The U.S. Militarys New Normal in Africa
What is Operation New Normal?
Its a question without an answer, a riddle the U.S. military refuses to
solve. Its a secret operation in Africa that no one knows anything about.
Except that someone does. His name is Lieutenant Colonel Robert E. Lee
Magee. He lives and breathes Operation New Normal. But he doesnt want to
breath paint fumes or talk to me, so you cant know anything about it.
Confused? Stay with me.
Whatever Operation New Normal may be pales in comparison to the real new
normal for U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM). The lower-cased variant is bold
and muscular. Its an expeditionary force on a war footing. To the men
involved, its a story of growth and expansion, new battlefields, combat,
and war. Its the culmination of years of construction, ingratiation, and
interventions, the fruits of wide-eyed expansion and dismal policy failures,
the backing of proxies to fight Americas battles, while increasing U.S.
personnel and firepower in and around the continent. It is, to quote an
officer with AFRICOM, the blossoming of a war-fighting combatant command.
And unlike Operation New Normal, its finally heading for a media outlet
near you.
Ever Less New, Ever More Normal
Since 9/11, the U.S. military has been ramping up missions on the African
continent, funneling money into projects to woo allies, supporting and
training proxy forces, conducting humanitarian outreach, carrying out air
strikes and commando raids, creating a sophisticated logistics network
throughout the region, and building a string of camps, cooperative security
locations, and bases-by-other-names.
All the while, AFRICOM downplayed the expansion and much of the media, witha
few notable exceptions, played along. With the end of the Iraq War and the
drawdown of combat forces in Afghanistan, Washington has, however, visibly
pivoted to Africa and, in recent weeks, many news organizations,
especiallythose devoted to the military, have begun waking up to the new
normal there.
While daily U.S. troop strength continent-wide hovers in the relatively
modest range of 5,000 to 8,000 personnel, an under-the-radar expansion has
been constant, with the U.S. military now conducting operations alongside
almost every African military in almost every African country and averaging
more than a mission a day.
This increased engagement has come at a continuing cost. When the U.S. and
other allies intervened in 2011 to aid in the ouster of Libyan dictator
Muammar Gaddafi, for instance, it helped set off a chain reaction that led
to a security vacuumdestabilizing that country as well as neighboring Mali.
The latter saw its elected government overthrown by a U.S.-trained officer.
The former never recovered and has tottered toward failed-state status ever
since. Local militias have beencarving out fiefdoms, while killing untold
numbers of Libyans -- as well, of course, as U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher
Stevens and three other Americans in a September 2012 attack on the U.S.
consulate in Benghazi, the cradle of the Libyan revolution, whose forces
the U.S. had aided with training, materiel, and military might.
Quickly politicized by Congressional Republicans and conservative news
outlets, Benghazi has become a shorthand for many things, including Obama
administration cover-ups and misconduct, as well as White House lies and
malfeasance. Missing, however, has been thoughtful analysis of the
implications of American power-projection in Africa or the possibility that
blowback might result from it.
Far from being chastened by the Benghazi deaths or chalking them up to a
failure to imagine the consequences of armed interventions in situations
whose local politics they barely grasp, the Pentagon and the Obama
administration have used Benghazi as a growth opportunity, a means to take
military efforts on the continent to the next level. Benghazi has provided
AFRICOM with a beefed-up mandate and new clout. It birthed the new normal in
Africa.
The Spoils of Blowback
Those 2012 killings changed AFRICOM forever, Major General Raymond Fox,
commander of the II Marine Expeditionary Force, told attendees of a recent
Sea-Air-Space conference organized by the Navy League, the Marine Corps, the
Coast Guard, and the Merchant Marine. The proof lies in the new crisis
response forces that have popped up in and around Africa, greatly enhancing
the regional reach, capabilities, and firepower of the U.S. military.
Following the debacle in Benghazi, for instance, the U.S. established an
Africa-focused force known as Special-Purpose Marine Air-Ground Task
Force-Crisis Response (SP-MAGTF CR) to give AFRICOM quick-reaction
capabilities on the continent. Temporarily positioned at Morón Air Base in
Spain, this rotating unit of Marines and sailors is officially billed as a
balanced, expeditionary force with built-in command, ground, aviation, and
logistics elements and organized, trained, and equipped to accomplish a
specific mission.
Similarly, Benghazi provided the justification for the birthing of another
rapid reaction unit, the Commanders In-Extremis Force. Long in the planning
stages and supported by the head of the Special Operations Command, Admiral
William McRaven, the Fort Carson, Colorado-based unit -- part of the 10th
Special Forces Group -- was sent to Europe weeks after Benghazi. Elements of
this specialized counterterrorism unit are now constantly forward
deployed, AFRICOM spokesman Benjamin Benson told TomDispatch, and stand
ready for the commander to use, if theres a crisis.
The East Africa Response Force (EARF), operating from the lone avowed
American base in Africa -- Camp Lemonnier in Djibouti -- is another new
quick-reaction unit. When asked about EARF, Benson said, The growing
complexity of the security environment demonstrated the need for us to have
a [Department of Defense]-positioned response force that could respond to
crises in the African region.
In late December, just days after the 1st Combined Arms Battalion, 18th
Infantry Regiment, out of Fort Riley, Kansas, arrived in Djibouti to serve
as the newly christened EARF, members of the unit were whisked off to South
Sudan. Led by EARFs commander, Lieutenant Colonel Lee Magee, the 45-man
platoon was dispatched to that restive nation (midwifed into being by the
U.S. only a few years earlier) as it slid toward civil war with armed
factions moving close to the U.S. embassy in the capital, Juba. The obvious
fear: another Benghazi.
Joined by elements of the Special-Purpose Marine Air-Ground Task
Force-Crisis Response and more shadowy special ops troops, members of EARF
helped secure and reinforce the embassy and evacuate Americans. Magee and
most of his troops returned to Djibouti in February, although a few were
still serving in South Sudan as recently as last month.
South Sudan, a nation the U.S. poured much time and effort into building, is
lurching toward the brink of genocide, according to Secretary of State John
Kerry. With a ceasefire already in shambles within hours of being signed,
the country stands as another stark foreign policy failure on a continent
now rife with them. But just as Benghazi proved a useful excuse for
dispatching more forward-deployed firepower toward Africa, the embassy scare
in South Sudan acted as a convenient template for future crises in which the
U.S. military would be even more involved. Were basically the firemen for
AFRICOM. If something arises and they need troops somewhere, we can be there
just like that, Captain John Young, a company commander with the East
Africa Response Force, told Stars and Stripesin the wake of the Juba
mission.
The New Normal and the Same Old, Same Old
A batch of official Army Africa documents obtained by TomDispatch convinced
me that EARF was intimately connected with Operation New Normal. A July 2013
briefing slide, for instance, references East Africa Response Force/New
Normal, while another concerning operations on that continent mentions New
Normal Reaction Force East. At the same time, the phrase new normal has
been increasingly on the lips of the men running Americas African ops.
Jason Hyland, a 30-year State Department veteran who serves as Foreign
Policy Advisor to Brigadier General Wayne Grigsby, the commander of Combined
Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa (CJTF-HOA), for instance, told an
interviewer that the task force is at the forefront in this region in
implementing U.S. policy on the new normal to protect our missions when
there are uncertain conditions.
A news release from CJTF-HOA concerning the Juba operation also used the
phrase: While the East Africa Response Force was providing security for the
embassy, additional forces were required to continue the evacuation mission.
Under the auspices of the new normal, which refers to the heightened
threat U.S. Embassies face throughout the world, the SP-MAGTF CR arrived
from Morón, Spain, wrote Technical Sergeant Jasmine Reif.
Earlier this year in Seapower magazine, the commander of Special-Purpose
Marine Air-Ground Task Force Crisis Response, Colonel Scott
Benedict,described the new normal as a world filled with a lot of rapidly
moving crises, requiring military interventions and likened it to the
Marine Corps deployments in the so-called Banana Wars in Central America and
the Caribbean in the early twentieth century.
On a visit to Camp Lemonnier, Marine commandant General James Amos echoed
the same sentiments, calling his troops Americas insurance policy.
Referencing the Marine task force, he invoked that phrase in an even more
expansive way. Aside from winning battles in Afghanistan, he said, the
creation of that force was probably the most significant thing weve done
in the last year-and-a-half as far as adjusting the Marine Corps for what
people are now calling the new normal, which are these crises that are
happening around the world.
In March, Brigadier General Wayne Grigsby explicitly noted that the phrase
meant far more than simple embassy security missions. Sitting in Djibouti
is really the new normal, the CJTF-HOA commander said. (He was, in fact,
sitting in an office in that country.) Its not the new normal... as far as
providing security for our threatened embassies. Its really the new normal
on how were going to operate as a [Department of Defense entity] in
supporting the national security strategy of our country.
Operation New Normal and the Incredible Disappearing Lee Magee
With so many officials talking about the new normal and with documents
citing a specific operation sporting the same name, I called up AFRICOMs
media chief Benjamin Benson looking for more information. I dont know the
name new normal, he told me. It isnt a term were using to define one of
the operations.
That seemed awfully curious. An official military document obtained by
TomDispatch explicitly noted that U.S. troops would be deployed as part of
Operation New Normal in 2014. The term was even used, in still another
document, alongside other code-named operations like Juniper Micron and
Observant Compass, missions to aid the French and African interventions in
Mali and to degrade or destroy Joseph Konys murderous Lords Resistance
Army in central Africa.
Next, I got in touch with Lieutenant Colonel Glen Roberts at CJTF-HOA and
explained that I wanted to know about Operation New Normal. His response was
effusive and unequivocal: I should speak with Lee Magee -- that is
Lieutenant Colonel Robert E. Lee Magee, a West Point graduate,
third-generation Army officer, and commander of the East African Response
Force who had deployed to South Sudan as the nation shattered on the rocks
of reality. He lives this concept and has executed it, was how Roberts put
it.
Was I available to talk to Magee the next day? Yes, indeed.
On March 27th, the day of the proposed interview, however, a lower-ranking
public affairs official got in touch to explain that Lieutenant Colonel
Magee could not speak to me and Lieutenant Colonel Roberts was out of the
office. I asked to reschedule for the next day. The spokesman said he didnt
know what their calendars looked like, but that Roberts was expected back
later that day. I left a message, but heard nothing.
The next morning, I called the press office in Djibouti and asked to speak
to Magee. He wasnt there. No one was. Everyone had left work early. The
reason? Paint fumes.
That was a new one.
Another follow-up and Roberts finally got back in touch. Apologies, but I
am no longer able to arrange an interview with Magee, he informed me.
Thanks for understanding.
But I didnt understand and told him so. After all, Magee was the man who
lived and executed the new normal. I thought we were set for an interview.
What happened?
He has simply declined an interview, as is his privilege, was the best
Roberts could do. Magee had been dropped into the hot zone in South Sudan to
forestall the next Benghazi, and had previously spoken with other media
outlets about his work in Africa, but conversing with me about Operation New
Normal was apparently beyond the pale. Or maybe it had something to do with
those paint fumes.
On March 31st, Roberts told me that he could answer the questions by email
-- questions that I had already sent in on March 17th. But no response came.
I followed up again. And again. And again. I sent the questions a second
time.
As of publication, almost two months after my initial inquiry, no word yet.
That, evidently, is the new normal, too.
The Real New Normal
Quite obviously, the U.S. military isnt eager to talk about Operation New
Normal, which -- despite Benjamin Bensons contentions, Lee Magees silence,
and Glen Roberts disappearance -- is almost certainly the name for a U.S.
military mission in East Africa that, U.S. documents suggest, is tied to the
Benghazi-birthed East African Response Force.
More important than uncovering the nature of Operation New Normal, however,
is recognizing the real new normal in Africa for the U.S. military:
ever-increasing missions across the continent -- now averaging about 1.5 per
day -- ever more engagement with local proxies in ever more African
countries, the construction of ever more new facilities in ever more
countries (including plans for a possible new compound in Niger), and a
string of bases devoted to surveillance activities spreading across the
northern tier of Africa. Add to this impressive build-up the three new rapid
reaction forces, specialized teams like a contingent of AFRICOM personnel
and officials from the FBI and the departments of Justice, State, and
Defense created to help rescue hundreds of Nigerian schoolgirls kidnapped by
members of the Islamic militant group Boko Haram, and other shadowy
quick-response units like the seldom-mentioned Naval Special Warfare Unit
10.
Having resources [on the continent] that are ready for a response is really
valuable, Benson told me when talking about the Djibouti-based EARF. The
same holds for the U.S. militarys new normal in Africa: more of everything
valuable to a military seeking a new mission in the wake of two fading,
none-too-successful wars.
The Benghazi killings, unrest in South Sudan, and now the Boko Haram
kidnappings have provided the U.S. with ways to bring a long-running light
footprint in Africa narrative into line with a far heavier reality. Each
crisis has provided the U.S. with further justification for publicizing a
steady expansion on that continent thats been underway but under wraps for
years. New forces, new battlefields, and a new openness about a new war,
to quote one of the men waging it. Thats the real new normal for the U.S.
military in Africa -- and you dont need to talk to Lieutenant Colonel Lee
Magee to know it.
By Nick Turse
EM
On the 49th Parallel
Thé Mulindwas Communication Group
"With Yoweri Museveni, Ssabassajja and Dr. Kiiza Besigye, Uganda is in
anarchy"
Kuungana Mulindwa Mawasiliano Kikundi
"Pamoja na Yoweri Museveni, Ssabassajja na Dk. Kiiza Besigye, Uganda ni
katika machafuko"
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