10 February 2004
Africa Is Still Ripe for Terrorism, Top Pentagon Official Asserts
Vincent Kern cites positive security partnerships at ACSS seminar
By Jim Fisher-Thompson
Washington File Staff Writer
Washington -- "Africa has been, is now, and will be into the foreseeable future ripe for terrorists and acts of terrorism," Department of Defense (DOD) official Vincent Kern told more than 120 senior African military officers and civilian defense officials at the Africa Center for Strategic Studies (ACSS) seminar February 10.
Kern, who is special assistant to the deputy assistant secretary of defense for stability operations, further explained to the participants in the February 8-12 Senior Leader Seminar in Washington that it therefore made sense for the DOD to focus on programs that help Africans battle this international scourge.
In that regard, he added, military-to-military partnerships are being strengthened with African nations to ward off terrorist outrages like the bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998 that killed far more Africans than Americans.
(The DOD program mirrors similar partnership efforts by the U.S. Government under the President's Emergency Plan for African Relief and other initiatives to help Africans fight the growing HIV/AIDS pandemic, which also threatens the future stability and development of the continent.)
Forty-four African nations sent representatives to the annual ACSS seminar, which works to upgrade the professional skills of African military and civilian leaders in areas like defense budgeting and securing a stable security environment.
According to an ACSS document, the event also "provides a forum for military and civilian leaders from across the African continent to share their experiences and work toward joint solutions to their common problems."
Addressing the February 10 plenary session, retired Marine Corps General Carl Fulford, who is now ACSS director said, "It is a declaration of our commander in chief [President Bush] that [terrorism] is of top importance." Therefore, he said, "pushing anti-terrorism as an element of security strategy" has become an important part of the ACSS training syllabus.
Kern said U.S. concern for terrorism on the continent rose sharply after September 11, 2001 -- the day the terrorist network al Qaeda, whose leader Osama bin Laden once lived and worked in Sudan, organized attacks in America that killed 3,000 people. "In mid-November 2001," he said, "Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld warned Sudan and Somalia, among other countries, not to harbor terrorists who were fleeing Afghanistan," where bin Laden had taken refuge and was being supported by its Taliban regime.
The United States was concerned about the situation in the entire Horn of Africa region. "Accordingly, in 2002, the United States created a Combined Joint Task Force for the Horn of Africa (CJTF-HOA) of U.S. soldiers based initially offshore and later in Djibouti," Kern explained. That force, now at 1,800 troops, is "engaged in a range of exercises and civil-military operations such as hospital and school renovation."
The CJTF effort in the Horn also includes "joint [military] exercises with local military forces because we do not desire any long-term presence in Africa beyond what is necessary to help to defeat terrorists, and we believe that ultimately it is the nations of the Horn which must defeat terrorism and keep it defeated."
Continuing to highlight East Africa, Kern pointed out that in June 2003, "President Bush announced a $100 million, 15-month Eastern Africa Counter-terrorism Initiative under which the United States is expanding and accelerating our counter-terrorism efforts with Kenya, Ethiopia, Djibouti, Uganda, Tanzania and Eritrea."
That program, he said, was designed to counter terrorism by focusing on coastal and border security; police and law enforcement training; immigration and customs; airport/seaport security; establishment of a terrorist tracking database; disruption of terrorist financing; and "community outreach through education, assistance projects and public information." Kenya, for example, will receive training and equipment for a counter-terrorism police unit aimed at "building an elite Kenyan law enforcement unit designed to investigate and react to terrorist incidents."
Another area of DOD concern in Africa -- the Sahel region -- is covered in a new program called the Pan Sahel Initiative (PSI), which Kern said is "a Department of State program (implemented by DOD and civilian contractors) designed to assist Mauritania, Mali, Niger and Chad in protecting their borders [and] tracking movements of persons."
The PSI initiative is a partnership involving 60 days of training for select country units, as well as equipment including Toyota Land Cruisers, uniforms and helmets, electric generators, fuel containers, communications gear and medical supplies, Kern said.
While equipment and training are an important part of U.S./African security partnerships, Kern told his audience: "We need to continue to listen to Africans as we develop initiatives and responses" to the threat of international terrorism. "I think we have done a good job so far, but we need to guard carefully against trying to dictate to our friends and allies in Africa."
(The Washington File is a product of the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)
This page printed from: http://usinfo.state.gov/xarchives/display.html?p=washfile-english&y=2004&m=February&x=200402101743101EJrehsiF0.23547&t=usinfo/wf-latest.html
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