1. The role of US military bases in aggression and intervention in Africa and the Middles East and the people’s response
Wim De Ceukelaire

2. US bases in ME and Africa
Middle East: Bases as the continuation of war
Africa: New ambitions

4. Objectives
Military
But also
Economic
Political

5. After the war...
Zoltan Grossman: “Wars are being waged in order to station bases. Pentagon documents consider what is left behind after the war as more important than he war itself.”

6. After World War II

7. New bases since 1990 1. Gulf War 2. Somalia/Yemen conflicts
3. Ex-Yugoslav wars
4. Afghan War
5. Iraq War

8. Gulf War I bases cluster

9. Somalia War,

10. Yugoslav Wars bases cluster

11. Afghan War bases cluster

12. Caspian Basin oil and gas pipelines
1996 Unocal
(Karzai, Khalilzad)
plans for route
across Afghanistan

13. New U.S. military base clusters
Gulf War, 1991
Yugoslav Wars,
Afghan War, 2001
4. Iraq War, 2003
“Their function may be more
political than military. They
send a message to everyone.”
--Deputy Defense Secretary
Paul Wolfowitz, NYT 2002

15. Camp Anaconda 30,000 troops 10,000 contractors
16 square miles + 12 square mile security perimeter
Streets, power supply,...

16. Bahrain Naval Support Activity Bahrain US Naval Forces CenCom
US fifth fleet

17. Syria and Iran...

18. Africa

20. Stiff competition

23. Competition
During a conference on 'The Evolution of African Militaries,' in February 2009, co-hosted by US Africa Command and the US Department of State, Professor David H. Shinn, adjunct professor for George Washington University, observed: “China is projected to pass the United States by 2010 as Africa's largest trading partner. It has diplomatic relations with forty- nine of Africa's fifty-three countries (four countries still recognize Taiwan) and has an embassy in all forty-nine countries except Somalia. (...) The playing field is much more crowded than it was just ten years ago. This gives the Africans more options, but it also complicates the nature of Africa's interaction with outside interests.”

24. Anticipate protest
AFRICOM commander General Carter F. Ham told the US Senate Armed Services Committee last April 7: “An Africa that can generate and sustain broad based economic development will contribute to global growth, which is a long-standing American interest. However, poverty in many parts of Africa contributes to an insidious cycle of instability, conflict, environmental degradation, and disease that erodes confidence in national institutions and governing capacity. This in turn often creates the conditions for the emergence of a wide range of transnational security threats that can threaten the American homeland and our regional interests.”

25. 2008: Africom

26. Libya