Africa+and+the+war+on+terror,+Virginia+Tilley,+Mail+and+Guardian

Mail and Guardian, Johannesburg, //07 March 2007 11:59//
=Africa and the 'war on terror'=


 * Virginia Tilley**//: COMMENT//

The Bush administration is signalling yet another war, issuing dark warnings of an Iranian nuclear threat and crying foul over the alleged presence of Iranian weaponry in Iraq.

Washington has backed this alarmist diplomacy by transferring the USS Enterprise, USS Stennis and USS Eisenhower aircraft carrier groups to the Persian Gulf region. Carrying squadrons of F-14s, Hornets, Prowlers, Vikings, Hawkeyes and Sea Hawks, each carrier is escorted by an entourage of guided-missile destroyers, frigates, fast combat-support ships and submarine escorts. The fleet includes the expeditionary strike group 5 and 2 200 marine special operations expeditionary forces, who are not sailors, but tactical invasion troops.

The only conceivable target of this massive deployment is Iran.

While many people believe a United States attack on Iran would be financially and politically impossible, the “neo-conservatives” have so far proved impressively immune to realist logic. But perhaps they have found a way to get around these obstacles. One possible scenario in the coming months includes an initial assault on Iran by Israel.

Israeli jets have been flying practice bombing runs on mock-ups of Iran’s Natanz reactor for the past year and the Israeli government is reportedly now arranging for clear passage through Iraqi airspace. If the plan is for Israel to strike Iran, the US fleet is being positioned to protect Israel from counterattack. Continued US congressional support for a new war in the Middle East is virtually assured once it becomes a mission to “protect Israel”.

Yet a US attack on Iran would unleash violence on a scale that would plunge the entire region into a security crisis, with widespread international ramifications. How should South Africa respond to this new stage of the “war on terror”?

The African Union (AU) and South Africa itself have already been drawn incrementally into Washington’s wake. Compliant counter-terrorism laws have been passed. AU forces are moving into Somalia, which voices in the US media opine is “the new front in the war on terror”. The announcement of the new US central command for the continent, Africom, suggests that more insistent American demands for military and intelligence cooperation will soon be heard in more African capitals.

Some analysts, such as Greg Mills, laud greater US military involvement in Africa. In a recent essay in a business newspaper, Mills welcomed Afri-com’s role, citing approvingly General James Jones of the US European command, who said: “the breeding grounds of terrorism and illicit activity on the continent of Africa require our attention.” Mills suggested that, by “building local security capacity”, Africom will even “improve the interface between those government departments concerned with development, health, the creation of viable economies and the military”.

Mills should pay more attention to the range of expert voices now deploring the results of US military policy. In recent testimony before the US Congress, for example, Cold War mandarin Zbigniew Brzezinski not only called the occupation of Iraq “a historic, strategic and moral calamity”, but condemned the Bush administration’s entire foreign policy for its “Manichean principles and imperial hubris” and “simplistic and demagogic” Islamophobia that is “intensifying regional instability”. Similar denunciations now pervade the US media.

We know that the “war on terror” has shattered international law. According to the Bush administration, pre-emptive strikes can now be launched on accusations that a country’s rulers merely want weapons of mass destruction, whether or not such weapons are being built. The “war” also has alarming effects on civil liberties. White House edicts have authorised illegal surveillance of US citizens’ private communications, arrest on secret evidence, indefinite detention without trial, torture and assassination.

This approach does not solve conflicts — it breeds them. In its main laboratory of Iraq, the “war on terror” has killed hundreds of thousands of people, brought the economy to collapse, inspired sectarian civil war and triggered the world’s greatest refugee flow since 1948. In its other major target, Afghanistan, international forces are scrambling to contain a Taliban/Pashtun resurgence.

Will stepped-up collaboration with such policies bring greater security to Africa? Where is all this heading?

Perhaps Somalia is a good test case. An unrepresentative government is installed and made dependent on continuous supplies of US funds and arms. A proxy force (Ethiopia) is authorised to expel the Islamic opposition (the only authority that could bring civil order to shattered Mogadishu), which is demonised by unsubstantiated claims that it was hosting al-Qaeda elements. The conflict is “Vietnamised” by foisting its management on to the AU.

Faced with the return of warlords and anarchy, African states are indeed anxious to contain the damage, if possible. But in the “war on terror”, each security crisis inevitably breeds another and AU interventions must expand accordingly. And Africom will be there to help the US steer their direction.

Renewed crisis in Somalia and the coming showdown with Iran suggest that the Bush administration’s agenda offers little but mounting expense and new dangers for African security. The urgent question for South Africa is not how to join that war, but how to help protect Africa from it.

//Virginia Tilley is a chief research specialist at the Human Sciences Research Council//


 * From: http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=300973&area=/insight/insight__comment_and_analysis/**

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