia and Russia. Niger has also other mineral riches, including gold, iron ore, molybdenum, tin, salt, gypsum and phosphates – and what are reckoned to be huge untapped oil and gas reserves. 

Yet despite all this natural wealth, Niger is officially the poorest country on Earth. According to the United Nations Human Development Index for 2012, it is ranked the lowest out of 186 nations. 

The explanation for this anomaly is that Niger’s chronic condition of underdevelopment, poverty and hunger is a result of politics – French politics to be precise. 

Like many other African countries, Niger gained official independence from France in 1960. But, as with other former colonies, its newfound «freedom» soon proved to be illusory. 

For the past six decades, Niger has been kept enslaved under the French monetary system known as the «African Franc». The currency was imposed on more than a dozen former French colonies, including Cote d’Ivoire, Burkina Faso, Benin, Chad, Mali and Niger, as a condition for their political «independence». 

Paris dictates that all member countries must deposit their annual revenues with the French Treasury, from which the former colonies can draw down borrowing – but they are charged financial interest for this dubious «privilege». Meanwhile, the French government allows itself to use this African money to invest in its own companies – interest free. 

France also unilaterally determines the exchange rate for the African Franc against the Euro and other international currencies. 

In this way, France has been able to continue its rapacious exploitation of Africa as if it were back in the colonial heyday of the 19th and early 20th Centuries – only now under the politically correct guise of «independent nations».

The financial and economic looting of Africa means that resources are extracted at the lowest cost to France, which can then export products back to its former colonies at the highest price. The upshot is that Africa is caught in a poverty trap of underdevelopment and hunger – as we are witnessing now in Niger – even though the continent has some of the most abundant resources on Earth.

A measure of Niger’s forced underdevelopment is this: apart from uranium ore, the other major exports from the country are livestock, cowpeas and onions. In other words, the county – despite its vast natural wealth – is stunted and crippled. And France wants to keep Niger crippled, economically and socially, because it ensures that France can exploit the country at will and in particular for the strategically vital uranium ore. 

Some 80 per cent of France’s national energy supply is derived from nuclear power generated at 59 plants operated by state-owned Electricite de France. About one-third of France’s total annual supply of uranium ore for its power stations is sourced from Niger. The French uranium-mining company, Areva, has mines across Niger, guarded by French Special Forces.

Electricity supply is perhaps the main determinant of a country’s overall development. So, while French citizens can enjoy ubiquitous electricity, and all the social development that goes along with that, it is on the back of widespread poverty and human suffering in Niger.

Areva is the world’s second biggest uranium-producing company with annual profits of €430 million. Earlier this year, the firm said it was spending a tenth of this figure on upgrading security at its main mining site in Arlit, Niger, after militants bombed the plant in May. That attack prompted French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius to visit, where he warned against the specter of «terrorism across Africa».

It was from the Areva mine in Arlit that four French employees were kidnapped by militants, believed to be linked to Al Qaeda in the Maghreb, back in late 2010. The hostages were returned to France at end of last month after French authorities reportedly paid a €20 million ransom.

Putting these figures into some perspective, when Niger experienced a previous severe famine in 2005, Areva reportedly donated €250,000 for «humanitarian relief» across the entire country – some 0.06 per cent of the company’s annual profits, or 1.3 per cent of what France paid in ransom for the release of four of its nationals, or less than 1 per cent of what Areva spends on «securing» its properties in Niger. 

To the west of Niger is Mali, another former French colony, which is also believed to possess lucrative deposits of uranium ore – although as yet untapped. 

When France launched its military invasion of Mali in January this year, President Francois Hollande claimed that his country was protecting Mali’s sovereignty from insurgents and «terrorists». At the same time that 3,000 French troops landed in Mali, it was scarcely reported but French Special Forces were also dispatched to tighten security at Areva’s mines in Niger. 

Terrorism, like poverty and hunger, has roots. These roots are traced all the way to Paris, where neocolonial policy has worked to ensure that French national development and wealth for its elites has been built on ruthless and relentless exploitation of Africans, over many decades to the present day. 

As one million people now face starvation in Niger – the poorest country on the planet that otherwise should be one of the richest – oblivious French politicians, reclining in Elysée Palace, will no doubt be toasting their glasses of fine wine over fine food, and arrogantly chortling: «Vive La France!»

Today Africa has become the main arena for international terrorism. Currently, dozens of large international terrorist organizations are active there: Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, the Movement for Oneness and Jihad and Ansar Dine in the Sahel region; Jama’atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda’awati wal-Jihad (Boko Haram) in Nigeria; Harakat Al-Shabaab Al Mujahideen in Somalia; Al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya in Egypt; the Lord's Resistance Army in Uganda; pirate terrorism in the Gulfs of Aden and Guinea… Today the African continent is firmly in the grip of an entire network of terrorist organizations.

Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) is an Islamist organization which aims to overthrow the Algerian government and establish an Islamic state. The organization's members are mainly Algerians, Tuaregs and Moroccans. AQIM was the main force behind the seizure of northern Mali and an attack on Bamako in January 2013. AQIM first announced its creation in January 2007, when it emerged from the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat. As a result of its illegal activities, international organizations (the UN and the EU) and several countries (the U.S., Great Britain, France and Spain) have added it to their lists of terrorist organizations. AQIM's main goals are spreading the ideology of global jihad and uniting all the extremist groups of North Africa to overthrow existing regimes and establish Islamic states. AQIM's fighters organize and carry out armed attacks and terrorist acts against authorities and government agencies, energy infrastructure sites, and representatives of national and foreign companies. AQIM's activities have affected Russia as well. For example, in March 2007 in the Algerian province of Ain Defla, a Russian citizen and three local residents were killed when AQIM blew up a bus belonging to the Russian company Stroytransgaz. In December 2007 in the province of Medea, another vehicle in which Russian specialists were traveling was blown up.

Al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya (GI) is an Egyptian Sunnite Islamist movement which aims to overthrow the Egyptian government and create an Islamic state. Over the course of five years, around 800 police and military personnel have become the victims of GI fighters. After the so-called «revolution» of 2011, GI was transformed into a political party which received 13 seats in the country's parliament. In Russia, Al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya is officially deemed a terrorist organization. 

Harakat Al-Shabaab Al Mujahideen, better known as Al-Shabaab, is a Somali militant group which controls a significant territory in southern Somalia. A strict form of sharia law is enforced on this territory. Al-Shabaab's official goal is jihad against the «enemies of Islam». However, in reality the organization is fighting with African Union troops in Somalia.

Jama’atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda’awati wal-Jihad, better known by its Hausa name Boko Haram (BH), officially protests secular laws and the «westernization» of society. BH was created in 1991 and aims to establish sharia law throughout the territory of Nigeria. However, there are serious reasons to believe that the official aims are not BH's main goal. For example, in northern Nigeria, where the main part of BH is based, sharia law has long been the official law of the states, although it only applies to Muslims. Trying to apply sharia law to Christians is pure terrorism and has no relation to Islam. The sultan of Sokoto State, Sa'adu Abubakar, who is the spiritual leader of Nigeria's Muslims, has called BH an «anti-Islamic sect» and a «disgrace to Islam». According to some figures, around ten thousand people have fallen victim to BH since 2001. In addition to Christians, who are the main victims of BH's terror, they kill Muslims as well, including clergymen who dare to criticize the sect. 

The list of organizations recognized by the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation as terrorist organizations contains several based in Africa. These are mostly Egyptian organizations: Holy War (al-Jihad or Egyptian Islamic Jihad), the Islamic Group (al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya) and the Muslim Brotherhood (al-Ikhwan al-Muslimun). (2) As for al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, the Supreme Court of Russia recognized it as a terrorist organization in November 2008. (3) In this regard, the decision of the Supreme Court of the RF states: «…The materials examined at the court session…testify to the fact that terrorists linked with the organization in question participated in illegal paramilitary groups (article 208, Crim. Code of the RF) operating on the territory of the Northern Caucasus»…

The beginning of 2013 was marked by an increase in the activity of terrorist groups in Africa. Recent weeks have brought news of more and more new terrorist attacks… In April a UN special rapporteur on human rights and fighting terrorism called for urgent assistance to Burkina Faso in dealing with the critical situation it is facing in connection with terrorist attacks. In early May, Boko Haram executed a new simultaneous attack in three places at once (an army barracks, a police station and a prison) in Bama, Nigeria. In late May a double attack took place in Niger at the uranium mines in the city of Arlit. The scale of the attacks and the number of people killed caused the government to declare a three-day mourning period. The radical Islamist group Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa took responsibility for the attack. (4) 

A peculiarity of the activities of terrorist organizations in Africa is their great mobility, which in turn is connected with the state of African borders; they are practically transparent, especially in the Sahel. For example, the successful suppression of terrorism in Algeria in the late 1990s was in fact to a great degree due to the migration of terrorists from Algeria to northern Mali across the completely transparent borders in the Sahara.

Terrorist organizations in Africa are more and more often presenting a united front. For example, during the movement of Nigerian troops to the territory of Mali, Boko Haram fighters engaged with them, attempting to prevent them from entering Mali. At the most recent session of the UN Security Council on terrorism, the Republic of Togo, which had encountered the threat of the new African terror first-hand, reported that individual terrorist groups are beginning to form a «terrorist international» by putting down roots in several countries at once; as a result, it is now difficult to differentiate international terrorism from local terrorism. The situation is exacerbated by the fact that the activities of such terrorist groups create a serious threat to the efforts of the international community toward keeping the peace. (5)

Several peculiarities of the activities of terrorist organizations in Africa may be pointed out. First, as was already mentioned, terrorist groups hinder the work of UN and African Union peacekeeping missions. Second, the terrorist threat in Africa is the product of a merger between political and religious extremism and organized crime. Africa could turn into a pool for the recruitment, training and financing of terrorists outside the Black Continent as well. Finally, terrorists could seize control of such strategic resources as oil, uranium, diamonds, etc. The activities of terrorist organizations in Africa are now being discussed in the UN Security Council (Al-Qaeda of the Islamic Maghreb, Ansar Dine and the Lord's Resistance Army) and the International Criminal Court (the Lord's Resistance Army and Boko Haram), but there have been no results. For example, despite the fact that the government of Uganda, the International Criminal Court and the UN Security Council are all fighting against the Lord's Resistance Army, they still have not been able to arrest a single one of the organization's leaders, for whom international arrest warrants have been issued.

It is impossible not to notice that practically all major terrorist attacks have served as a basis for the West's interference in the affairs of African states. The attacks on the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998 led to the American bombing of Sudan. The Lockerbie bombing became the basis for air strikes against Libya. Terrorism in Mali was the basis for an invasion by France. It is also apparent that African terrorist organizations, which officially are each fighting for their own cause, also have a common goal: fighting against the peacekeeping operations conducted by the African Union. Thus one can infer that the spread of terror is someone's way of not allowing Africans to take the resolution of conflicts on the Black Continent into their own hands.

The new drone base is initially located in the capital of Niamey and will later be moved to a forward operating location expected to be located in Agadez in the heart of Tuareg Niger… The base is being established to counter various Islamist groups – including Ansar Dine, Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), Nigeria-based Boko Haram, and a new group, Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa (MOJWA) – that briefly seized control of northern Mali from Tuaregs, led by the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad, who took advantage of a coup d’etat in Mali to establish an independent Tuareg state called Azawad. 

The U.S. has long been opposed to any attempt by the suppressed Tuareg people to establish their own independent state in the Sahara. American opposition to the Tuaregs dovetails with historical French opposition to Tuareg nationalism.

However, U.S. State Department and CIA personnel have been discussing a U.S. presence in Niger since February 25, 2010, when a U.S. delegation met with the Chairman of the Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy (CSRD), General Souleyman Salou, just one week after the military junta overthrew democratically-elected President Mamadou Tandja in a coup and suspended the Nigerien constitution. According to a leaked State Department cable from the U.S. embassy in Niamey:

Eric Whitaker, the U.S. Charge d’affaires met with Salou and Colonel Moussa Gros, the Senior Military Advisor to the CSRD, in a session that drew praise from Salou, who highlighted «the friendship between the two countries». Salou also told the U.S. emissaries «the CSRD would continue bilateral information liaison via the Directorate General for Documentation and External Security (DGDSE) [The Nigerien intelligence agency].» He stressed that the CSRD sought cooperation with Washington in the areas of security assistance, the fight against al-Qaida, and support for the regime. Although the United States has a policy of not recognizing governments that achieve power through military coups and force of arms, the Obama administration was as quick to embrace the Nigerien junta as it had in supporting similar CIA-installed juntas in Honduras and Paraguay.

Salou smiled as he stated that he understood the United States did not support military coups and armed seizures of power. Obviously, Salou was in on the Obama administration’s dirty little secret. While publicly opposing coups, Washington had already supported one in Honduras and would soon be supporting them in Paraguay, Libya, Syria, and other countries. Salou’s resume spoke volumes of his U.S. training and according to the leaked cable from Nimaey:

«BG [Brigadier General] Salou has been the Chief of Staff of the Nigerien Air Force since at least 2003. He is a graduate of the US Air Force's Command and Staff College and is assessed by the DATT [Defense Attache] as extremely pro-U.S…Col. Gros, prior to assuming his role as the advisor to the President of the CSRD, was the military advisor to the Nigerien Prime Minister. Also assessed to be pro-U.S., at least one of his children was educated in the United States and he reports to have served as the Defense Attache) to the U.S. for a short period in 1987».

Niger is a poor African backwater country only of importance to the United States when it can be used as a pawn in wider international geopolitical security matters. The George W. Bush administration used Niger and what turned out to be bogus attempts by Saddam Hussein to obtain Nigerien «yellow cake» uranium to justify its invasion and occupation of Iraq. It was later discovered that forged Niger government documents on a Niger-Iraq uranium connection were provided to the White House by the chief of Italy's SISMI intelligence service, General Nicolo Pollari, on the orders of then-Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.

In addition to using uranium-rich Niger as a cause for intervention I the country, the Pentagon and CIA have also eyed Niger’s other mineral and its oil resources. Those who have stood in the way of plans by Western companies to exploit Niger’s natural resources have often paid with their lives. In 1995, Niger's Tuareg leader Mano Dayak was killed in a suspicious plane crash in northern Niger. Dayak was engaged in peace negotiations with the central Niger government and was on his way to Niamey when the plane crashed shortly after takeoff. However, an autonomous Tuareg government in northern Niger threatened to undermine the plans of Exxon and other U.S. oil companies and mineral miners to have a free hand in exploiting oil and mineral resources around Lake Chad, along the Chadian-Nigerien border. Many Tuaregs believed Dayak’s plane was sabotaged by the CIA. Ironically, the location of America’s future drone base in Agadez, northern Niger, complete with CIA officers and U.S. Special Operations personnel, will be at Mano Dayak International Airport, named for the martyred Tuareg leader.

Washington’s increasing military presence in the Sahel region has been at least two decades in the making. U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency personnel began recruiting agents-of-influence among the 400-man contingent sent by Niger to fight alongside American troops battling Saddam Hussein’s forces in Operation Desert Storm. Under the rubric of the Trans-Saharan Counter-Terrorism Partnership (TSCTP), the United States, with the cooperation of the U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM), has pumped hundreds of millions of dollars in security assistance to the security and intelligence services, as well as the military forces of West African nations. The TSCTP was formerly known as the Pan-Sahel Initiative. Nigerien security forces have used U.S.-supplied lethal military and non-lethal crowd control equipment, including night-vision equipment, armored high mobility multipurpose wheeled vehicles, global positioning systems, and secure radios, to forcibly put down pro-autonomy Tuareg and other pro-democracy protesters.

U.S. military training for Niger is provided annually during the Pentagon's OPERATION FLINTLOCK military exercise. U.S.-trained Nigerien forces are also used to protect the uranium mines operated by the French state-owned Areva nuclear power production company in cooperation with Japanese and Spanish companies.

In addition to U.S. military personnel in Niamey, there are also U.S. bases in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso; Bamako, Mali; Nouakchott, Mauritania; and Tamanrasset, Algeria. The U.S. presence in Burkina Faso is known as Creek Sand. From these and other suspected bases, the United States has let loose armed and unarmed drones across the Sahara. This is how the peoples of West Africa have been introduced to America’s first president of African descent. Such a military incursion into Africa would have been unthinkable and undoable for such white American presidents as Jimmy Carter, Gerald Ford, John F. Kennedy, or Dwight Eisenhower. However, Obama, as a president with roots in Kenya, gives weighty cover for the U.S. plans to establish a neo-colonialist regime for Africa, one run out of Washington.

Niger was once a colonial backwater of the French empire. It is now transitioning into a full-blown protectorate of the American empire. However, Niger should not grow used to its new American masters. The American empire is crumbling due to financial and moral decay. When Pax Americana finally falls, it will leave much of the world, including Niger, in shock.