Washington - The Pentagon has no plans to scrap the
US military's Africa Command despite growing
pressures on the defence budget, the general who leads
the headquarters said on Wednesday.
As it prepares for another round of automatic budget
cuts, the defence department is looking at cutting back
spending on regional headquarters and senior
positions, fuelling speculation that Africa Command
could be dissolved and its responsibilities taken over by
other commands.
But General David Rodriguez, head of Africa Command,
said "that is not part of the plan right now".
"We will continue to look at that in the future, but right
now the United States believes that the focus of having
a headquarters focused on Africa to improve the
effectiveness of our military support to the state
department in the region is going to remain separate,"
he told reporters in a teleconference.
The four-star general added that "right now there are no
plans to consolidate".
Africa Command or Africom, created in 2007, has
overseen an expanding role for the American military
across the continent, focusing on countering Islamist
militants through training and arming partners in the
region.
"We've always had an interest in Africa. What is new
over the past five years is that we're more engaged,
we're more direct, it's more co-ordinated, it's more
strategic than it's been in the past," Assistant Secretary
of State for Africa Linda Thomas-Greenfield told the
same teleconference.
Political controversy
The command is based out of Stuttgart, Germany, after
US officials ran into political controversy trying to find a
location for its headquarters in Africa.
The command has operated with an annual budget of
about $296m in recent years, though that does not
cover the cost of a major US base on the continent,
Camp Lemonnier at Djibouti, which has been funded
under war-related "overseas contingency operations."
Over the past decade, the US military has built up a
logistical network across East Africa and beyond,
securing access to key airfields and ports.
The Pentagon has tended to prefer a light footprint in
Africa, gathering intelligence while relying on allies to
take direct action against al-Qaeda-linked groups in
Somalia, Mali and elsewhere.
But earlier this month, the US military staged stealthy
raids with commandos in Libya and Somalia. The raid in
Tripoli captured a long-sought al-Qaeda figure who had
been on a wanted list for years, Abu Anas al-Libi, while
US special operations forces in the Somali assault ran
into heavy fire and did not succeed in seizing a targeted
Shabaab militant.
AFP

when did they started having interest in Africa...??