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<blockquote>
<p><span style="font-size: x-large;"><strong>America’s Secret
African Drone War Against the Islamic State</strong> </span><br>
<span style="font-size: medium;"><strong>Predators and the
“Neutralization” of 69 People in Iraq and Syria</strong> </span><br>
By <a target="_blank"
href="http://www.tomdispatch.com/authors/nickturse">Nick Turse</a><br>
</p>
<p><b><small><small><small><small><a class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/176083/tomgram%3A_nick_turse%2C_a_shadow_war_and_an_american_drone_unit_under_wraps/#more">http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/176083/tomgram%3A_nick_turse%2C_a_shadow_war_and_an_american_drone_unit_under_wraps/#more</a></small></small></small></small></b><br>
</p>
<p>On October 7th, at an “undisclosed location” somewhere in
“Southwest Asia,” men wearing different types of camouflage and
dun-colored boots gathered before a black backdrop adorned with
Arabic script. They were attending a ceremony that mixed
solemnity with celebration, the commemoration of a year of
combat that left scores of their enemies slain. One of their
leaders spoke of comraderie and honor, of forging a family and
continuing a legacy. </p>
<p>While this might sound like the description of a scene from an
Islamic State (IS) video or a clip from a militia battling them,
it was, in fact, a U.S. Air Force “inactivation ceremony.”
There, Lieutenant Colonel Dennis Drake handed over to Colonel
John Orchard the “colors” of his drone unit as it slipped into
an ethereal military limbo. But that doesn’t mean the gathering
had no connection to the Islamic State. </p>
<p>It did.</p>
</blockquote>
<blockquote>
<p>Within days, Drake was back in the United States <a
target="_blank"
href="http://www.stgeorgeutah.com/news/archive/2015/10/14/ccj-military-father-surprise-tuacahn/#.VlyEjr_519F">surprising</a>
his family at a Disney “<a target="_blank"
href="https://www.tuacahn.org/online/default.asp?doWork::WScontent::loadArticle=Load&BOparam::WScontent::loadArticle::article_id=320B8588-685B-4182-B1E3-0088EAB5F964">musical
spectacular</a>.” Meanwhile, his former unit ended its most
recent run having been responsible for the “neutralization of 69
enemy fighters,” according to an officer who spoke at that
October 7th ceremony. Exactly whom the unit’s drones <em>neutralized
</em>remains unclear, but an Air Force spokesman has for the
first time revealed that Drake’s force, based in the Horn of
Africa, spent more than a year targeting the Islamic State as
part of Operation Inherent Resolve (OIR), the undeclared war on
the militant group in Iraq and Syria. The Air Force has since
taken steps to cover up the actions of the unit.</p>
<p><strong>Base-Building in the Horn of Africa</strong></p>
<p>From November 20, 2014, until October 7, 2015, Drake commanded
the 60th Expeditionary Reconnaissance Squadron, a unit operating
under the auspices of U.S. Air Forces Central Command (AFCENT),
which flew MQ-1 Predator drones from <a target="_blank"
href="https://theintercept.com/2015/10/21/stealth-expansion-of-secret-us-drone-base-in-africa/">Chabelley
Airfield</a> in the tiny sun-baked African nation of
Djibouti. For the uninitiated, Chabelley is the <em>other</em>
U.S. outpost in that country -- the site of America’s lone
avowed “major military facility” in Africa, Camp Lemonnier --
and a key node in an expanding archipelago of hush-hush American
outposts that have spread across that continent since 9/11. </p>
<p>Last week, in fact, the <em>New York Times</em> <a
target="_blank"
href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/11/us/politics/pentagon-seeks-string-of-overseas-bases-to-contain-isis.html?smid=tw-share&_r=0">reported</a>
on new Pentagon plans to counter the Islamic State by creating a
<a target="_blank"
href="https://theintercept.com/drone-papers/target-africa/">hub-and-spoke</a>
network of bases and outposts stretching across southern Europe,
the Greater Middle East, and Africa by “expanding existing bases
in Djibouti and Afghanistan -- and… more basic installations in
countries that could include Niger and Cameroon, where the
United States now carries out unarmed surveillance drone
missions, or will soon.” </p>
<p>Weeks earlier, <em>TomDispatch</em> had <a target="_blank"
href="http://www.tomdispatch.com/blog/176070/tomgram%3A_nick_turse%2C_america%27s_empire_of_african_bases">revealed</a>
that those efforts were already well underway, drawing attention
to key bases in Spain and Italy as well as 60 U.S. military
outposts, port facilities, and other sites dotting the African
continent, including those in Djibouti, Niger, and Cameroon.
The <em>Times</em> cited a senior Pentagon official who noted
that some colleagues are “advocating a larger string of new
bases in West Africa,” a plan <em>TomDispatch</em> had <a
target="_blank"
href="http://www.tomdispatch.com/blog/175830/tomgram%3A_nick_turse,_africom_becomes_a_%22war-fighting_combatant_command%22">reported</a>
on early last year. The <em>Times</em> didn’t mention
Djibouti’s secret drone base by name, but that airfield, Drake’s
home for almost a year, is now a crucial site in this expanding
network of bases and was intimately involved in the war on the
Islamic State a year before the <em>Times </em>took notice.</p>
<p>A few years ago, Chabelley was little more than a tarmac in the
midst of a desert wasteland, an old French Foreign Legion
outpost that had seemingly gone to seed. About 10 kilometers
away, Camp Lemonnier, which shares a runway with the
international airport in Djibouti’s capital, was handling
America’s fighter aircraft and cargo planes, as well as drones <a
target="_blank"
href="https://theintercept.com/drone-papers/target-africa/">carrying
out</a> secret assassination missions in Yemen and Somalia.
By 2012, an average of 16 U.S. drones and four fighter jets were
<a target="_blank"
href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/remote-us-base-at-core-of-secret-operations/2012/10/25/a26a9392-197a-11e2-bd10-5ff056538b7c_story.html">taking
off</a> or landing there each day. Soon, however, local air
traffic controllers in the predominantly Muslim nation became <a
target="_blank"
href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/miscues-at-us-counterterrorism-base-put-aircraft-in-danger-documents-show/2015/04/30/39038d5a-e9bb-11e4-9a6a-c1ab95a0600b_story.html">incensed</a>
about the drones being used to kill fellow Muslims. At about
the same time, those robotic planes taking off from the base
began crashing, although the Air Force did not find Djiboutians
responsible.</p>
<p>In February 2013, the Pentagon <a target="_blank"
href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/drone-safety-concerns-force-us-to-move-large-fleet-from-camp-lemonnier-in-djibouti/2013/09/24/955518c4-213c-11e3-a03d-abbedc3a047c_story.html">asked</a>
Congress to provide funding for “minimal facilities necessary to
enable temporary operations” at Chabelley. That June, as the
House Armed Services Committee <a target="_blank"
href="http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/cpquery/?&r_n=hr102.113&dbname=cp113&sel=DOC&">noted</a>,
“the Government of Djibouti mandated that operations of remotely
piloted aircraft (RPA) cease from Camp Lemonnier, while allowing
such operations to relocate to Chabelley Airfield.” By the
fall, the U.S. drone fleet had indeed been <a target="_blank"
href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/drone-safety-concerns-force-us-to-move-large-fleet-from-camp-lemonnier-in-djibouti/2013/09/24/955518c4-213c-11e3-a03d-abbedc3a047c_story.html">transferred</a>
to the more remote airstrip. “Since then, Chabelley Airfield
has become more permanent. And it appears to have grown,” says
Dan Gettinger, co-founder and co-director of the Center for the
Study of the Drone at Bard College and the author of a <a
target="_blank"
href="http://dronecenter.bard.edu/how-to-hunt-for-drones/">guide</a>
to identifying drone bases from satellite imagery. </p>
<p>Despite the supposedly temporary nature of the site, U.S.
Africa Command (AFRICOM) “directed an expansion of operations”
at Chabelley and, in May 2014, the U.S. signed a “long-term
implementing arrangement” with the Djiboutian government to
establish the airfield as an “enduring” base, according to
documents provided to the House Appropriations Committee earlier
this year by the Undersecretary of Defense (Comptroller).</p>
<p><strong>The Djiboutian Solution to the Islamic State</strong></p>
<p>As 2014 was coming to a close, Lieutenant Colonel Dennis Drake
took command of the 60th Expeditionary Reconnaissance Squadron
at Chabelley. Under his watch, the unit reportedly carried out
combat operations in support of three combatant commanders.
AFCENT failed to respond to a request for clarification about
which commands were involved, but Gettinger speculates that
AFRICOM; U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM), responsible for the
Greater Middle East; and Special Operations Command were the
most likely.</p>
<p>Before U.S. drones moved from Camp Lemonnier to Chabelley,
according to secret Pentagon documents exposed by the<em>
Intercept</em> in October, a Special Operations task force
based there conducted a drone assassination campaign in nearby
Yemen and Somalia. Gettinger believes the missions continued
after the move. “We know that MQ-1s have been involved in
counterterrorism operations in the Horn of Africa and Predators
have for many years been flying missions over Yemen,” he told me
recently by phone, noting however that the strikes in Yemen have
slowed of late. </p>
<p>“There were no U.S. drone strikes reported in Yemen in
November, the second calendar month this year without a reported
attack,” researchers with the Bureau of Investigative Journalism
<a target="_blank"
href="https://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/2015/12/01/us-drone-war-november-2015-american-troops-in-afghanistan-and-somalia-supported-by-new-strikes/#Pakistan">noted</a>
earlier this month. After a lull since July, a November drone
strike in Somalia killed at least five people, according to
local reports. And just last week, the Pentagon <a
target="_blank"
href="http://www.defense.gov/News/News-Releases/News-Release-View/Article/633220/statement-from-pentagon-press-secretary-peter-cook-on-dec-2-airstrike-in-somalia">announced</a>
that another U.S. strike in Somalia had killed Abdirahman
Sandhere, a senior leader of the militant group al-Shabaab.</p>
<p>Drake’s 60th Expeditionary Reconnaissance Squadron, however,
focused its firepower on another target: the Islamic State. The
unit was “a large contributor to OIR,” according to Major Tim
Smith of AFCENT Public Affairs, and “executed combat flight
operations for AFCENT in support of Operation Inherent Resolve.”</p>
<p>Based in Africa, it was, according to Lieutenant Colonel Kristi
Beckman, director of public affairs at the Combined Air
Operations Center at al-Udeid air base in Qatar, “a
geographically separated unit.” By the beginning of October
2015, drones flown out of Chabelley had already logged more than
24,000 hours of intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance
(ISR), according to the chief of operations analysis and
reconstructions of the 380th Expeditionary Operations Group, its
parent unit. (In an Air Force news release, that officer was
identified only as “Major Kori,” evidently to obscure his
identity.) According to Kori, Chabelley’s drones were also
“responsible for the neutralization of 69 enemy fighters,
including five high-valued individuals.”</p>
<p>AFCENT failed to provide additional details about the missions,
those targeted, or that euphemism, “neutralization,” which was
once a favored term of the CIA’s often muddled and sometimes
murderous Phoenix Program that targeted the civilian
“infrastructure” of America’s enemies during the <a
target="_blank"
href="https://books.google.com/books?id=6q3vpJ3ePH4C&pg=PA190&dq=neutralize,+phoenix+program&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjult_Q_czJAhVDND4KHVpYCqQ4HhDoAQgvMAE#v=onepage&q=neutralize%2C%20phoenix%20program&f=false">Vietnam
War</a>. Beckman did, however, confirm that “neutralizations”
took place in Iraq and/or Syria.</p>
<em> </em>
<p>Despite the loss of a unit that had flown tens of thousands of
hours of ISR missions and attacked scores of targets, Smith says
that America’s war on the Islamic State has not suffered.
“Coalition efforts in the region are not hampered,” he assured
me. “Operation Inherent Resolve has the personnel and assets
necessary to continue aerial dominance within the region,”
according to Smith. “Though the squadron isn’t needed anymore,
there is sufficient capability within the AOR [area of
operations] to ensure the needs of the mission are met.”</p>
<p><strong>The Beginning of the End or the End of the Beginning
for Drones in Djibouti?</strong></p>
<p>Some commentators have speculated that the transfer of the 60th
Expeditionary Reconnaissance Squadron’s Predators <a
target="_blank"
href="http://www.defenceweb.co.za/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=41634:us-halting-uav-flights-from-djibouti&catid=35:Aerospace&Itemid=107">indicates</a>
a possible end to U.S. drone missions from Djibouti. Others
suggest that the move offers a clear indication of <a
target="_blank"
href="http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/syria-strikes-increase-us-predator-drones-leave-africa-14501">demands</a>
for the robot aircraft elsewhere in the world. </p>
<p>There’s no question about the demand for drones. The Air Force
<a target="_blank"
href="https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/usaf-plans-to-end-mq-1-predator-operations-in-2018-415742/">pushed
back</a> plans to <a target="_blank"
href="http://www.airforcemag.com/DRArchive/Pages/2015/September%202015/September%2015%202015/Predator%E2%80%99s-Last-Days.aspx">retire</a>
the Predator by a year -- until 2018 -- and began <a
target="_blank"
href="http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-fg-drone-contractor-20151127-story.html">outsourcing</a>
combat air patrols to civilian contractors to deal with a <a
target="_blank"
href="http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175964/tomgram%3A_pratap_chatterjee,_is_drone_warfare_fraying_at_the_edges/">paucity</a>
of drone pilots at a moment of expanding operations. Last week,
it <a target="_blank"
href="http://www.stripes.com/news/air-force/air-force-proposes-3-billion-plan-to-vastly-expand-its-drone-program-1.383321">unveiled</a>
a $3 billion plan, which must be approved by Congress, to
significantly expand its drone program by doubling the number of
pilots, deploying them to more bases, and adding scores of new
drones to its arsenal. </p>
<p>All of this comes at a time when, according to a top AFRICOM
commander, the Islamic State is making inroads in Africa from
Nigeria to Somalia, and especially in Libya. "If Raqqa [the
“capital” of its caliphate in Syria] is the nucleus, the nearest
thing to the divided nucleus is probably Sirte,” <a
target="_blank"
href="http://www.voanews.com/content/islamic-state-targeting-africa-top-african-commander-warns-voa/3083034.html">said</a>
Vice Admiral Michael Franken, the command's deputy for military
operations, speaking of a Libyan city in which IS fighters are
deeply entrenched. “From there they look to export their terror
into Europe and elsewhere.”</p>
<p>Dan Gettinger sees no end in sight for the use of the
Djiboutian airfield or of American drones flying from there.
“All the signs point to a more permanent installation at
Chabelley,” he says, noting a string of construction contracts
awarded for the base in recent years. Indeed, at the end of
October, Navy Seabees were constructing another aircraft
maintenance pad there. This month, they are working to extend
the apron -- where aircraft can be parked and serviced -- at the
drone base. It’s the Predator that’s on its way out, he tells
me. “I think the MQ-1 is becoming old hat at this point.” </p>
<p>Like Gettinger, Jack Serle of the <a target="_blank"
href="https://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/">Bureau of
Investigative Journalism</a> sees the larger, more heavily
armed cousins of the Predator, MQ-9 Reapers, as the future of
drone operations at the satellite Djiboutian base. “I don't
think this means the Predators the 60th launched and recovered
are being retired -- I think they'll have been redeployed,” he
told me by email. “And I don't think this means Chabelley is
denuded of drones. I think it means Reapers only will be
operating out of there.” </p>
<p>“The personnel that were assigned to the 60th were sent back to
the states to retrain on other weapon systems and the assets
were redistributed to the states, [European Command], and
CENTCOM,” AFCENT’s Major Tim Smith told me. “And this unit has
not been replaced with another.” Military press materials
suggest, however, that members of the 870th Air Expeditionary
Squadron and the 33rd Expeditionary Special Operations Squadron
have recently been operating at Chabelley airfield. The latter
unit has been <a target="_blank"
href="https://theintercept.com/2015/10/21/stealth-expansion-of-secret-us-drone-base-in-africa/">known</a>
to fly Reapers from there.</p>
<p><strong>Family Planning</strong></p>
<p>U.S. Air Forces Central Command failed to provide additional
information in response to multiple requests for clarification
about missions carried out by the 60th Expeditionary
Reconnaissance Squadron. “Due to force protection concerns and
operational security, I cannot discuss further,” Smith
explained, although how the security of an inactive unit could
be compromised was unclear. Smith also referred me to AFRICOM
for answers. That command, however, failed to respond to
repeated questions about drone operations flown from Chabelley.</p>
<p>During the course of my reporting, the Air Force news release
about the October 7th inactivation ceremony was removed from the
AFCENT website, leaving only an error message -- "404 - Page not
found!" -- where an article with minimalist details about the
“neutralization” of “enemy fighters” by drones once stood.
AFCENT failed to reply to a request for further information on
the reason the story was withdrawn.</p>
<p>Nor did the command respond to a request for an interview with
Lieutenant Colonel Dennis Drake. Before he traveled home to
surprise his own family, however, Drake spoke of the “family” he
had forged as, in the words of Major Kori, he “engaged enemies
of the United States from Chabelley Airfield.” </p>
<p>“My desire at the beginning was simple: make the squadron a
family while still continuing the tradition of excellence the
previous commanders already established,” said Drake. “[I]f I
took care of the people they took care of the mission... I am
most proud of the family this squadron became.”</p>
<p>Today, those words, along with photos of the ceremony, have
vanished from AFCENT’s website, joining a raft of information
about America’s war against the Islamic State, operations in
Africa, and drone campaigns that the military has no interest in
sharing with the taxpayers who foot the bill for all of it and
in whose name it’s carried out. For more than a year, U.S.
drones flying out of Djibouti waged a secret war against the
Islamic State. For more than a year, it went unreported on the
nightly news, in the country’s flagship newspapers, or evidently
anywhere else. </p>
<p>The <em>New York Times</em> now <a target="_blank"
href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/11/us/politics/pentagon-seeks-string-of-overseas-bases-to-contain-isis.html?smid=tw-share&_r=0">reports</a>
that "the Pentagon has proposed a new plan to the White House to
build up a string of military bases in Africa" and beyond,
"bring[ing] an ad hoc series of existing bases into one coherent
system that would be able to confront regional threats from the
Islamic State, Al Qaeda, or other terrorist groups." But the
expansion of <a target="_blank"
href="https://theintercept.com/2015/10/21/stealth-expansion-of-secret-us-drone-base-in-africa/">Chabelley</a>,
the far flung <a target="_blank"
href="http://www.tomdispatch.com/blog/176070/tomgram%3A_nick_turse%2C_america%27s_empire_of_african_bases">network
of bases</a> of which it’s a part, and the war on the Islamic
State waged from it suggest that there is little "new" about the
proposal. The facts on the ground indicate that the Pentagon’s
plan has been underway for a long time. What’s new is its
emergence from the shadows.<em> </em></p>
<p><em>Nick Turse is the managing editor of </em>TomDispatch<em>
and a fellow at the </em><a target="_blank"
href="http://www.nationinstitute.org/fellows/2904/nick_turse/"><em>Nation
Institute</em></a><em>. A 2014 Izzy Award and </em><a
target="_blank"
href="http://www.beforecolumbusfoundation.com/foundation-news/2014-american-book-awards/"><em>American
Book Award</em></a><em> winner for his book </em>Kill
Anything That Moves<em>, his pieces have appeared in the </em><a
target="_blank"
href="http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2015/04/29/lessons-40-years-after-the-fall-of-saigon/in-vietnam-callous-use-of-power-led-to-years-of-civilian-misery-3">New
York Times</a><em>, the </em><a target="_blank"
href="https://theintercept.com/drone-papers/target-africa/">Intercept</a><em>,
the </em>Los Angeles Times<em>, the </em>Nation<em>, and
regularly at </em><a target="_blank"
href="http://www.tomdispatch.com/blog/176060/tomgram%3A_nick_turse,_success,_failure,_and_the_%22finest_warriors_who_ever_went_into_combat%22/">TomDispatch</a><em>.
His latest book is </em><a target="_blank"
href="http://www.amazon.com/dp/1608464636/ref=nosim/?tag=tomdispatch-20">Tomorrow's
Battlefield: U.S. Proxy Wars and Secret Ops in Africa</a><em>.</em></p>
<p>Copyright 2015 Nick Turse</p>
</blockquote>
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