BRIEF

.50cal Instruction

Historically, sub-Saharan Africa has been something of a bastard child with regard to the U.S. Department of Defense; while most other areas of the world fall under a geographically-defined "combatant command" (Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) is responsible for South America, for example, while Pacific Command (PACOM) is responsible for the Pacific Ocean and East Asia), Africa has not.  Instead, operational responsibility for sub-Sarahan Africa has fallen to European Command (EUCOM).  During the cold war, when EUCOM was focused on countering a Soviet push across central Europe and/or a potential nuclear exchange, sub-Saharan Africa received very little attention.

With the end of the cold war, however, and the advent of the Global Posture Initiative—designed to shift the "center of gravity" of U.S. deployments further south and east than was required in the cold war—the U.S. operational footprint in Africa has expanded significantly.  In early 2001, the Djiboutian government agreed to a lease that allowed Central Command (CENTCOM) to establish Camp Le Monier, an 88-acre  (later expanded to over 500 acres) base with access to both airport and port facilities, in Djibouti.  EUCOM, meanwhile, has augmented a number of programs in Africa, including the West-Africa Training Cruise program, an annual exercise that gives Marines, such as those from 3/25 featured in this week's episode of CFR-TV, an opportunity to cross train and build relationships with West-African armed forces.  Other, similar programs have expanded as well.  The International Military Education and Training (IMET) Program, for example, which trains foreign military officers at facilities in the United States, has seen appreciable increases both in the number of African officers trained and in the funds allocated for that training since 2001.  By 2003, some forty-four African countries were participating in IMET.  As the U.S. presence and level of engagement in Africa has increased, so too has discussion over whether or not to establish a combatant command independent of EUCOM to manage relations and operations in the region.

As a tangential point of interest, the weapon the Marines are training the Ghanaian troops on in this video is the venerable M2 .50 caliber machine gun—a weapon that's been in service, with slight modifications, in the U.S. military since the early 1920s!