Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire
  • bandar togel
  • maincuan
  • neko77
  • omnibus
  • raja slot
  • situs bandar togel
  • slot gacor
  • slot qris
  • slot zeus
  • slot777
  • slot88
  • stm88
  • stm88
  • winsgoal

Fleets of Drones Descend on Africa
06 Feb 2013
🖨️ Print Article

 

A Black Agenda Radio commentary by BAR executive editor Glen Ford

U.S. drone bases are multiplying on the African continent. Niger has just “given the green light to accepting American surveillance drones on its soil”; neighboring Burkina Faso already has one; two new drone facilities are opening in Ethiopia and the Seychelles; and UN peacekeepers in Congo want U.S. drones. Drones have terrorized Somalia from AFRICOM’s base in Djibouti for the past seven years.

 

Fleets of Drones Descend on Africa

A Black Agenda Radio commentary by BAR executive editor Glen Ford

“Drone warfare has become central to the modern U.S. version of gunboat diplomacy.”

With the U.S. and European military offensive in Africa in full swing, the drone wars are set to enter a new phase. Therefore, it is appropriate that U.S. anti-war activists will descend on the White House, on April 13, to demand “Drones Out of Africa and Everywhere!” The activists, including former Georgia Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney and the ANSWER Coalition, say the real target is Africa’s vast natural resources. Drone warfare, say the organizers, has become central to the modern U.S. version of gunboat diplomacy, to “force exploitative terms of trade and political accommodations.”

The West African nation of Niger has been very accommodating to the Americans, as she has been to the French, the former colonial master. According to a high Niger official quoted by Reuters news service, Niger has “given the green light to accepting American surveillance drones on its soil to improve the collection of intelligence on Islamist movements.” However, there is no reason to believe that the U.S. drones will be restricted to unarmed surveillance. Sources in Washington say “there are no constraints to military-to-military co-operation within the agreement" with Niger, which presumably means the U.S. can use the drones as it likes. The U.S. base in northern Niger puts the robotic planes within easy reach of Mali, Algeria and Libya.

The U.S. already has a drone base in neighboring Burkina Faso, which also borders on Benin, Togo, Ghana, and the Ivory Coast.

“Ethiopia is now home to a new U.S. drone base, as are the Seychelles Islands, offshore in the Indian Ocean.”

In East Africa, the U.S. has been terrorizing Somalia with drones since 2006, when it instigated the Ethiopian invasion of Somalia. The U.S. Africa Command, AFRICOM, sends out drones from its large, permanent base in neighboring Djibouti, from which it can watch – or attack - most of the Horn of Africa, including Eritrea, right next door, one of the few countries in Africa that has no relationship with AFRICOM. Eritrea is under constant threat from Ethiopia, from which it won independence after a 30-year war.

Ethiopia is now home to a new U.S. drone base, as are the Seychelles Islands, offshore in the Indian Ocean and within easy drone range of most of the East African coast: Somalia, Kenya, Tanzania and Mozambique.

In the very heart of the African continent, the 17,000-man United Nations peacekeeping force in the Democratic Republic of Congo wants to use U.S. drones to monitor armed groups in the region, where U.S. Special Forces are also operating. Those drones would be deployed under much the same UN Security Council language that NATO used to launch its war against Libya, in 2011, allowing “all necessary measures…to protect civilians and civilian populated areas under threat of attack.”

At the same time, another section of the United Nations is about to launch an investigation into the legality of U.S. drone warfare in Somalia, Yemen and Pakistan. Thus, it is possible that the United Nations Security Council could wind up calling in American drones to attack people in the Congo region, while the U.N.’s special rapporteur for human rights and counterterrorism is investigating whether U.S. drone warfare violates international law.

For Black Agenda Radio, I’m Glen Ford. On the web, go to BlackAgendaReport.com.

BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaReport.com.



Your browser does not support the audio element.

listen
http://traffic.libsyn.com/blackagendareport/20130206_gf_DronesInAfrica.mp3

More Stories


  • BAR Radio Logo
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    Black Agenda Radio May 9, 2025
    09 May 2025
    In this week’s segment, we discuss the 80th anniversary of victory in Europe in World War II, and the disinformation that centers on the U.S.'s role and dismisses the pivotal Soviet role in that…
  • Book: The Rebirth of the African Phoenix
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    The Rebirth of the African Phoenix: A View from Babylon
    09 May 2025
    Roger McKenzie is the international editor of the UK-based Morning Star, the only English-language socialist daily newspaper in the world. He joins us from Oxford to discuss his new book, “The…
  • ww2
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    Bruce Dixon: US Fake History of World War II Underlies Permanent Bipartisan Hostility Toward Russia
    09 May 2025
    The late Bruce Dixon was a co-founder and managing editor of Black Agenda Report. In 2018, he provided this commentary entitled, "US Fake History of World War II Underlies Permanent Bipartisan…
  • Nakba
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    The Meaning of Nakba Day
    09 May 2025
    Nadiah Alyafai is a member of the US Palestinian Community Network chapter in Chicago and she joins us to discuss why the public must be aware of the Nakba and the continuity of Palestinian…
  • Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
    Ryan Coogler, Shedeur Sanders, Karmelo Anthony, and Rodney Hinton, Jr
    07 May 2025
    Black people who are among the rich and famous garner praise and love, and so do those who are in distress. But concerns for the masses of people and their struggles are often missing.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us