[News] U.S. Military Is Building a $100 Million Drone Base in Africa

[Anti-Imperialist News]

https://theintercept.com/2016/09/29/u-s-military-is-building-a-100-million-drone-base-in-africa/ 



  U.S. Military Is Building a $100 Million Drone Base in Africa

Nick Turset at nickturse - September 29, 2016

_From high above_, Agadez almost blends into the cocoa-colored wasteland 
that surrounds it. Only when you descend farther can you make out a city 
that curves around an airfield before fading into the desert. Once a 
nexus for camel caravans hauling 
<http://www.wsj.com/articles/agadez-traffickers-profit-from-movement-through-niger-to-libya-1437002559> 
tea and salt across the Sahara, Agadez is now a West African paradise 
for people smugglers and a way station for refugees and migrants 
<http://www.newsweek.com/why-niger-west-africas-people-smuggling-hub-471600> 
intent on reaching Europe’s shores by any means necessary.

agadez-doc_edit-tint 
<https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3115803-Niger-Drone-Base-Page-1.html> 


Document: U.S. Africa Command

Africans

fleeing 
<http://www.wsj.com/articles/agadez-traffickers-profit-from-movement-through-niger-to-libya-1437002559> 


unrest and poverty are not, however, the only foreigners making their 
way to this town in the center of Niger. U.S. military documents reveal 
new information about an American drone base under construction on the 
outskirts of the city. The long-planned project — considered the most 
important U.S. military construction effort in Africa, according to 
formerly secret files obtained by The Intercept through the Freedom of 
Information Act — is slated to cost $100 million, and is just one of a 
number of recent American military initiatives in the

impoverished 
<http://www.newsweek.com/why-niger-west-africas-people-smuggling-hub-471600> 


nation.

The base is the latest sign, experts say, of an ever-increasing emphasis 
on counterterror operations in the north and west of the continent. As 
the only country in the region willing to allow a U.S. base for MQ-9 
Reapers — a newer, larger, and potentially more lethal model than the 
venerable Predator drone — Niger has positioned itself to be the key 
regional hub for U.S. military operations, with Agadez serving as the 
premier outpost for launching intelligence, surveillance, and 
reconnaissance missions against a plethora of terror groups.

For years, the U.S. operated from an air base in Niamey, Niger’s 
capital, but in early 2014, Capt. Rick Cook, then chief of U.S. Africa 
Command’s Engineer Division, mentioned the potential for a new 
“semi-permanent … base-like facility” in Niger. That September, the 
Washington Post’s Craig Whitlock exposed plans to base drones at 
Agadez. Within days, the U.S. Embassy in Niamey announced that AFRICOM 
was, indeed, “assessing the possibility of establishing a temporary, 
expeditionary contingency support location” there. The outpost, 
according to the communiqué, “presents an attractive option from which 
to base ISR (Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance) assets 
given its proximity to the threats in the region and the complexity of 
operating with the vast distance of African geography.”

Air Force documents submitted to Congress in 2015 note 
<http://www.saffm.hq.af.mil/Portals/84/documents/FY16/AFD-150130-009.pdf?ver=2016-08-24-100128-300> 
that the U.S. “negotiated an agreement with the government of Niger to 
allow for the construction of a new runway and all associated pavements, 
facilities, and infrastructure adjacent to the Niger Armed Force’s Base 
Aerienne 201 (Airbase 201) south of the city of Agadez.” When the 
National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2016 was introduced 
last April, embedded in it was a $50 million request for the 
construction of an “airfield and base camp at Agadez, Niger … to support 
operations in western Africa.” When President Obama signed the defense 
bill, that sum was authorized 
<https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/senate-bill/1356/text?q=%7b%22search%22%3A%5b%22agadez%22%5d%7d&resultIndex=4>.

Reporting by The Intercept found the true cost to be double that sum. In 
addition to the $50 million to “construct Air Base 201,” another $38 
million in operation and maintenance (O&M) funds was slated to be spent 
“to support troop labor and ancillary equipment,” according to a second 
set of undated, heavily redacted, formerly secret documents obtained 
from U.S. Africa Command by The Intercept. But the $38 million O&M price 
tag — for expenses like fuel and troops’ per diem — has already jumped 
to $50 million, according to new figures provided by the Pentagon, while 
sustainment costs are now projected at $12.8 million per year.

The files obtained by The Intercept attest to the importance of Agadez 
for future missions by drones, also known as remotely piloted aircraft 
or RPAs. “

The top MILCON 
<https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3115684-Niger-Drone-Base-Page-2.html> 


[military construction] project for USAFRICOM is located in Agadez, 
Niger to construct a C-17 and MQ-9 capable airfield,” reads a 2015 
planning document. “

RPA presence in NW Africa 
<https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3115722-Niger-Drone-Base-Page-3.html> 


supports operations against seven [Department of State]-designated 
foreign terrorist organizations. Moving operations to Agadez aligns 
persistent ISR to current and emerging threats over Niger and Chad, 
supports French regionalization and extends range to cover Libya and 
Nigeria.”

The Pentagon is tight-lipped about the outpost, however.

“Due to operational security considerations, we don’t release details on 
numbers of personnel or specific missions or locations, including 
information regarding the Nigerien military air base located in Agadez,” 
Pentagon spokesperson Lt. Col. Michelle L. Baldanza told The Intercept 
in an email, stressing that drones are not yet flying from the outpost. 
However, the declassified documents say construction will be completed 
next year.

The documents offer further details 
<https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3115803-Niger-Drone-Base-Page-1.html>, 
including plans for a 1,830-meter paved asphalt runway capable of 
supporting C-17 cargo aircraft and “miscellaneous light and medium load 
aircraft”; a 17,458-square-meter parking apron and taxiway for “light 
load ISR aircraft”; and the installation of “three 140’ x 140’ 
relocatable fabric tension aircraft hangars”; as well as all the 
standard infrastructure for troops, including “force protection” 
measures like barriers, fences, and an “Entry Control Point.”

While AFRICOM failed to respond to requests for information about the 
projects, a May 2016 satellite photo of the site provides a status 
report. “The image shows that the main runway … has been repaved,” said 
Dan Gettinger, the co-founder and co-director of the Center for the 
Study of the Drone at Bard College and author of a guide 
<http://dronecenter.bard.edu/how-to-hunt-for-drones/> to identifying 
drone bases from satellite imagery. “Near the runway there’s a structure 
that appears to be a future hangar, though it’s still under 
construction. There’s also a new dirt road that runs a fair distance 
from the runway to a U.S. base that’s enclosed with a perimeter wall and 
there are a number of shelters there for personnel as well as a command 
center. All the things that you’d expect on a base.”

satellite-date-2

Satellite images of site of U.S. drone base outside Agadez, Niger.

Photo: Google Earth

According to the documents, Niger was the “

only country 
<https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3115803-Niger-Drone-Base-Page-1.html> 


in NW Africa willing to allow basing of MQ-9s,” the larger, newer 
cousins of the Predator drone. The documents went on to

note 
<https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3115722-Niger-Drone-Base-Page-3.html> 


: “President expressed willingness to support armed RPAs.”

The U.S. military activity in Niger is not isolated. “There’s a trend 
toward greater engagement and a more permanent presence in West Africa — 
the Maghreb and the Sahel,” noted Adam Moore of the department of 
geography at the University of California in Los Angeles and the 
co-author of an academic study 
<http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14650045.2016.1160060> of 
the U.S. military’s presence in Africa.

Since 9/11, in fact, the United States has poured vast amounts of 
military aid into the region. In 2002, for example, the State Department 
launched a counterterrorism program — known as the Pan-Sahel Initiative, 
which later became the Trans-Sahara Counterterrorism Partnership (TSCTP) 
— to assist the militaries of Chad, Mali, Mauritania, and Niger. Between 
2009 and 2013 alone, the U.S. allocated 
<https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=8&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwiu88LO-8_JAhWHqB4KHcsbB1YQFghKMAc&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.gao.gov%2Fassets%2F670%2F664337.pdf&usg=AFQjCNHhWyEg8qLY-TiVAhKq5Og2wSqNcw&bvm=bv.109395566,d.eWE> 
$288 million in TSCTP funding, according to a 2014 report by the 
Government Accountability Office. Niger was one of the top three 
recipients, netting more than $30 million.

Niger3 
<https://prod01-cdn07.cdn.firstlook.org/wp-uploads/sites/1/2016/09/Niger3.png> 


Niger and neighboring countries.

Image: The Intercept

U.S. special operations forces

regularly 
<http://www.africom.mil/Newsroom/Article/11773/african-led-exercise-flintlock-kicks-off-in-niger>train 
<http://www.africom.mil/newsroom/article/25269/flintlock-15-wraps-up-in-ndjamena-chad> 


with Niger’s army and the U.S. has

transferred 
<http://www.africom.mil/newsroom/article/11021/niger-gets-new-planes-and-trucks-through-us-security-cooperation-programs> 


millions of dollars’ worth of planes, trucks, and other gear to that 
impoverished nation. In a 2015 report to the Senate Foreign Relations 
Committee’s Subcommittee on Africa and Global Health, Lauren Ploch 
Blanchard of the Congressional Research Service noted that since 2006 
Niger had received more than $82 million in assistance through the 
Department of Defense’s Global Train and Equip program.

“In close coordination with partner militaries in West Africa, including 
Niger, USAFRICOM supports a range of security and capacity building 
efforts in the greater Sahelian region,” Baldanza told The Intercept. 
“These efforts support U.S. diplomatic and national security objectives 
and are designed to strengthen relationships with African partners, 
promote stability and security, and enable our African partners to 
address their security threats.”

Stability and security have, however, proved elusive. In 2010, for 
example, a military junta

overthrew 
<http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/20/world/africa/20niger.html?_r=0>

Niger’s president as he attempted to extend his rule. In fact, all the 
original members of the Pan-Sahel Initiative have fallen victim to 
military uprisings. Chad saw attempted coups in 2006 and 2013, members 
of Mauritania’s military overthrew the government in 2005 and again in 
2008, and a U.S.-trained military officer toppled the democratically 
elected president of Mali in 2012.

The region, relatively free 
<https://theintercept.com/2015/11/20/in-mali-and-rest-of-africa-the-u-s-military-fights-a-hidden-war/> 
of transnational terror threats in 2001, is now beset by regular attacks 
<https://www.thecable.ng/path-of-a-ruthless-killer-all-boko-haram-deaths-in-2015> 
from Boko Haram, a once-tiny, nonviolent 
<http://www.voanews.com/content/us-training-niger-army-to-resist-boko-haram/3026340.html>, 
Islamist sect from Nigeria that has since pledged allegiance to the 
Islamic State and threatens the stability of not only its homeland but 
also Cameroon, Chad, and Niger. And Boko Haram is just one of 17 
militant groups now menacing the region, according 
<https://theintercept.com/2016/07/11/in-africa-u-s-military-sees-enemies-everywhere/> 
to the Defense Department’s Africa Center for Strategic Studies.

Drones have long been integral to U.S. efforts in Niger. In 2012, 
according to the files obtained by The Intercept, Niger agreed to host 
U.S. drones in Niamey, the capital, on the condition that operations 
would eventually be shifted to a more remote military base in Agadez.

In February 2013, the U.S. began flying Predator drones out of the 
capital. Later in the spring, an AFRICOM spokesperson revealed that U.S. 
air operations there were providing “support for intelligence collection 
with French forces conducting operations in Mali and with other partners 
in the region.” The Air Force recently announced plans to upgrade shower 
and latrine facilities at Niamey “to serve a steady state of 200 to 250 
personnel a day.”

“The U.S. shares that base with France,” said Gettinger. The base in 
Niamey, he explained, “is strategically important simply because to the 
north there’s Mali and the threat posed by al Qaeda-linked groups, 
including al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb. … To the south you have 
Nigeria and Boko Haram, so there’s lots of demand for ISR capabilities.” 
At Agadez, he noted, the U.S. doesn’t need to share facilities with the 
French military or commercial aircraft. And it is, he said, “more 
strategically located than Niamey.”

As UCLA’s Moore puts it: “The recent trajectory of sites and money 
suggests that Niger is becoming, after Djibouti, the second most 
important country for U.S. military counterterrorism operations on the 
continent.”

-- 
Freedom Archives 522 Valencia Street San Francisco, CA 94110 415 
863.9977 www.freedomarchives.org
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