The United States’ war on terror in Africa has failed spectacularly, with terrorism in the region spiking by 75,000 percent since the US began its interventions.
The US has spent decades providing security assistance, training African military officers, and setting up outposts in Africa, but these efforts have only served to destabilize the region and empower terrorist groups.
The US invasion of Libya in 2011 created a power vacuum that was quickly filled by militants. These militants have since spread across the Sahel region, destabilizing countries like Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger.
This year, according to the Pentagon, terrorist attacks in the Sahel region alone have resulted in 9,818 deaths — a 42,500 percent increase.
US-trained militaries in the Sahel have been unable to stop the onslaught of terrorism, and have often been complicit in human rights abuses.
In 2020, for example, a top political leader in Burkina Faso admitted that his country’s security forces were carrying out extrajudicial killings.
The US has continued to provide security assistance to coup-prone regimes in Africa, even though these regimes have been ineffective in fighting terrorism and have often committed human rights abuses.
Colonel Assimi Goita, who has twice overthrown Mali’s government, is one example of a US-backed leader who has committed human rights abuses.
The US has also failed to prevent the spread of Russian mercenaries in Africa. The Wagner Group, a paramilitary group founded by the late Yevgeny Prigozhin, has been implicated in hundreds of human rights abuses in Mali.
Violence in Togo and Benin has, for example, jumped 633 percent and 718 percent over the last year, according to the Pentagon.
Despite all of this, the US continues to provide security assistance to African countries.
The State Department provided more than $16 million in security aid to Mali in 2020 and almost $5 million in 2021.
