Most do not associate Africa with the high-tech sphere of “space”. However, in recent years, many countries on the continent have woken up to the potential and usefulness of space technology. In sub-Saharan Africa, Nigeria and South Africa are leading the charge.
What have South Africa and Nigeria have achieved?
Both countries have recognised the usefulness of satellites for earth observation, telecommunications and advancing space science. They have funded and overseen a number of launches.
Nigeria’s space agency, the National Space Research and Development Agency, flies several multimillion-dollar satellites. South Africa launched its first satellite,SUNSAT, in 1999. A second, SumbandilaSat, was launched from Kazakhstan in 2009. A year later, South Africa formed its National Space Agency, SANSA. In 2013, the Cape Peninsula University of Technology launched South Africa’s first CubeSat – a type of nano-satellite, known as ZACUBE-1.
And in early 2015, the Kondor-E satellite built for South Africa in Russia was launched into orbit. It provides all-weather, day-and-night radar imagery for the South African military.
Earth observation satellites can collect data on areas of importance to a country’s economy and well-being such as agriculture, natural disasters and elections. Nigeria has used its satellites to monitor the oil-rich Niger Delta . Its satellites have also been used in election monitoring, providing crucial information about voters who may otherwise have been overlooked by poll workers.
Satellites have also proved useful in the fight against extremist groups such as Boko Haram. In 2014, Nigeria used its SatX and Sat 2 to monitor the group’s movements and to help find the 273 girls it had abducted.
There are limits to how useful satellites can be in these situations. Finding those kidnapped proved difficult because the satellites only have a 2.5 metre resolution. This means that you cannot trace individuals’ movement – you can only get maps of some locations at some particular times.
Also, because satellites move from one location to another, it means that it can take up to four days for one to get into position to take a particular photograph.
Amnesty International has pioneered the use of satellite images for human rights research and advocacy over the past six years using imagery from GeoEye and DigitalGlobe. It has also used satellite imagery to collect information about Boko Haram’s activities. Satellite photos taken in January showed the scale of the group’s atrocities after they attacked the towns of Baga and Doron Baga.
Satellite image of housing in Doro Baga taken in January after a Boko Haram attack. Amnesty International
South Africa has harnessed earth observation satellite capability to do human settlement mapping. This has enabled it to monitor urbanisation by examining the growth of settlements and the transformation of housing. It provides useful data for service delivery projects and town planning.
As the largest space agency in southern Africa, SANSA frequently provides disaster monitoring and post-disaster assessment for South Africa and the region. Fires and floods are the most common natural disaster. It also monitors space weather effects and forecasts, which are crucial for aviation.
Other African nations are getting involved
Other growing sub-Saharan African countries have recently begun space programmes. Ghana launched its Space Science and Technology Centre in 2012. Kenya started its space programme in 2012. Kenya’s geographic position on the equator makes it ideal to launch satellites into geostationary and other orbits.
Oil- and mineral-rich Angola plans on launching its first satellite, AngoSat-1, into orbit by 2016. It is being built by a Russian consortium.
North African nations are no strangers to space and satellites. Algeria, which established its space agency in 2002, launched five disaster monitoring microsatellites in the 2000s, and an earth observation satellite in 2010. The latter was launched from Chennai, India.
Egypt, like South Africa, now has its own military satellite thanks to Russian assistance. Egypt launched its first satellite in 2007 for scientific research, but has run into recent concerns over human and financial resources.
Along with Sudan, Egypt has been at the forefront to establish a African space agency to combat some of the monetary and skills issues. The African Union Working Group on Space recently approved a draft African space policy and is currently developing a comprehensive space strategy.
However, even if African resources and skillsets are combined, an operational African Space Agency appears to be at least five to ten years away. Countries are focused on growing their own space agencies first. The project will also undoubtedly depend upon political relations between continental powerhouses Nigeria and South Africa, which are at a low.
Its effectiveness will depend on an African country developing domestic satellite launch capability, which is a huge necessary step forward in space exploration. Nevertheless, continued collaboration – such as SANSA working with the Zambia Remote Sensing Centre in a research project using satellite earth observation data for drought, soil and vegetation monitoring – will assist in speeding up the process towards a true continental space alliance.
Government space agencies aside, satellites over rural Africa can help provide Internet connectivity to hundreds of millions of African citizens. In June 2014, only 44% of the 410 million people who live in sub-Saharan Africa were living within 25km of an operational fibre optic network node. Facebook has reportedly been talking to satellite operator Avanti – which owns two broadband satellites over Africa – to help in this endeavour.
There is no question satellites and space exploration have socioeconomic benefits. Satellites can help find mineral resources. Satellites helped uncover an underground aquifer in Kenya’s driest region. The plethora of possible benefits is combined with other crucial hard to quantify advantages. These projects inspire youth, increase national pride and advance education.
But, space endeavours require capital. And for most African countries, capital is a limited commodity.
JERUSALEM (AP) — Shimon Peres, a former Israeli president and prime minister, whose life story mirrored that of the Jewish state and who was celebrated around the world as a Nobel prize-winning visionary who pushed his country toward peace, has died, the Israeli news website YNet reported early Wednesday. He was 93.
Peres’ condition worsened following a major stroke two weeks ago.
In an unprecedented seven-decade political career, Peres filled nearly every position in Israeli public life and was credited with leading the country through some of its most defining moments, from creating its nuclear arsenal in the 1950s, to disentangling its troops from Lebanon and rescuing its economy from triple-digit inflation in the 1980s, to guiding a skeptical nation into peace talks with the Palestinians in the 1990s.
A protege of Israel’s founding father David Ben-Gurion, he led the Defense Ministry in his 20s and spearheaded the development of Israel’s nuclear program. He was first elected to parliament in 1959 and later held every major Cabinet post — including defense, finance and foreign affairs — and served three brief stints as prime minister. His key role in the first Israeli-Palestinian peace accord earned him a Nobel Peace Prize and revered status as Israel’s then most recognizable figure abroad.
And yet, for much of his political career he could not parlay his international prestige into success in Israeli politics, where he was branded by many as both a utopian dreamer and political schemer. His well-tailored, necktied appearance and swept-back gray hair seemed to separate him from his more informal countrymen. He suffered a string of electoral defeats: competing in five general elections seeking the prime minister’s spot, he lost four and tied one.
He finally secured the public adoration that had long eluded him when he has chosen by parliament to a seven-year term as Israel’s ceremonial president in 2007, taking the role of elder statesman.
Peres was celebrated by doves and vilified by hawks for advocating far-reaching Israeli compromises for peace even before he negotiated the first interim accord with the Palestinians in 1993 that set into motion a partition plan that gave them limited self-rule. That was followed by a peace accord with neighboring Jordan. But after a fateful six-month period in 1995-96 that included Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin’s assassination, a spate of Palestinian suicide bombings and Peres’ own election loss to the more conservative Benjamin Netanyahu, the prospects for peace began to evaporate.
Relegated to the political wilderness, he created his non-governmental Peres Center for Peace that raised funds for cooperation and development projects involving Israel, the Palestinians and Arab nations. He returned to it at age 91 when he completed his term as president.
Shimon Perski was born on Aug. 2, 1923, in Vishneva, then part of Poland. He moved to pre-state Palestine in 1934 with his immediate family. Her grandfather and other relatives stayed behind and perished in the Holocaust. Rising quickly through Labor Party ranks, he became a top aide to Ben-Gurion, Israel’s first prime minister and a man Peres once called “the greatest Jew of our time.”
At 29, he was the youngest person to serve as director of Israel’s Defense Ministry, and is credited with arming Israel’s military almost from scratch. Yet throughout his political career, he suffered from the fact that he never wore an army uniform or fought in a war.
Of his 10 books, several amplified his vision of a “new Middle East” where there was peaceful economic and cultural cooperation among all the nations of the region.
Despite continued waves of violence that pushed the Israeli political map to the right, the concept of a Palestinian state next to Israel became mainstream Israeli policy many years after Peres advocated it.
Shunted aside during the 1999 election campaign, won by party colleague Ehud Barak, Peres rejected advice to retire, assuming the newly created and loosely defined Cabinet post of Minister for Regional Cooperation.
In 2000, Peres absorbed another resounding political slap, losing an election in the parliament for the largely ceremonial post of president to Likud Party backbencher Moshe Katsav, who was later convicted and imprisoned for rape.
Even so, Peres refused to quit. In 2001, at age 77, he took the post of foreign minister in the government of national unity set up by Ariel Sharon, serving for 20 months before Labor withdrew from the coalition.
Then he followed Sharon into a new party, Kadima, serving as vice-premier under Sharon and his successor, Ehud Olmert, before assuming the presidency.
JERUSALEM (AP) — Shimon Peres, a former Israeli president and prime minister, whose life story mirrored that of the Jewish state and who was celebrated around the world as a Nobel prize-winning visionary who pushed his country toward peace, has died, the Israeli news website YNet reported early Wednesday. He was 93.
Peres’ condition worsened following a major stroke two weeks ago.
In an unprecedented seven-decade political career, Peres filled nearly every position in Israeli public life and was credited with leading the country through some of its most defining moments, from creating its nuclear arsenal in the 1950s, to disentangling its troops from Lebanon and rescuing its economy from triple-digit inflation in the 1980s, to guiding a skeptical nation into peace talks with the Palestinians in the 1990s.
A protege of Israel’s founding father David Ben-Gurion, he led the Defense Ministry in his 20s and spearheaded the development of Israel’s nuclear program. He was first elected to parliament in 1959 and later held every major Cabinet post — including defense, finance and foreign affairs — and served three brief stints as prime minister. His key role in the first Israeli-Palestinian peace accord earned him a Nobel Peace Prize and revered status as Israel’s then most recognizable figure abroad.
And yet, for much of his political career he could not parlay his international prestige into success in Israeli politics, where he was branded by many as both a utopian dreamer and political schemer. His well-tailored, necktied appearance and swept-back gray hair seemed to separate him from his more informal countrymen. He suffered a string of electoral defeats: competing in five general elections seeking the prime minister’s spot, he lost four and tied one.
He finally secured the public adoration that had long eluded him when he has chosen by parliament to a seven-year term as Israel’s ceremonial president in 2007, taking the role of elder statesman.
Peres was celebrated by doves and vilified by hawks for advocating far-reaching Israeli compromises for peace even before he negotiated the first interim accord with the Palestinians in 1993 that set into motion a partition plan that gave them limited self-rule. That was followed by a peace accord with neighboring Jordan. But after a fateful six-month period in 1995-96 that included Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin’s assassination, a spate of Palestinian suicide bombings and Peres’ own election loss to the more conservative Benjamin Netanyahu, the prospects for peace began to evaporate.
Relegated to the political wilderness, he created his non-governmental Peres Center for Peace that raised funds for cooperation and development projects involving Israel, the Palestinians and Arab nations. He returned to it at age 91 when he completed his term as president.
Shimon Perski was born on Aug. 2, 1923, in Vishneva, then part of Poland. He moved to pre-state Palestine in 1934 with his immediate family. Her grandfather and other relatives stayed behind and perished in the Holocaust. Rising quickly through Labor Party ranks, he became a top aide to Ben-Gurion, Israel’s first prime minister and a man Peres once called “the greatest Jew of our time.”
At 29, he was the youngest person to serve as director of Israel’s Defense Ministry, and is credited with arming Israel’s military almost from scratch. Yet throughout his political career, he suffered from the fact that he never wore an army uniform or fought in a war.
Of his 10 books, several amplified his vision of a “new Middle East” where there was peaceful economic and cultural cooperation among all the nations of the region.
Despite continued waves of violence that pushed the Israeli political map to the right, the concept of a Palestinian state next to Israel became mainstream Israeli policy many years after Peres advocated it.
Shunted aside during the 1999 election campaign, won by party colleague Ehud Barak, Peres rejected advice to retire, assuming the newly created and loosely defined Cabinet post of Minister for Regional Cooperation.
In 2000, Peres absorbed another resounding political slap, losing an election in the parliament for the largely ceremonial post of president to Likud Party backbencher Moshe Katsav, who was later convicted and imprisoned for rape.
Even so, Peres refused to quit. In 2001, at age 77, he took the post of foreign minister in the government of national unity set up by Ariel Sharon, serving for 20 months before Labor withdrew from the coalition.
Then he followed Sharon into a new party, Kadima, serving as vice-premier under Sharon and his successor, Ehud Olmert, before assuming the presidency.
Slave shackles on display at the new National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington. (Kevin Lamarque/Reuters)
The history of slavery in the United States justifies reparations for African Americans, argues a recent report by a U.N.-affiliated group based in Geneva.This conclusion was part of a study by the United Nations’ Working Group of Experts on People of African Descent, a body that reports to the international organization’s High Commissioner on Human Rights. The group of experts, which includes leading human rights lawyers from around the world, presented its findings to the United Nations Human Rights Council on Monday, pointing to the continuing link between present injustices and the dark chapters of American history.
“In particular, the legacy of colonial history, enslavement, racial subordination and segregation, racial terrorism and racial inequality in the United States remains a serious challenge, as there has been no real commitment to reparations and to truth and reconciliation for people of African descent,” the report stated. “Contemporary police killings and the trauma that they create are reminiscent of the past racial terror of lynching.”
Citing the past year’s spate of police officers killing unarmed African American men, the panel warned against “impunity for state violence,” which has created, in its words, a “human rights crisis” that “must be addressed as a matter of urgency.”
The panel drew its recommendations, which are nonbinding and unlikely to influence Washington, after a fact-finding mission in the United States in January. At the time, it hailed the strides taken to make the American criminal justice system more equitable but pointed to the corrosive legacy of the past.
“Despite substantial changes since the end of the enforcement of Jim Crow and the fight for civil rights, ideology ensuring the domination of one group over another, continues to negatively impact the civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights of African Americans today,” it said ina statement. “The dangerous ideology of white supremacy inhibits social cohesion amongst the US population.”
In its report, it specifically dwells on the extrajudicial murders that were a product of an era of white supremacy:
Lynching was a form of racial terrorism that has contributed to a legacy of racial inequality that the United States must address. Thousands of people of African descent were killed in violent public acts of racial control and domination and the perpetrators were never held accountable.
The reparations could come in a variety of forms, according to the panel, including “a formal apology, health initiatives, educational opportunities … psychological rehabilitation, technology transfer and financial support, and debt cancellation.”
Separately, a coalition of Caribbean nations is calling for reparations from their former European imperial powers for the impact of slavery, colonial genocide and the toxic racial laws that shaped life for the past two centuries in these countries. Their efforts are fitful, and so far not so fruitful.
When asked by reporters to comment on the tone of the American presidential election campaign on Monday, the working group’s chairman, Ricardo A. Sunga of the Philippines, expressed concernabout “hate speech … xenophobia [and] Afrophobia” that he felt was prevalent in the campaign, although he didn’t specifically call out Republican candidate Donald Trump.
“We are very troubled that these are on the rise,” said Sunga.
China and Saudi Arabia are building military bases next door to US AFRICOM in Djibouti—and bringing the consequences of American withdrawal from the region into stark relief.
Djibouti, a resource-poor nation of 14,300 square miles and 875,000 people in the Horn of Africa, rarely makes international headlines. But between its relative stability and strategic location—20 miles across from war-consumed Yemen and in destroyer range of the pirate-infested western edge of the Indian Ocean—it is now one of the more important security beachheads in the develohttp://www.amazon.com/Joseph-Braude/e/B001KDV64Kping world. Its location also matters greatly to global commerce and energy, due to its vicinity to the Mandeb Strait and the Suez-Aden canal, which sees ten percent of the world’s oil exports and 20 percent of its commercial exports annually.[1] Since November 2002, the country has been home to Camp Lemonnier, a U.S. Expeditionary base—the only American base on the African continent—along with other bases belonging to its French, Italian, Spanish, and Japanese allies. (The United States maintains numerous small outposts and airfields in Africa, but officially regards Lemonnier as its only full-scale military base on the continent.)
But now there are two new kids on the block: On January 21st, the Chinese Foreign Affairs Ministry announced an agreement with Djibouti to host its first-ever base beyond the South China Sea, and construction commenced days later.[2] Though Beijing called the installation a “logistics and fast evacuation base,” the Asian power’s “near-abroad” rivals, such as Taiwan, opined that it is more likely the beginning of a new, aggressive military buildup to rival the United States. Six weeks later, Saudi Arabia declared that it too would construct a base in Djibouti,[3]apparently as part of its newly assertive policy of countering Iranian proxies politically and militarily throughout the region.[4]
Both new players have made substantial economic and soft power investments in the country to boot. Since 2015, Beijing has poured over $14 billion into infrastructure development.[5] Saudi Arabia, itself a prominent donor to Djibouti’s public works, has spent generously on social welfare projects for the country’s poor; built housing, schools and mosques for its swelling Yemeni refugee population; and dispatched teachers and preachers from the World Assembly of Muslim Youth, long a pillar for the promulgation of Saudi-backed interpretations of Islam. Augmenting Saudi aid, moreover, has been further spending by some of its Arab military allies. The United Arab Emirates and Bahrain have poured millions into charitable work over the past few months—and the UAE in particular is working to spur economic development along the lines of the “Dubai model.” Even cash-poor North Sudan, newly returned to the Saudi orbit after a years-long alliance with Iran, began construction of a hospital in Djibouti in early February.
Neither the timing nor the confluence of these projects is mere coincidence. America’s diminishing global military footprint has begun to affect the calculation of allies and rivals alike, and the outsized role Djibouti is poised to play in its neighborhood presents a case in point of the consequences. An examination of the changing role the country plays in American, Chinese, and Arab security policy offers a glimpse into potential conflicts as well as opportunities arising from the shift—and some steps Americans can take to prepare for both.
The American Posture
As the only American base in Africa, Camp Lemonnier serves a vital function for US AFRICOM. Housing 4,000 military and civilian personnel, it is the nerve center of six drone launching stations across the continent, which have attacked targets as far-flung as Al-Shabab in Somalia, Boko Haram in Nigeria, and Yemeni-based Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. U.S. Special Forces, the CIA, and Air Force surveillance craft converge to process and pool intelligence at the camp. It also serves as headquarters to Task Force 48-4, a counterterrorism unit that targets militants in East Africa and Yemen.[6] Special Forces rely on it too: In 2012, when Navy SEALs rescued American and Danish hostages from Somalia, they brought them to safety in Camp Lemonnier.[7] And as a springboard for American-led anti-piracy operations, Camp Lemonnier helps the U.S. maintain its role as the primary guarantor of mercantile security in the Gulf of Aden, the Horn of Africa, and the Indian Ocean. The significance of the base grows only greater amid regional conflagration: The U.S. has been using it to meet its pledge of technical and intelligence assistance to Saudi Arabia in its war against the Iranian-backed Houthi militia in Yemen.
In 2014, the U.S. signed a new 20-year lease on the base with the Djiboutian government, and committed over $1.4 billion to modernize it in the years to come.[8] This significant expenditure bucks the overall trend of diminishing American military commitments overseas. For example, President Obama has announced plans to reduce the number of active naval vessels to 1917 numbers, possibly including aircraft carriers.[9]
As the segments below will show, America’s status in the country stands to be affected by the activities of the Chinese and Saudi bases. It may also be affected by the two countries’ soft power deployments, each aiming to influence the cultural and political fiber of the country and, by extension, the policies of its government. America’s own soft power commitments have been minimal: the U.S. supplies $3 million worth of food aid annually through USAID as part of the U.N. World Food Program, runs modest health and education projects, and netted only $152 million in trade in 2015.[10] Nor is there any concerted effort to enter the public discussion in Djibouti in the service of American goals or values.
The Chinese Posture
By contrast to the U.S., China has never previously established a base beyond its “near abroad.” Thus the Djibouti project, however modest, fuels the perception that China’s military footprint is growing. Sending such a message may itself be among Beijing’s goals. David Shedd, former Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, told us that “[The Chinese] want to signal to the world that they have a worldwide presence. Part of the mission is simply defined as being seen. That in and of itself is defined as an interest.”[11]
With respect to its potential operational significance, the Chinese Foreign Ministry says, “Facilities will mainly be used for logistical support and personnel recuperation of the Chinese armed forces conducting such missions as maritime escort in the Gulf of Aden and waters off the Somali coast, peacekeeping, and humanitarian assistance.” It would also enable fast evacuation for any of the million Chinese citizens now living in the Middle East and Africa should they require it.[12]The need to prepare for such eventualities became clear to China in the bloody aftermath of the Arab Spring: It evacuated 35,680 nationals employed mainly in Libya’s oil industry, and 629 more from Yemen soon thereafter.[13] During the Libya evacuation, China had only one frigate available in the vicinity, so most of the evacuees had to be flown out of the country on chartered commercial planes.
But from Washington to Taipei, observers suspect that the project is more ambitious than the Chinese let on. In an interview on the national news network Taiwan Today, political analyst Lai Yueqian said, “[The base] can be used to pin down the United States and any U.S.-led organizations, and if [the U.S.] wants to intervene against China’s interests, they will have to think carefully, because China will use their military to protect their citizens and their property.”[14] In the following clip, Yueqian elaborates on this analysis, bespeaking Taiwanese concerns about the base:
Yueqian’s assessment, shared by most Chinese “near-abroad” allies of the United States, is also the view of prominent members of the political class in Washington. At a December hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on African Affairs in which rumors about the base were discussed, Senator Chris Coons (R-De.) stated in relation to the Djibouti base, “[The US has to be] vigilant in the face of China’s growing ambitions.”[15]
Beijing’s outlook toward nearby North Africa and the Middle East differs with American policies. As Taiwan’s Lai Yueqian described in the video above, the U.S.- and NATO-led military intervention in Libya angered China. At the U.N. Security Council, Beijing subsequently blocked attempts to engineer a Western military intervention in Syria. With respect to the region-wide conflict between Saudi Arabia and Iran, America’s tradition of siding with Saudi Arabia — or, for that matter, its more recent tendency to tilt toward Iran — may conflict with Chinese policies: Guided by the need to quench its substantial thirst for oil, Beijing mostly seeks to avoid irking either oil-rich nation. A new military base in boating range of North Africa as well as the Arabian peninsula promises to bolster any Chinese political stance—however modestly—with a measure of force. The base, to be located near the small port city of Obock on the northern coast of Djibouti, lies 20 miles closer than Lemonnier to the conflict in Yemen, to which Washington has committed resources in support of Saudi Arabia’s war with the Houthis.
But China’s strategic goals cannot be explained solely in terms of a perceived reaction to Western policies. According to Beijing’s most recent defense policy paper, released in May 2015, “China’s armed forces will work harder to create a favorable strategic posture with more emphasis on the employment of military forces and means.”[16] This formulation is widely believed to allude to China’s “String of Pearls” and “One Belt, One Road” initiatives. “String of Pearls” is a metaphor for an envisioned network of naval ports of call, predominantly along the Indian Ocean, to secure sea lanes of transit, commerce, and communication from mainland China to Sudan. The “One Belt, One Road” initiative seeks to strengthen Chinese exports through commercial land and sea roads, largely along the historic “silk road,” straddling Europe and the Middle East. The Djibouti base would be vital in ensuring the success of the latter goal, since most of China’s $1 billion in daily exports to Europe traverse the Gulf of Aden and the Suez Canal.[17] With respect to the former plan, Toshi Yoshihara, Chair of Asia-Pacific Studies at the U.S. Naval War College, has been mapping the intersection of Chinese naval and commercial ventures across the Pacific region. Arrayed together, he told us, they “certainly do look like a string of pearls.”[18] Djibouti, home to both the nascent base and extensive Chinese economic investment, would clearly amount to a new pearl on the string (see Figure 1).[19]
Are Chinese and American pursuits in the vicinity of Djibouti necessarily a zero-sum game? Some of China’s stated goals do not conflict with American aspirations, and to the contrary, may benefit both superpowers as well as their allies: Both the growing Chinese capacity to evacuate citizens from war-torn areas and its further enhancement of anti-piracy operations are each a “public good.” On the other hand, a different term in Beijing’s political vocabulary raises more disturbing possibilities. In our conversation with FPRI Senior Fellow June Teufel Dreyer, she stressed the principle of “All Under Heaven”—rooted in Chinese imperial history—which places Chinese central authority at the epicenter of a tributary system of dominance over lesser powers. Some analysts of China see the country’s recent installation of surface-to-air missiles and fighter jets on Woody Island in the South China Sea as a manifestation of this supremacist tendency.[20] One might ask whether the construction of a Djibouti base reflects the extension of “All Under Heaven” beyond China’s traditional orbit.
At a time of rapid Chinese construction of aircraft and aircraft carriers and more serious competition with American military industries, the base in Djibouti could indeed reflect a Chinese aspiration to eventually meet and surpass the United States as a military and economic power in the area. In January 2016, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) conducted a 72-hour exercise involving thousands of marines and the navy special operations regiment in the Gobi Desert in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. The area’s topography and climate resemble much of North Africa and the Sahel.[21] Between “All Under Heaven” and China’s stated goal of housing up to 10,000 Chinese servicemen in Djibouti, such exercises offer ample basis for concern.[22]
Beijing’s hard power initiative in Djibouti is meanwhile accompanied by its soft power initiatives to build ties with state and society alike. The $14 billion in Chinese support for infrastructure development, widely publicized in Djibouti, has generated enormous goodwill with the population. Far exceeding U.S. spending, the injection is also an investment in the government of President Isma’il Omar Guelleh. There are also cultural ventures, such as the new Confucius Institute in Djibouti City, which Beijing typically uses to cultivate personal ties and “assets” within the society.[23] Add to all this China’s $1.1 billion in trade in 2014—roughly ten times that of the United States.[24] As Chinese influence grows in Djibouti, its ability to influence the government’s foreign policy and security strategies promises to grow along with it.
The Saudi Posture
From a Saudi perspective, stationing troops in Djibouti is both a defensive and a potential offensive measure in its pan-regional conflict with Iran, with particular bearing on the nearby war in Yemen. The defensive aspect was on display in mid-February, when Saudi intelligence officials, tracking the flow of munitions from Iran to its Houthi proxy militia in Yemen, discovered that the Islamic Republic was using Djibouti as a waystation. A ship en route to Yemen carrying encrypted military communication equipment and other hardware had originated in the southern Iranian port of Bandar Abbas. The Kingdom intercepted it en route, and recognized the importance of strengthening its capacity to act in and around Djibouti.[25] In terms of “offense,” Ben Ho Wan Beng, a military analyst in Singapore, speculates that given the Houthi presence in western Yemen, Riyadh could use the base to “open up a new front against the Houthis, who [would] then face the prospect of being attacked from another axis.”[26]
By contrast to the U.S. and its Japanese and Western allies, for which the establishment of a base in Djibouti is a matter of paying rent on a discrete strip of land, Saudis view their own barrack walls as permeable. Djibouti is an Arab League member state, bound to its brethren by ties of blood, culture, and faith. It has also joined the 34-member, Saudi-led “Islamic coalition” against Iran-sponsored terror announced by Deputy Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman in December.[27]Thus from Riyadh’s perspective, all of Djibouti is a kind of “base”—and the Kingdom feels it has a right to weigh in on any of the country’s non-Arab military installations. It was hardly a coincidence when the Djiboutian government recently rejected a Russian proposal to establish its own base in the country: Moscow, a staunch ally to the Iran-backed Assad regime in Damascus, would have been at best unhelpful to Saudi Arabia in the Yemen war.
Saudi soft power activity in the country serves to intensify this bond. One of the state-backed organizations spearheading it is the Riyadh-based World Assembly of Muslim Youth (WAMY). The group historically served as a primary exporter of Islamist preaching across the globe—a mission that enabled both Salafi jihadists and the Muslim Brotherhood to politicize and radicalize Muslim communities. But the Kingdom more recently purged the organization of jihadist preachers, and streamlined WAMY’s religious line to follow “Salafi traditionalism,” which holds that only the head of state has the right to declare “jihad.” Moreover, clerical elites who traditionally controlled the group now share authority with stalwarts of the government—call them “lay leaders”—who have their own direct line to the royal family. In Djibouti, WAMY funds and staffs health and human services for the indigenous population, and tends to the needs of Yemeni refugees. Other goals determined by the state appear to take precedence over preaching: provide disaster and poverty relief; back the government of President Isma’il Omar Guelleh; instill an ethos of Djiboutian nationalism that insulates the population from trans-state ideologies; build person-to-person relationships between Saudis and Djiboutians; engineer support for the Kingdom’s specific regional objectives. Some of these goals are subtly on display in the following excerpt from a March 21, 2016 report by WAMY on its Djibouti bureau:
To be sure, the positive aspects of WAMY’s programs should not diminish the concern that Salafi missionary activity may still promote a profoundly sectarian worldview in Djibouti, casting the Sunni-Shi’ite conflict in existential, rather than political, terms.
As to the presence of 30,000-and-counting Yemeni refugees in Djibouti, Saudis view it as both a humanitarian concern and a strategic opportunity. Twenty-five years ago, in the aftermath of the “Gulf War” to repel Saddam Hussein’s invasion and occupation of Kuwait, Saudi Arabia established a refugee camp in the northern town of Rafha to host 33,000 Iraqis fleeing persecution by Saddam. The installation served Riyadh and some of its international allies as an intelligence listening post—hundreds of Iraqis were debriefed about the situation inside the country—and as a platform for cultivating Iraqi assets.[28] Though the Yemeni and gulf wars are far from analogous, the presence of a substantial number of newly departed Yemeni civilians in a safe environment far from the battlefield presents the opportunity to tap a similar wealth of information and human networks.
In deepening their security and intelligence presence in Djibouti at a time of unease between Riyadh and Washington, they will be keen to explore potential security partnerships with China. As recently as 2014, Beijing sought to forge joint counterterrorism training programs with the Yemeni government that Saudi Arabia is now fighting to reinstall.[29] More recently, Beijing made a rare break with its policy of neutrality between Iran and Saudi Arabia to express support for the Saudi position in Yemen. In January 2016, King Salman hosted a landmark visit to Riyadh by Chinese President Xi Jinping, together with high-level meetings between senior security and intelligence officials of both countries. The strengthening of these ties may serve to lessen Saudi reliance on American support.[30]
The importance of Djibouti has become a popular topic of discussion throughout the Saudi-allied Arab world. Prominent voices in Egypt, for example, are talking about building a base there too, while other Gulf allies are ramping up their own soft power projects in the country. The following video montage begins with a clip from Tawfiq Okasha—an eccentric, ultranationalist Egyptian pundit known for his fondness of Israel—in which he makes the case for a Djibouti base. In perhaps a sign of the times, he bolsters his argument by saying that Djiboutians are one of the lost tribes of Israel, and therefore “good people.”
Grappling with New U.S. Challenges
In a February letter to Secretary of State John Kerry and Defense Secretary Ashton Carter, Representatives Dana Rohrabacher (R-Ca.), Chris Smith (R-N.J.), and Duncan Hunter (R-Ca.) raised alarms about China’s rising influence in Djibouti: “[We are] worried that our own strategic interests around the Horn of Africa, specifically our critical counter-terrorism operations, will be impacted by China’s growing strategic influence in the region.” Recognizing Beijing’s soft power gains, they castigated the Djibouti leadership for its “cozy relationship with China,” and dubbed the government of Ismail Omar Guelleh a “corrupt and repressive regime.” Guelleh is indeed a human rights violator, and the lawmakers’ criticism have been echoed repeatedly by the White House in recent months. Doing so has of course done little to improve Washington’s relationship with Guelleh: Judging from the angry reaction in Djiboutian state media, he reads the American denunciations as support for his political opponents. When Djibouti holds its presidential elections on April 8, the incumbent’s likely victory will bring the government another step closer to China—and a step away from the United States.
America’s shifting circumstances in Djibouti—and, by extension, the Horn of Africa and southern Arabia—are a symptom of its broader political and military withdrawal from conflicts in which longtime Asian and Arab allies have a stake. The situation also reflects the weakness of Washington’s commitment and capacity to wield soft power in politically contested foreign environments. It will ultimately be difficult for Washington to address the concerns about Djibouti raised by American lawmakers and Taiwanese analyst Lai Yueqian without restoring its support for longtime allies in the Middle and Far East, as well as deploying American soft power alongside military might. To be sure, the U.S. should welcome efforts by China to help protect civilians from the region’s tumult and secure the sea lanes for international trade. But it should also be prepared for a formidable new presence in the area capable of challenging American objectives politically and militarily.
Meanwhile, the growing presence of Saudi Arabia alongside China in the country promises to strengthen security ties between Riyadh and Beijing, potentially at Washington’s expense. It is but one example of the increasing interplay between China and the Arab world, for which it behooves Americans to prepare. A first step toward doing so is to address an American gap in studying the phenomenon. From government to think tanks and the academy, Arab affairs specialists have long been institutionally separated from their counterparts in Asian affairs. As the leaders, peoples, and armies of these diverse environments begin to intermingle, the Americans who study and engage them must do the same.
Joseph Braude and Tyler Jiang originally published this article as an E-Note at the Foreign Policy Research Institute.
[1] Ben Ho Wan Beng, “The Strategic Attractions of Djibouti,” The National Interest, March 18, 2016.
[2] Hong Lei, “Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Hong Lei’s Regular Press Conference on January 21, 2016,” January 21, 2016.
[3] Habib Toumi, “Saudi Arabia ‘to open military base in Djibouti’ Djibouti keen to expand ties and cooperation with Saudi Arabia,”Gulf News Saudi Arabia, March 8, 2016.
[4] Hasan al-Mustafa, “Al-Diblomasiya al-Sa’udiya Tub’id Iran ‘An al-Qarn al-Ifriqi” (Saudi Diplomacy Ejects Iran from the Horn of Africa). Al-Arabiya, October 21, 2015.
[5] Dana Sanchez, “China Financing Most of Djibouti’s $14.4 Billion In Planned Infrastructure Projects,” AFK Insider, June 11, 2010.
[6] Nick Turse, “The US military’s best-kept secret,” The Nation, November 17, 2015.
[7] BBC News, “Somalia: Western Hostages Freed in US Military Raid.” BBC News, January 25, 2012.
[8] Josh Wood, “Djibouti, a Safe Harbour in the Troubled Horn of Africa,” The National, June 2, 2015.
[9] Colin Hanna and J.D. Gordon, “Obama naval Doctrine: Anchors Away?” The Hill, March 3, 2014. http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/homeland-security/199570-obama-naval-doctrine-anchors-away
[10] United States Census Bureau, “Trade in Goods with Djibouti,” accessed 3/27/2016. USAID, “Food Assistance Fact Sheet – Djibouti,” accessed 3/27/2016.
[12] Ankit Panda, “Confirmed: Construction Begins on China’s First Overseas Military Base in Djibouti,” The Diplomat, February 29, 2016.
[13] CCTV, “35,860 Chinese nationals in Libya evacuated:FM,” CCTV.com, 3/3/2011.
[14] Entering Taiwan – Taiwan Today, “China to Build Military Base in Djibouti,” Filmed [December 2015], YouTube video, Posted [December 2015]. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZVfEGj0Gh4.
[15] Geoffrey Aronson, “China to open its first naval base in Africa,” Aljazeera, December 22, 2015.
[16] The State Council Information Office of the People’s Republic of China, “China’s Military Strategy,” en.people.cn, May 26, 2015. http://en.people.cn/n/2015/0526/c90785-8897779.html
[17] European Commission, “Countries and regions: China,” accessed 3/27/2016.
[18] Interview with Toshi Yoshihara, March 9th, 2016.
[19] Ross Rustici and Christopher D. Yung, with Scott Devary and Jenny Lin, “‘Not an Idea We Have to Shun: Chinese Overseas Basing Requirements in the 21st Century,” (National Defense University, October 2014,) 29.
[20] Ray Sanchez and Barbara Starr, “U.S. Says China deploys fighter jets to disputed South China Sea Island,” CNN, February 23, 2016.
[21] Shang Wenbin, Liang Jingfeng, and Li Youtao, “Chinese Marines, Special Forces Training in Gobi Desert,” Military Training International, January 19, 2016.
[22] Daily Pioneer, “China’s military might, now for Africa to see,” Daily Pioneer, February 11, 2016.
[23] Joseph Braude, “Radio Beijing in the Middle East,” The American Interest, January 20, 2014.
[24] World Bank, “World Integrated Trade Solution,” accessed 3/27/2016.
[25] Abd al-Rahman ‘Atiya, “I’tiradh Safina Iraniya min Miyah al-Yemen” (Interception of an Iranian Ship from the Waters of Yemen). Al-Hayat, February 14, 2016.
[26] Beng, “The Strategic Attractions of Djibouti.”
[27] “Al-Sa’udiya Tu’lin Ta’sis Tahaluf Yadhum 34 Dawla li-‘Muharabat al-Irhab’” (Saudi Arabia Announces Establishment of a Coalition of 34 States to ‘Fight Terrorism’). BBC Arabic, December 15, 2015.
[28] Interview with Rafha camp administrative officials, Rafha, Saudi Arabia, January 2003.
[29] Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China, “Wang Yi: China and Arab Countries Should Carry Out Counter-Terrorism Cooperation,” Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China, June 4, 2014.
[30] Ben Blanchard, Edited Simon Cameron-Moore and Paul Tait, “China offers support for Yemen government as Xi visits Saudi Arabia,” Reuters, January 20, 2016.
China and Saudi Arabia are building military bases next door to US AFRICOM in Djibouti—and bringing the consequences of American withdrawal from the region into stark relief.
Djibouti, a resource-poor nation of 14,300 square miles and 875,000 people in the Horn of Africa, rarely makes international headlines. But between its relative stability and strategic location—20 miles across from war-consumed Yemen and in destroyer range of the pirate-infested western edge of the Indian Ocean—it is now one of the more important security beachheads in the develohttp://www.amazon.com/Joseph-Braude/e/B001KDV64Kping world. Its location also matters greatly to global commerce and energy, due to its vicinity to the Mandeb Strait and the Suez-Aden canal, which sees ten percent of the world’s oil exports and 20 percent of its commercial exports annually.[1] Since November 2002, the country has been home to Camp Lemonnier, a U.S. Expeditionary base—the only American base on the African continent—along with other bases belonging to its French, Italian, Spanish, and Japanese allies. (The United States maintains numerous small outposts and airfields in Africa, but officially regards Lemonnier as its only full-scale military base on the continent.)
But now there are two new kids on the block: On January 21st, the Chinese Foreign Affairs Ministry announced an agreement with Djibouti to host its first-ever base beyond the South China Sea, and construction commenced days later.[2] Though Beijing called the installation a “logistics and fast evacuation base,” the Asian power’s “near-abroad” rivals, such as Taiwan, opined that it is more likely the beginning of a new, aggressive military buildup to rival the United States. Six weeks later, Saudi Arabia declared that it too would construct a base in Djibouti,[3]apparently as part of its newly assertive policy of countering Iranian proxies politically and militarily throughout the region.[4]
Both new players have made substantial economic and soft power investments in the country to boot. Since 2015, Beijing has poured over $14 billion into infrastructure development.[5] Saudi Arabia, itself a prominent donor to Djibouti’s public works, has spent generously on social welfare projects for the country’s poor; built housing, schools and mosques for its swelling Yemeni refugee population; and dispatched teachers and preachers from the World Assembly of Muslim Youth, long a pillar for the promulgation of Saudi-backed interpretations of Islam. Augmenting Saudi aid, moreover, has been further spending by some of its Arab military allies. The United Arab Emirates and Bahrain have poured millions into charitable work over the past few months—and the UAE in particular is working to spur economic development along the lines of the “Dubai model.” Even cash-poor North Sudan, newly returned to the Saudi orbit after a years-long alliance with Iran, began construction of a hospital in Djibouti in early February.
Neither the timing nor the confluence of these projects is mere coincidence. America’s diminishing global military footprint has begun to affect the calculation of allies and rivals alike, and the outsized role Djibouti is poised to play in its neighborhood presents a case in point of the consequences. An examination of the changing role the country plays in American, Chinese, and Arab security policy offers a glimpse into potential conflicts as well as opportunities arising from the shift—and some steps Americans can take to prepare for both.
The American Posture
As the only American base in Africa, Camp Lemonnier serves a vital function for US AFRICOM. Housing 4,000 military and civilian personnel, it is the nerve center of six drone launching stations across the continent, which have attacked targets as far-flung as Al-Shabab in Somalia, Boko Haram in Nigeria, and Yemeni-based Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. U.S. Special Forces, the CIA, and Air Force surveillance craft converge to process and pool intelligence at the camp. It also serves as headquarters to Task Force 48-4, a counterterrorism unit that targets militants in East Africa and Yemen.[6] Special Forces rely on it too: In 2012, when Navy SEALs rescued American and Danish hostages from Somalia, they brought them to safety in Camp Lemonnier.[7] And as a springboard for American-led anti-piracy operations, Camp Lemonnier helps the U.S. maintain its role as the primary guarantor of mercantile security in the Gulf of Aden, the Horn of Africa, and the Indian Ocean. The significance of the base grows only greater amid regional conflagration: The U.S. has been using it to meet its pledge of technical and intelligence assistance to Saudi Arabia in its war against the Iranian-backed Houthi militia in Yemen.
In 2014, the U.S. signed a new 20-year lease on the base with the Djiboutian government, and committed over $1.4 billion to modernize it in the years to come.[8] This significant expenditure bucks the overall trend of diminishing American military commitments overseas. For example, President Obama has announced plans to reduce the number of active naval vessels to 1917 numbers, possibly including aircraft carriers.[9]
As the segments below will show, America’s status in the country stands to be affected by the activities of the Chinese and Saudi bases. It may also be affected by the two countries’ soft power deployments, each aiming to influence the cultural and political fiber of the country and, by extension, the policies of its government. America’s own soft power commitments have been minimal: the U.S. supplies $3 million worth of food aid annually through USAID as part of the U.N. World Food Program, runs modest health and education projects, and netted only $152 million in trade in 2015.[10] Nor is there any concerted effort to enter the public discussion in Djibouti in the service of American goals or values.
The Chinese Posture
By contrast to the U.S., China has never previously established a base beyond its “near abroad.” Thus the Djibouti project, however modest, fuels the perception that China’s military footprint is growing. Sending such a message may itself be among Beijing’s goals. David Shedd, former Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, told us that “[The Chinese] want to signal to the world that they have a worldwide presence. Part of the mission is simply defined as being seen. That in and of itself is defined as an interest.”[11]
With respect to its potential operational significance, the Chinese Foreign Ministry says, “Facilities will mainly be used for logistical support and personnel recuperation of the Chinese armed forces conducting such missions as maritime escort in the Gulf of Aden and waters off the Somali coast, peacekeeping, and humanitarian assistance.” It would also enable fast evacuation for any of the million Chinese citizens now living in the Middle East and Africa should they require it.[12]The need to prepare for such eventualities became clear to China in the bloody aftermath of the Arab Spring: It evacuated 35,680 nationals employed mainly in Libya’s oil industry, and 629 more from Yemen soon thereafter.[13] During the Libya evacuation, China had only one frigate available in the vicinity, so most of the evacuees had to be flown out of the country on chartered commercial planes.
But from Washington to Taipei, observers suspect that the project is more ambitious than the Chinese let on. In an interview on the national news network Taiwan Today, political analyst Lai Yueqian said, “[The base] can be used to pin down the United States and any U.S.-led organizations, and if [the U.S.] wants to intervene against China’s interests, they will have to think carefully, because China will use their military to protect their citizens and their property.”[14] In the following clip, Yueqian elaborates on this analysis, bespeaking Taiwanese concerns about the base:
Yueqian’s assessment, shared by most Chinese “near-abroad” allies of the United States, is also the view of prominent members of the political class in Washington. At a December hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on African Affairs in which rumors about the base were discussed, Senator Chris Coons (R-De.) stated in relation to the Djibouti base, “[The US has to be] vigilant in the face of China’s growing ambitions.”[15]
Beijing’s outlook toward nearby North Africa and the Middle East differs with American policies. As Taiwan’s Lai Yueqian described in the video above, the U.S.- and NATO-led military intervention in Libya angered China. At the U.N. Security Council, Beijing subsequently blocked attempts to engineer a Western military intervention in Syria. With respect to the region-wide conflict between Saudi Arabia and Iran, America’s tradition of siding with Saudi Arabia — or, for that matter, its more recent tendency to tilt toward Iran — may conflict with Chinese policies: Guided by the need to quench its substantial thirst for oil, Beijing mostly seeks to avoid irking either oil-rich nation. A new military base in boating range of North Africa as well as the Arabian peninsula promises to bolster any Chinese political stance—however modestly—with a measure of force. The base, to be located near the small port city of Obock on the northern coast of Djibouti, lies 20 miles closer than Lemonnier to the conflict in Yemen, to which Washington has committed resources in support of Saudi Arabia’s war with the Houthis.
But China’s strategic goals cannot be explained solely in terms of a perceived reaction to Western policies. According to Beijing’s most recent defense policy paper, released in May 2015, “China’s armed forces will work harder to create a favorable strategic posture with more emphasis on the employment of military forces and means.”[16] This formulation is widely believed to allude to China’s “String of Pearls” and “One Belt, One Road” initiatives. “String of Pearls” is a metaphor for an envisioned network of naval ports of call, predominantly along the Indian Ocean, to secure sea lanes of transit, commerce, and communication from mainland China to Sudan. The “One Belt, One Road” initiative seeks to strengthen Chinese exports through commercial land and sea roads, largely along the historic “silk road,” straddling Europe and the Middle East. The Djibouti base would be vital in ensuring the success of the latter goal, since most of China’s $1 billion in daily exports to Europe traverse the Gulf of Aden and the Suez Canal.[17] With respect to the former plan, Toshi Yoshihara, Chair of Asia-Pacific Studies at the U.S. Naval War College, has been mapping the intersection of Chinese naval and commercial ventures across the Pacific region. Arrayed together, he told us, they “certainly do look like a string of pearls.”[18] Djibouti, home to both the nascent base and extensive Chinese economic investment, would clearly amount to a new pearl on the string (see Figure 1).[19]
Are Chinese and American pursuits in the vicinity of Djibouti necessarily a zero-sum game? Some of China’s stated goals do not conflict with American aspirations, and to the contrary, may benefit both superpowers as well as their allies: Both the growing Chinese capacity to evacuate citizens from war-torn areas and its further enhancement of anti-piracy operations are each a “public good.” On the other hand, a different term in Beijing’s political vocabulary raises more disturbing possibilities. In our conversation with FPRI Senior Fellow June Teufel Dreyer, she stressed the principle of “All Under Heaven”—rooted in Chinese imperial history—which places Chinese central authority at the epicenter of a tributary system of dominance over lesser powers. Some analysts of China see the country’s recent installation of surface-to-air missiles and fighter jets on Woody Island in the South China Sea as a manifestation of this supremacist tendency.[20] One might ask whether the construction of a Djibouti base reflects the extension of “All Under Heaven” beyond China’s traditional orbit.
At a time of rapid Chinese construction of aircraft and aircraft carriers and more serious competition with American military industries, the base in Djibouti could indeed reflect a Chinese aspiration to eventually meet and surpass the United States as a military and economic power in the area. In January 2016, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) conducted a 72-hour exercise involving thousands of marines and the navy special operations regiment in the Gobi Desert in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. The area’s topography and climate resemble much of North Africa and the Sahel.[21] Between “All Under Heaven” and China’s stated goal of housing up to 10,000 Chinese servicemen in Djibouti, such exercises offer ample basis for concern.[22]
Beijing’s hard power initiative in Djibouti is meanwhile accompanied by its soft power initiatives to build ties with state and society alike. The $14 billion in Chinese support for infrastructure development, widely publicized in Djibouti, has generated enormous goodwill with the population. Far exceeding U.S. spending, the injection is also an investment in the government of President Isma’il Omar Guelleh. There are also cultural ventures, such as the new Confucius Institute in Djibouti City, which Beijing typically uses to cultivate personal ties and “assets” within the society.[23] Add to all this China’s $1.1 billion in trade in 2014—roughly ten times that of the United States.[24] As Chinese influence grows in Djibouti, its ability to influence the government’s foreign policy and security strategies promises to grow along with it.
The Saudi Posture
From a Saudi perspective, stationing troops in Djibouti is both a defensive and a potential offensive measure in its pan-regional conflict with Iran, with particular bearing on the nearby war in Yemen. The defensive aspect was on display in mid-February, when Saudi intelligence officials, tracking the flow of munitions from Iran to its Houthi proxy militia in Yemen, discovered that the Islamic Republic was using Djibouti as a waystation. A ship en route to Yemen carrying encrypted military communication equipment and other hardware had originated in the southern Iranian port of Bandar Abbas. The Kingdom intercepted it en route, and recognized the importance of strengthening its capacity to act in and around Djibouti.[25] In terms of “offense,” Ben Ho Wan Beng, a military analyst in Singapore, speculates that given the Houthi presence in western Yemen, Riyadh could use the base to “open up a new front against the Houthis, who [would] then face the prospect of being attacked from another axis.”[26]
By contrast to the U.S. and its Japanese and Western allies, for which the establishment of a base in Djibouti is a matter of paying rent on a discrete strip of land, Saudis view their own barrack walls as permeable. Djibouti is an Arab League member state, bound to its brethren by ties of blood, culture, and faith. It has also joined the 34-member, Saudi-led “Islamic coalition” against Iran-sponsored terror announced by Deputy Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman in December.[27]Thus from Riyadh’s perspective, all of Djibouti is a kind of “base”—and the Kingdom feels it has a right to weigh in on any of the country’s non-Arab military installations. It was hardly a coincidence when the Djiboutian government recently rejected a Russian proposal to establish its own base in the country: Moscow, a staunch ally to the Iran-backed Assad regime in Damascus, would have been at best unhelpful to Saudi Arabia in the Yemen war.
Saudi soft power activity in the country serves to intensify this bond. One of the state-backed organizations spearheading it is the Riyadh-based World Assembly of Muslim Youth (WAMY). The group historically served as a primary exporter of Islamist preaching across the globe—a mission that enabled both Salafi jihadists and the Muslim Brotherhood to politicize and radicalize Muslim communities. But the Kingdom more recently purged the organization of jihadist preachers, and streamlined WAMY’s religious line to follow “Salafi traditionalism,” which holds that only the head of state has the right to declare “jihad.” Moreover, clerical elites who traditionally controlled the group now share authority with stalwarts of the government—call them “lay leaders”—who have their own direct line to the royal family. In Djibouti, WAMY funds and staffs health and human services for the indigenous population, and tends to the needs of Yemeni refugees. Other goals determined by the state appear to take precedence over preaching: provide disaster and poverty relief; back the government of President Isma’il Omar Guelleh; instill an ethos of Djiboutian nationalism that insulates the population from trans-state ideologies; build person-to-person relationships between Saudis and Djiboutians; engineer support for the Kingdom’s specific regional objectives. Some of these goals are subtly on display in the following excerpt from a March 21, 2016 report by WAMY on its Djibouti bureau:
To be sure, the positive aspects of WAMY’s programs should not diminish the concern that Salafi missionary activity may still promote a profoundly sectarian worldview in Djibouti, casting the Sunni-Shi’ite conflict in existential, rather than political, terms.
As to the presence of 30,000-and-counting Yemeni refugees in Djibouti, Saudis view it as both a humanitarian concern and a strategic opportunity. Twenty-five years ago, in the aftermath of the “Gulf War” to repel Saddam Hussein’s invasion and occupation of Kuwait, Saudi Arabia established a refugee camp in the northern town of Rafha to host 33,000 Iraqis fleeing persecution by Saddam. The installation served Riyadh and some of its international allies as an intelligence listening post—hundreds of Iraqis were debriefed about the situation inside the country—and as a platform for cultivating Iraqi assets.[28] Though the Yemeni and gulf wars are far from analogous, the presence of a substantial number of newly departed Yemeni civilians in a safe environment far from the battlefield presents the opportunity to tap a similar wealth of information and human networks.
In deepening their security and intelligence presence in Djibouti at a time of unease between Riyadh and Washington, they will be keen to explore potential security partnerships with China. As recently as 2014, Beijing sought to forge joint counterterrorism training programs with the Yemeni government that Saudi Arabia is now fighting to reinstall.[29] More recently, Beijing made a rare break with its policy of neutrality between Iran and Saudi Arabia to express support for the Saudi position in Yemen. In January 2016, King Salman hosted a landmark visit to Riyadh by Chinese President Xi Jinping, together with high-level meetings between senior security and intelligence officials of both countries. The strengthening of these ties may serve to lessen Saudi reliance on American support.[30]
The importance of Djibouti has become a popular topic of discussion throughout the Saudi-allied Arab world. Prominent voices in Egypt, for example, are talking about building a base there too, while other Gulf allies are ramping up their own soft power projects in the country. The following video montage begins with a clip from Tawfiq Okasha—an eccentric, ultranationalist Egyptian pundit known for his fondness of Israel—in which he makes the case for a Djibouti base. In perhaps a sign of the times, he bolsters his argument by saying that Djiboutians are one of the lost tribes of Israel, and therefore “good people.”
Grappling with New U.S. Challenges
In a February letter to Secretary of State John Kerry and Defense Secretary Ashton Carter, Representatives Dana Rohrabacher (R-Ca.), Chris Smith (R-N.J.), and Duncan Hunter (R-Ca.) raised alarms about China’s rising influence in Djibouti: “[We are] worried that our own strategic interests around the Horn of Africa, specifically our critical counter-terrorism operations, will be impacted by China’s growing strategic influence in the region.” Recognizing Beijing’s soft power gains, they castigated the Djibouti leadership for its “cozy relationship with China,” and dubbed the government of Ismail Omar Guelleh a “corrupt and repressive regime.” Guelleh is indeed a human rights violator, and the lawmakers’ criticism have been echoed repeatedly by the White House in recent months. Doing so has of course done little to improve Washington’s relationship with Guelleh: Judging from the angry reaction in Djiboutian state media, he reads the American denunciations as support for his political opponents. When Djibouti holds its presidential elections on April 8, the incumbent’s likely victory will bring the government another step closer to China—and a step away from the United States.
America’s shifting circumstances in Djibouti—and, by extension, the Horn of Africa and southern Arabia—are a symptom of its broader political and military withdrawal from conflicts in which longtime Asian and Arab allies have a stake. The situation also reflects the weakness of Washington’s commitment and capacity to wield soft power in politically contested foreign environments. It will ultimately be difficult for Washington to address the concerns about Djibouti raised by American lawmakers and Taiwanese analyst Lai Yueqian without restoring its support for longtime allies in the Middle and Far East, as well as deploying American soft power alongside military might. To be sure, the U.S. should welcome efforts by China to help protect civilians from the region’s tumult and secure the sea lanes for international trade. But it should also be prepared for a formidable new presence in the area capable of challenging American objectives politically and militarily.
Meanwhile, the growing presence of Saudi Arabia alongside China in the country promises to strengthen security ties between Riyadh and Beijing, potentially at Washington’s expense. It is but one example of the increasing interplay between China and the Arab world, for which it behooves Americans to prepare. A first step toward doing so is to address an American gap in studying the phenomenon. From government to think tanks and the academy, Arab affairs specialists have long been institutionally separated from their counterparts in Asian affairs. As the leaders, peoples, and armies of these diverse environments begin to intermingle, the Americans who study and engage them must do the same.
Joseph Braude and Tyler Jiang originally published this article as an E-Note at the Foreign Policy Research Institute.
[1] Ben Ho Wan Beng, “The Strategic Attractions of Djibouti,” The National Interest, March 18, 2016.
[2] Hong Lei, “Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Hong Lei’s Regular Press Conference on January 21, 2016,” January 21, 2016.
[3] Habib Toumi, “Saudi Arabia ‘to open military base in Djibouti’ Djibouti keen to expand ties and cooperation with Saudi Arabia,”Gulf News Saudi Arabia, March 8, 2016.
[4] Hasan al-Mustafa, “Al-Diblomasiya al-Sa’udiya Tub’id Iran ‘An al-Qarn al-Ifriqi” (Saudi Diplomacy Ejects Iran from the Horn of Africa). Al-Arabiya, October 21, 2015.
[5] Dana Sanchez, “China Financing Most of Djibouti’s $14.4 Billion In Planned Infrastructure Projects,” AFK Insider, June 11, 2010.
[6] Nick Turse, “The US military’s best-kept secret,” The Nation, November 17, 2015.
[7] BBC News, “Somalia: Western Hostages Freed in US Military Raid.” BBC News, January 25, 2012.
[8] Josh Wood, “Djibouti, a Safe Harbour in the Troubled Horn of Africa,” The National, June 2, 2015.
[9] Colin Hanna and J.D. Gordon, “Obama naval Doctrine: Anchors Away?” The Hill, March 3, 2014. http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/homeland-security/199570-obama-naval-doctrine-anchors-away
[10] United States Census Bureau, “Trade in Goods with Djibouti,” accessed 3/27/2016. USAID, “Food Assistance Fact Sheet – Djibouti,” accessed 3/27/2016.
[12] Ankit Panda, “Confirmed: Construction Begins on China’s First Overseas Military Base in Djibouti,” The Diplomat, February 29, 2016.
[13] CCTV, “35,860 Chinese nationals in Libya evacuated:FM,” CCTV.com, 3/3/2011.
[14] Entering Taiwan – Taiwan Today, “China to Build Military Base in Djibouti,” Filmed [December 2015], YouTube video, Posted [December 2015]. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZVfEGj0Gh4.
[15] Geoffrey Aronson, “China to open its first naval base in Africa,” Aljazeera, December 22, 2015.
[16] The State Council Information Office of the People’s Republic of China, “China’s Military Strategy,” en.people.cn, May 26, 2015. http://en.people.cn/n/2015/0526/c90785-8897779.html
[17] European Commission, “Countries and regions: China,” accessed 3/27/2016.
[18] Interview with Toshi Yoshihara, March 9th, 2016.
[19] Ross Rustici and Christopher D. Yung, with Scott Devary and Jenny Lin, “‘Not an Idea We Have to Shun: Chinese Overseas Basing Requirements in the 21st Century,” (National Defense University, October 2014,) 29.
[20] Ray Sanchez and Barbara Starr, “U.S. Says China deploys fighter jets to disputed South China Sea Island,” CNN, February 23, 2016.
[21] Shang Wenbin, Liang Jingfeng, and Li Youtao, “Chinese Marines, Special Forces Training in Gobi Desert,” Military Training International, January 19, 2016.
[22] Daily Pioneer, “China’s military might, now for Africa to see,” Daily Pioneer, February 11, 2016.
[23] Joseph Braude, “Radio Beijing in the Middle East,” The American Interest, January 20, 2014.
[24] World Bank, “World Integrated Trade Solution,” accessed 3/27/2016.
[25] Abd al-Rahman ‘Atiya, “I’tiradh Safina Iraniya min Miyah al-Yemen” (Interception of an Iranian Ship from the Waters of Yemen). Al-Hayat, February 14, 2016.
[26] Beng, “The Strategic Attractions of Djibouti.”
[27] “Al-Sa’udiya Tu’lin Ta’sis Tahaluf Yadhum 34 Dawla li-‘Muharabat al-Irhab’” (Saudi Arabia Announces Establishment of a Coalition of 34 States to ‘Fight Terrorism’). BBC Arabic, December 15, 2015.
[28] Interview with Rafha camp administrative officials, Rafha, Saudi Arabia, January 2003.
[29] Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China, “Wang Yi: China and Arab Countries Should Carry Out Counter-Terrorism Cooperation,” Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China, June 4, 2014.
[30] Ben Blanchard, Edited Simon Cameron-Moore and Paul Tait, “China offers support for Yemen government as Xi visits Saudi Arabia,” Reuters, January 20, 2016.
A top South Sudanese opposition leader called Saturday for armed resistance to the government in Juba – a stance that suggests the troubled Central African nation could face a renewed civil war in the near future.
Leader Riek Machar and top officials of the opposition SPLM-IO party issued a statement saying their forces would reorganize to “wage a popular armed resistance against the authoritarian and racist regime of President Salva Kiir.” It’s the first political statement by Machar since he fled South Sudan in August.
The statement, obtained by The Associated Press, came after a meeting Saturday of Machar and his supporters in Khartoum, Sudan.
His call for armed resistance adds to South Sudan’s spiraling problems. South Sudan gained independence in 2011 but fell into a civil war in 2013 in which at least 50,000 civilians died and more than 2 million were displaced. A peace deal was forced on both Kiir and Machar last August, but fighting in the capital, Juba, in July put that deal in doubt.
“We have been driven back to the bush,” James Gadet, a spokesman for Machar, told the AP on Saturday in a call from Nairobi, Kenya.
Gadet called for the removal of Taban Deng Gai, who was controversially named to replace Machar as the country’s First Vice President. He says the South Sudan government must stop attacking civilians and a regional protection force must be deployed in the country or there will be “an escalation of the civil war,” which he says began again on July 8.
“(We) call on the international community to declare the regime in Juba a rogue government,” the document says, adding that international agencies monitoring the peace deal should “suspend their activities” until the agreement is “resuscitated.”
Some critics blame American foreign policy in South Sudan, saying the U.S. has given Kiir a “blank check” to pursue a militant policy.
“It’s not at all surprising to see Machar call for continued armed struggle, in light of the U.S. policy to back Taban Deng as First Vice President and the clear absence of a viable political process,” Kate Almquist Knopf, director of the Africa Center for Strategic Studies, told the AP.
Machar has demanded that the government accept the U.N. Security Council’s decision to send an additional 4,000 peacekeepers to increase the size of the existing U.N. force of 12,000 in South Sudan. The Kiir government has resisted the U.N. decision, saying it violates South Sudan’s sovereignty. State Department officials say if South Sudan doesn’t accept the additional peacekeepers, the U.S. would support an arms embargo on the country.
A top South Sudanese opposition leader called Saturday for armed resistance to the government in Juba – a stance that suggests the troubled Central African nation could face a renewed civil war in the near future.
Leader Riek Machar and top officials of the opposition SPLM-IO party issued a statement saying their forces would reorganize to “wage a popular armed resistance against the authoritarian and racist regime of President Salva Kiir.” It’s the first political statement by Machar since he fled South Sudan in August.
The statement, obtained by The Associated Press, came after a meeting Saturday of Machar and his supporters in Khartoum, Sudan.
His call for armed resistance adds to South Sudan’s spiraling problems. South Sudan gained independence in 2011 but fell into a civil war in 2013 in which at least 50,000 civilians died and more than 2 million were displaced. A peace deal was forced on both Kiir and Machar last August, but fighting in the capital, Juba, in July put that deal in doubt.
“We have been driven back to the bush,” James Gadet, a spokesman for Machar, told the AP on Saturday in a call from Nairobi, Kenya.
Gadet called for the removal of Taban Deng Gai, who was controversially named to replace Machar as the country’s First Vice President. He says the South Sudan government must stop attacking civilians and a regional protection force must be deployed in the country or there will be “an escalation of the civil war,” which he says began again on July 8.
“(We) call on the international community to declare the regime in Juba a rogue government,” the document says, adding that international agencies monitoring the peace deal should “suspend their activities” until the agreement is “resuscitated.”
Some critics blame American foreign policy in South Sudan, saying the U.S. has given Kiir a “blank check” to pursue a militant policy.
“It’s not at all surprising to see Machar call for continued armed struggle, in light of the U.S. policy to back Taban Deng as First Vice President and the clear absence of a viable political process,” Kate Almquist Knopf, director of the Africa Center for Strategic Studies, told the AP.
Machar has demanded that the government accept the U.N. Security Council’s decision to send an additional 4,000 peacekeepers to increase the size of the existing U.N. force of 12,000 in South Sudan. The Kiir government has resisted the U.N. decision, saying it violates South Sudan’s sovereignty. State Department officials say if South Sudan doesn’t accept the additional peacekeepers, the U.S. would support an arms embargo on the country.
Zimbawe’s president, Robert Mugabe, gestures as he addresses supporters of his ruling ZANU-PF party at Harare International Airport, Zimbabwe, Sept. 24, 2016.
HARARE, ZIMBABWE — Zimbabwe’s president said Saturday that the African Union was planning to form a splinter group with countries such as Russia, China and India if the U.N. Security Council did not include members of his continent next year.President Robert Mugabe said the African Union was still concerned that it had no permanent seats on the Security Council.
Upon arrival in Harare from New York and this year’s U.N. General Assembly late Saturday, the 92-year-old Zimbabwean leader told ZANU-PF supporters that the African Union wanted to be on the Security Council if veto powers of the five permanent members — China, France, the United Kingdom, the U.S., and Russia — were not removed.
“It is not all permanent members being tough. It is Britain, France and [the United States of] America,” he said. “If they remain adamant, they must not cry foul when we agree to form our own organization with countries like China, India and other Asian countries. This is what we want to do next year in September, when we have made a commitment.”
During his 30-minute speech, Mugabe did not refer to calls made Thursday by his Botswana counterpart, Ian Khama, to step down and allow fresh blood to improve Zimbabwe’s economy.
Just months after the 21 September 2014 coup, Houthi militias stormed the Central Bank of Yemen along with other government institutions and Yemen’s largest national newspaper, Al Thawra, in order to establish as much institutional control of Yemen as possible. President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi was later placed under house arrest on 22 January 2015, only to escape to Aden a month later before relocating to Saudi Arabia after the airstrikes began.
The current Yemeni government under Hadi has been very disconnected from the capital city Sana’a since the start of the coup. It is often forgotten that at the beginning of August last year, the then-governor of Aden, Nayef Al Bakri, announced that Aden was to become the capital city of Yemen for the next five years. This decision was welcomed for many reasons that range from the political to the economic, but it also signalled that the Yemeni government was losing hope of regaining Sana’a in the near future. Such sentiments can only be seen as being amplified following the government’s latest move of transferring the country’s central bank to Aden.
Militarily speaking, the Houthis and former Yemeni dictator Ali Abdullah Saleh have the upper hand in Sana’a. They have complete control of governmental institutions and local resistance forces have not been making advances against the Houthi and Saleh militias. It is also clear that the Saudi-led coalition airstrikes are not helping to clear Sana’a of militia forces. Currently, whatever is in Sana’a is subject to being coerced, threatened or swayed by the Houthis and Saleh, including the Central Bank.
The bank is seen as the last hope for some form of stability in Yemen with the political and security situation spiralling out of control. Exports have decreased dramatically and the government is finding it increasingly difficult to pay for imports. The fact that there is $5 billion missing from the bank means that the country’s economic security is at high risk.
In Sana’a, the Houthis and Saleh have been using the Central Bank to fund their war expenses. In August, the president of the Houthi revolutionary committee announced a pledge of 1 billion Yemeni riyals (just under $4 million) to restore Saleh’s Republican Guard. The Houthis have also recently stolen $1.2 million of public funds to start a radio station after they broke into the Central Bank’s headquarters. This is despite the fact that, in May, the Central Bank stated that it will allow for $100 million a month to finance the Houthi-Saleh side to the war.
Politically speaking, Mohamed bin Hammam, the former governor of the Central Bank was seen as an ally to the Houthis. In August, the Hadi government openly announced its mistrust toward the former governor, accusing him of turning a blind eye to the Houthi and Saleh induced corruption in the bank. Houthi spokesman Mohamed Abdel Salam slammed the government’s decision to dismiss Hammam, along with the decision to relocate the bank earlier this week, perpetuating sentiments of the bank being subjected to Houthi and Saleh corruption if it remained in Sana’a. This is making it harder for aid to get to the Yemeni people and even making creditors and donors reluctant to pay sums of money into the bank.
Having the Central Bank situated in the temporary capital means there will be a significant amount of autonomy for Aden. The Adeni authorities will most likely receive a priority for financing and pay, including civil servants many of whom have not yet received their salaries.
It will also affect the separatism debate. On the one hand, taking the Central Bank out of Sana’a could calm separatist views, as one of the main grievances for southerners was that the Yemeni government was centralised in Sana’a under Saleh who purposely marginalised southerners. On the other hand, the bank’s move could also mean separatist perceptions could be heightened as it poses an opportunity for southern Yemen to institutionally prepare itself for autonomy. This is something only southern Yemenis can decide for themselves at some time in the future.
The Central Bank is the last lifeline for Yemen. With war and famine widespread across the country, the faltering of economic security could be catastrophic. Though the move of relocating the Central Bank is overdue and ideally should have been done in September 2014 after the Houthi coup, it is one of the only ways to ensure money does not continue to pour itself into the militia forces. Now, the country faces the challenging process of relocating the bank and preventing any further corruption and damage from occurring to the economy.
© AFP file picture | Rebel chief Riek Machar on Saturday issued a statement urging armed resistance against the government in Juba
