U.S. Training African Forces to Uproot Terrorists

In response to growing concerns over terrorist group activity in North Africa, the US is launching a campaign to beef up government forces in several African countries. Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Chad, and Senegal are among the countries that will be receiving American training as well as trucks and equipment to use against terrorist groups roaming the region. The March bombings in Spain that killed 191 people is suspected to have been planned by people using North Africa as a base, and the US is concerned that the area could become "a new Afghanistan, with well-financed bands of Islamic militants recruiting, training and arming themselves." Rather than put US troops on the ground, explains one US military official, Washington hopes to train local troops and equip them so that they can better find and combat terrorist networks that are trying to take root in the area. "We want to be preventative, so that we don't have to put boots on the ground here in North Africa as we did in Afghanistan," he said, adding that the US wants to avoid becoming "a lightning rod for popular anger that radicals can capitalize on." – YaleGlobal