US loses ground to Russia in geopolitical battle over Africa

The expected withdrawal of US forces from Niger will endanger US counter-terrorism operations and give Russia more influence in Africa as American and Western ties on the continent fracture.

About 1,000 troops in Niger are expected to eventually withdraw from the country following the conclusion of ongoing high-level talks between Niamey and Washington following a military coup in the African country last year, the Pentagon said.

A forced withdrawal from Niger is a major setback for the U.S. military, which is fighting Islamic extremist groups across the Sahel, a volatile region that stretches from Senegal in West Africa to the Red Sea.

The risk for the US is not only keeping ISIS, Boko Haram and other insurgent groups under control, but also the growing influence of Russia, Iran and China, which are competing for power in Africa alongside the West.

But Western powers like the US and the European Union appear to be losing the battle in the Sahel.

“There has been a hollowing out of all international security cooperation,” said Joseph Siegle, director of research at the Pentagon-funded National Defense University’s African Center for Strategic Studies. “They were all part of a broader regional effort to try to support these countries.”

Siegle attributes the change to a series of governments overthrown by military junta and an anti-Western disinformation campaign supported by malicious actors in Russia or other hostile nations. But he said closer ties with Russia will harm those countries in the future because Moscow is not investing economically in those nations.

“These countries will feel enormous tensions and will continue to try to put on a good face [show] this is working, but it is not something they will be able to sustain,” he added. “Something’s going to have to give here.”

The immediate risk of a withdrawal from Niger is that the Sahel could erupt into more violence as the US and France, along with other Western powers, face an erosion of influence with military junta that have close ties to Russia and other rival powers.

Threats from insurgent groups linked to al-Qaeda and ISIS have already increased in other countries governed by military governments, including Mali, which expelled French forces in 2022 but has since seen terrorist groups double their territorial control.

Jacques Du Preez, an analyst at South African research and intelligence firm In on Africa, warned that a hollower US presence in the Sahel could create conditions for an Islamic extremist resurgence like the rise of ISIS in 2014.

“It is the most active border in the global conflict against terrorism outside the Middle East,” he said of the Sahel. “The place where al-Qaeda and ISIS concentrated was in the Sahel.”

“They understand that this is a very vital region [and] very strategic region that, if they managed to gain a foothold”, he explained, “could allow them to have a very large impact, not only in Africa, but also in neighboring regions such as Europe”.

Du Preez also stressed that other nations in the Sahel region are at risk if instability increases, including Nigeria.

One near-term risk is Chad, where the US is redeploying some troops following a military coup about three years ago. However, negotiations are ongoing and are expected to resume after the elections that begin on May 6.

Chad’s leader, Mahamat Idriss Déby, has closer ties with the US than with Russia.

Déby will likely prevail in what is expected to be a sham electoral process and will have no reason to expel the US from the country, experts say. Still, Chad faces other political factions within the country that are closer to Russia, posing a potential long-term threat.

“The Russians contributed greatly to many of the [Déby’s] potential challengers,” said Du Preez. “There is a clear movement to isolate Chad and try to install its own regime.”

While experts see the rise of the junta – and the marginalization of Western powers – as creating instability that could empower terrorist groups, these same military leaders have cited governments’ inability to suppress extremist threats as justification for their power grabs.

Niger’s government fell to a military coup in July that paved the way for General Abdourahamane Tchiani to take power, promising to combat terrorist threats more effectively.

Instead of turning to the West, Tchiani fostered relations with the Russian private military company Wagner Group, which has ties to Moscow and has long exploited the resources of African nations.

The Wagner Group was previously led by founder Yevgeny Prigozhin, who organized a short-lived mutiny against Russian President Vladimir Putin and was killed in a plane crash last August.

Since then, Putin has begun to exert more influence over the mercenary group, which gives Moscow a discreet position in Africa. The Wagner Group appears to have become a successor to the newly formed Africa Corps, which sent military trainers to Niger in April.

Russia also has close relations and security arrangements with Mali and Burkina Faso, both controlled by military junta, and with Libya, a country divided between two major rival factions. The Central African Republic is also close to Russia and is reportedly discussing a deal to host a Russian military base.

A reduced US presence in the Sahel will likely encourage greater Russian influence in the region, especially if terrorist threats increase.

Siegle, of the National Defense University, said that “the main way Russia gained influence was at the expense of the West.”

“A lot of this is information warfare that’s going on,” he said. “But their entry point is these authoritarian military leaders who see Russia as their strongest international patron to maintain their power.”

It’s not just Russia: China also has hands in Africa.

The Chinese Belt and Road Initiative, a large-scale investment project mainly for infrastructure in Asia and Africa, financed loans to African nations that the West accused of being predatory to give military, financial and political influence to Beijing. China, however, only has one base in Africa, in Djibouti.

Iran is also another regional actor, supporting a proxy group called the Islamic Movement of Nigeria and the government of Sudan, which is waging a destructive civil war against a rebel group.

Last year, Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi traveled to Kenya, Uganda and Zimbabwe to strengthen ties with the three nations.

Some experts see a populist, anti-Western movement that is organic in nature — even if fueled in part by China and Russia and exploited by military junta — and centered on long-standing grievances with former Western colonial powers but also disenfranchisement. with the current state of conditions.

Abigail Kabandula, director of the University of Denver’s Africa Center, said the US is losing its influence in Africa, in part because Washington has failed to confront terrorism, a threat that she added has “grown rapidly” over the past decade.

“The issue that several [people] to propose is why are the West or the French in the region if we still have the same problems and the problems have really increased?” she said. “It’s a matter of rethinking the entire anti-terrorism approach in the region. Whether we have the US or not, what matters is how counterterrorism is being approached.”

Kabandula also said the US has largely relied on security agreements with African nations in the Sahel and has failed to focus more cooperation on economic or other needs, creating a “continent-wide power vacuum.”

“The U.S. didn’t support a number of countries in the things they wanted to accomplish,” she said. “Several African countries actually asked for other things, such as development, development projects, development aid or infrastructure development. These did not come from the USA and therefore from African countries [look] to China for help.”

Will Walldorf, a professor who studies politics and international affairs at Wake Forest University, said he supports a U.S. withdrawal from Niger because it could allow Washington to recalibrate its approach to Africa and counterterrorism.

Walldorf said the U.S. focus on counterterrorism “misses the heart of the problem” and that it is “striking” how terrorism has increased under U.S. watch.

“The lack of good governance, the lack of meeting the everyday needs of citizens in West Africa, where we know food insecurity is extreme, has really been the main driver of terrorist recruitment in the region,” he said.

“If you can get to that kind of core question,” he added, that would be “on a different playing field than what we’re offering now in terms of a strength-first approach.”