Military Review English Edition January-February 2014 | Page 53

AFRICOM

Contrary to Africa’s strategic insignificance to
the United States in the post-immediate Cold War
era, it gained primacy in post-9/11 due to terrorism,
energy sources, and China’s creeping influence into
Africa.2 Defense secretary Robert Gates warned
against the risk of “creeping militarization” of U.S.
foreign policy and recommended the State Department lead U.S. engagement with other countries.3
This article is an examination of the militarization
of America’s foreign policy and the ramifications
for its strategic interests in Africa. It observes that
America’s military involvement in Africa, despite
some strategic gains, has backfired due to the
inherent contradiction of the use of realist means to
achieve liberal ends. The article recommends that
it would be prudent for America to deemphasize
“hard power” and heighten “soft power” to achieve
its interests in Africa.

Why Militarization?
U.S. militarization of Africa is intended to fight
terrorism, secure oil resources, and counter China’s
influence in the continent.4 Africa’s relevance in
U.S. national security policy and military affairs
gained primacy during the Bush administration.
Vice Adm. Robert T. Moeller, while serving as
deputy commander for Military Operations, U.S.
Africa Command, listed oil disruption, terrorism,
and the growing influence of China as challenges to
U.S. interests in Africa. The spillage of Al-Qaeda’s
heinous activities in the Middle East into Africa in
1998 with Al-Qaeda’s bombing of U.S. embassies
in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam changed America’s
disengagement policy with Africa. America’s
involvment in Africa was accentuated by the 9/11
attacks and the emerging hotbeds of terrorism in
East Africa.
America views weak and failed African states as
incubators of threats to its geo-strategic interests in
Africa. Weak and failed states are prone to growth
of terrorism and international criminal activities
such as drugs and money laundering, all of which
threaten America’s interests. Susan Rice, former
assistant secretary of state for African Affairs,
states:
Much of Africa has become a veritable
incubator for the foot soldiers of terrorism.
Its poor, young, disaffected, unhealthy,
uneducated populations often have no stake
MILITARY REVIEW

January-February 2014

in government, no faith in the future, and
harbor an easily exploitable discontent with
the status-quo . . . these are the swamps we
must drain . . . to do otherwise, is to place our
security at further and more permanent risk.5
The lethality of terrorism attained a new height
following the 9/11 attacks on the United States, and
the composition of the attackers reinforced the argument. Al-Qaeda, for example, enjoy