One of major global developments recently has been the creation of AFRICOM, the new U.S. military command covering the entire African continent. This is a big change from the post-WWII era, when imperialist security over the continent was primarily left in the hands of its former colonial masters, France and Britain, while the U.S., for the most part, intervened in Africa only indirectly. Besides greater U.S. deployments, Germany has also begun to send troops to Africa and is mulling much greater commitments in the near future; Italy participated in the war on Libya; Japan opened its first post-war military base abroad in Djibouti; and even non-imperialist powers like China have begun to send soldiers in just the past year or two. In the near term, these interventions may be primarily directed at the spread of right-wing Islamic groups. But ultimately, imperialist domination over Africa will serve to suppress much more fundamental threats to the security of local regimes across Africa. Just a couple years ago, Nigeria was crippled by a massive general strike involving tens of millions of workers, which only petered out when the strike leaders refused to confront the government. In North Africa, rebellions have overthrown dictators and shaken pro-U.S. regimes. Hundreds of millions of people in Africa are leaving the countryside and moving to the cities, swelling the ranks of a massive new working class that investors all over the world are eying as the next big savior of the global economy. Because local ruling classes on the continent are so weak and with hardly any legitimacy, foreign military intervention will be vital for keeping order and making this possible. If the Islamists could give U.S. forces a few black eyes like they received in their attempted intervention in Somalia in the 1990s, it would be a blow to the imperialists ability to police the continent. At the same time, Islamists like Boko Haram are widely hated (amongst many other things, they were on the same side as the bosses during the Nigerian general strike) and the masses on the ground should continue their efforts to bring them to justice without giving an opening to the much-bloodier foreign powers.
Posted on: Wed, 21 May 2014 23:36:44 +0000
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