AFRICOM, CHINA AND SOMALIA

Navy Vice Adm. Robert Moeller, U.S. Africa Command's deputy military commander, spoke with bloggers from AFRICOM headquarters in Germany. (AFRICOM photo)

Not Looking for Trouble

U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) is not involved in any military activities inside Somalia – either against insurgents or pirates, AFRICOM’s deputy military commander says.

U.S. Navy Vice Admiral Robert Moeller says AFRICOM also is not involved in any formal cooperation or joint exercises with the Chinese in Africa – but that’s not to say the Pentagon’s regional combatant command for Africa doesn’t want to work with the People’s Republic and its military.

In recent years, China has often been described as a potential near peer military rival and, at best, a commercial competitor in Africa, Latin America and elsewhere for iron, oil and other commodities needed by its relentless, export-driven economy.

U.S. officials — including President Barack Obama — however, have been making overtures to Peking for more cooperation on a range of political, economic and environmental issues include efforts to block North Korea’s missile and nuclear weapons proliferation and Iran’s nuclear weapons development program.

No Somalia Military Ops

Despite recent press reports – especially in the African media which have been suspicious of any U.S. military presence on the continent – Moeller says the U.S. military is not involved in any ground operations in Somalia, despite Somali pirate incursions in the waters around the Horn of Africa and growing threats from radical Islamic groups like al-Shabab.

“Those reports are simply not true,” Moeller told a recent bloggers roundtable. Speaking from AFRICOM headquarters in Stuttgart, Germany, Moeller added: “We don’t plan, nor direct, nor coordinate the military operations” of Somali government  forces.  He said the U.S. was not providing military advisers or “direct support for any potential military offensives.”

As for the pirate problem, Moeller said “there are at, this point, no counter-piracy activities” occurring “from or in Somalia.” He noted that U.S. Central Command has the primary responsibility for the majority of the counter-piracy activities “going on in the Gulf of Aden and off the east coast of Somalia.”

U.S. Africa Command hopes to cooperate with China in Africa -- perhaps in a multi-national exercise like Africa Endeavor 2009 in Gabon (Photo by Staff Sgt. Samara Scott)