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
  • omnibus

Shutting down AFRICOM and the New Scramble for Africa
Netfa Freeman
03 Oct 2018
Shutting down AFRICOM and the New Scramble for Africa
Shutting down AFRICOM and the New Scramble for Africa

The US must cease its military occupation of Africans at home and abroad, and abandon its attempt to rule the world by force.

“U.S. Special Forces troops now operate in more than a dozen African nations.”

Marking exactly 10 years after the establishment of AFRICOM, short for U.S. Africa Command, the Black Alliance for Peace (BAP) has launched “U.S. Out of Africa!: Shut Down AFRICOM,” a campaign designed to end the U.S. invasion and occupation of Africa.

Although U.S. leaders say AFRICOM is “fighting terrorism” on the continent in reality AFRICOM is a dangerous structure that has only increased militarism. The real reason for its existence is geopolitical competition with China.

When AFRICOM was established in the months before Barack Obama assumed office as the first Black President of the United States, a majority of African nations—led by the Pan-Africanist government of Libya—rejected AFRICOM, forcing the new command to instead work out of Europe. But with the U.S. and NATO attack on Libya that led to the destruction of that country and the murder of its leader, Muammar Gaddafi, in 2011, corrupt African leaders began to allow AFRICOM forces to operate in their countries and establish military-to-military relations with the United States. Today, those efforts have resulted in 46 various forms of U.S. bases as well as military-to-military relations between 53 out of the 54 African countries and the United States. U.S. Special Forces troops now operate in more than a dozen African nations.

“The real reason for AFRICOM’s existence is geopolitical competition with China.”

Vice Admiral Robert Moeller, the head of AFRICOM, declared in 2008, “Protecting the free flow of natural resources from Africa to the global market is one of Africom’s guiding principles.”

AFRICOM is the flip side of the domestic war being waged by the same repressive state structure against Black and poor people in the United States. The Black power and civil rights movement of the 60s and 70s was met with the repressive response of the FBI in the form of its COINTELPROor Counter Intelligence Program that effectively obliterated these movements for social justice and self-determination. While in the very same era on the continent of Africa, the CIA conspired with other colonizing powers to do the exact same things, exemplified by the overthrow of Kwame Nkrumahin Ghana the and theassassination of Patrice Lumumbain the Congo.

BAP’s U.S. Out of Africa!: Shut Down AFRICOM campaign links the resistance to the domestic war on Black people to U.S. interventionism and militarism abroad. Not only does there need to be a mass movement in the U.S. to shut down AFRICOM, this mass movement needs to become inseparably bound with the movement that has swept this country to end murderous police brutality against Black and Brown people. The whole world must begin to see AFRICOM and the militarization of U.S. domestic police departments as counterparts.

There is a petition that should be signed and distributed by all peace and justice loving people in support of BAP’s effort to help shut down all U.S. foreign military bases as well as NATO bases: tinyurl.com/ShutDownAFRICOM

BAP makes the following demands:

  1. the complete withdrawal of U.S. forces from Africa,
  2. the demilitarization of the African continent,
  3. the closure of U.S. bases throughout the world, and
  4. the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) opposing AFRICOM and conducting hearings on AFRICOM’s impact on the African continent.

Netfa Freemanis an organizer in Pan-African Community Action (PACA), a member organization in the Black Alliance for Peace, as well as an Analyst at the Institute for Policy Studies.

COMMENTS?

Please join the conversation on Black Agenda Report's Facebook page at http://facebook.com/blackagendareport

Or, you can comment by emailing us at [email protected]

AFRICOM

Do you need and appreciate Black Agenda Report articles. Please click on the DONATE icon, and help us out, if you can.


Related Stories

The Sun Never Sets: Why Is AFRICOM Expanding in Zambia?
Jeremy Kuzmarov
The Sun Never Sets: Why Is AFRICOM Expanding in Zambia?
17 May 2022
Why Is AFRICOM Expanding in Zambia? Because of Zambia’s Copper and to Thwart the Chinese.
AFRICOM Watch Bulletin #39
US Out of Africa Network
AFRICOM Watch Bulletin #39
19 April 2022
The latest AFRICOM Watch Bulletin provides analysis of coups in
U.S. Airstrike Killed 11 Libyan Civilians and Allies, Human Rights Groups Say
Nick Turse
U.S. Airstrike Killed 11 Libyan Civilians and Allies, Human Rights Groups Say
05 April 2022
A criminal complaint accuses a former commander at a U.S. airbase in Sicily of murder. But U.S.
AFRICOM Watch Bulletin #38
Black Alliance For Peace
AFRICOM Watch Bulletin #38
23 March 2022
Black Alliance for Peace reports on its US Out of Africa: Shut Down AFRICOM campaign in the
NATO and Africa: A Relationship of Colonial Violence and Structural White Supremacy
Djibo Sobukwe
NATO and Africa: A Relationship of Colonial Violence and Structural White Supremacy
23 February 2022
NATO is the means of continuing colonial aggressions against African countries.
MLK Day at Camp Lemonnier, US Army
T.J. Coles
Using and Abusing Djibouti: How the US Transformed a Tiny African state Into a Hub of Imperial Aggression
04 January 2022
From Djibouti, the US trains proxies and bombs strategically-important countries in the name of democracy and counterterrorism.
U.S. military outposts, port facilities, and other areas of access in Africa, 2002-2015 (Nick Turse/TomDispatch, 2015)
Dina M. Asfaha, Tunde Osazua
Eritrea Versus AFRICOM: Defending Sovereignty in the Face of Imperialist Aggression
01 December 2021
The rapid expansion of AFRICOM on the African continent should be a cause for concern as African nations are quickly surrendering their soverei
Kenyan Families Say U.S. Government Fueling “War on Terror” Disappearances and Killings, Demand Records
Center for Constitutional Rights
Kenyan Families Say U.S. Government Fueling “War on Terror” Disappearances and Killings, Demand Records
24 November 2021
Security forces trained by the CIA and the UK's MI6 use the "war on terror" as justification for killing and abducting Kenyans. In fact, the US
Black Alliance for Peace & the U.S. Out of Africa Network Stand with the People of Sudan
Black Alliance For Peace
Black Alliance for Peace & the U.S. Out of Africa Network Stand with the People of Sudan
27 October 2021
There will not be true democracy for Africans as long the U.S., EU, NATO, and Israel train and finance the military in these nations.
Imperialism and the Horn of Africa
Salome Ayuak
Imperialism and the Horn of Africa
06 October 2021
This is a condensed speech by Salome Ayuak given at the International Month of

More Stories


  • Liberals Drive State Censorship
    Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
    Liberals Drive State Censorship
    18 May 2022
    Liberals are the force behind censorship efforts. They defend the state and seek to silence anyone who questions its narratives.
  • The New White Supremacist Consensus Part Two: Shootings in Buffalo Solidify the Cons
    ​​​​​​​ Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor and columnist
    The New White Supremacist Consensus Part Two: Shootings in Buffalo Solidify the Consensus
    18 May 2022
    The latest mass shooter in Buffalo, New York was clearly a racist, and identified with Ukrainian and other neo-Nazis. But white supremacy has a stronger hold on European and U.S. society than is…
  • REFLECTION: Choosing Ourselves: Black Women and Abortion, Beverly Smith, 1989
    Editors, The Black Agenda Review
    REFLECTION: Choosing Ourselves: Black Women and Abortion, Beverly Smith, 1989
    18 May 2022
    A 1989 talk by Black feminist Beverly Smith reminds us that for Black women, the right to abortion can be a woman’s right to life.
  • Notes from Ethiopia, Part 4: The TPLF Destruction of Afar
    Ann Garrison, BAR Contributing Editor
    Notes from Ethiopia, Part 4: The TPLF Destruction of Afar
    18 May 2022
    Contributing Editor Ann Garrison continues her reporting from the Horn of Africa. She is once again in Ethiopia.
  • Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
    Camera and Pen
    18 May 2022
                                                                                                  Camera and Pen  
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us