organization:special operations command

USA trekker seg ut, Russland rykker inn – NRK Urix – Utenriksnyheter og -dokumentarer

▻https://www.nrk.no/urix/usa-trekker-seg-ut_-russland-rykker-inn-1.14342752

Alors que les États-unis semblent réduire peu à peu leur présence en Afrique, la Russie a signé des accords de coopération militaire avec au moins la moitié des pays africains.

https://gfx.nrk.no/S-VnISTc_WPp8dtWpqBnOwlLvsmm5muTNP7kfh09z6Cg.jpg

USA trekker seg ut, Russland rykker inn

Afrika består av 54 selvstendige stater. Russland har i løpet av de fire siste årene inngått et militært samarbeid med over halvparten av dem.
Russiske og egyptiske spesialstyrker under en øvelse i Egypt i august 2018.

Det handler om å lære moderne krigføring. Hvordan nedkjempe og utslette militsgrupper som ikke følger vanlige regler som gjelder for krigføring ?

I tillegg trekker supermakten USA seg ut av Afrika. Mange av landene på det afrikanske kontinentet ser seg om etter en ny samarbeidspartner og militær støttespiller.

–---------

U.S. Prepares to Reduce Troops and Shed Missions in Africa - The New York Times
▻https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/01/world/africa/us-withdraw-troops-africa.html

https://static01.nyt.com/images/2018/08/02/us/02DC-COMMANDOS-print/02DC-COMMANDOS-facebookJumbo.jpg

STUTTGART, Germany — Hundreds of American troops in Africa would be reassigned and the number of Special Operations missions on the continent would be wound down under plans submitted by a top military commander, a response to the Trump administration’s strategy to increasingly focus on threats from China and Russia.

Defense Department officials said they expected most of the troop cuts and scaled-back missions to come from Central and West Africa, where Special Operations missions have focused on training African militaries to combat the growing threat from extremist Islamist militant groups.

The plan by Gen. Thomas D. Waldhauser, the leader of United States Africa Command, follows an ambush in Niger last fall that killed four American soldiers and an attack in southwestern Somalia that killed another in June.

In an interview with The New York Times, General Waldhauser said his plan would help streamline the military’s ability to combat threats around the world — but not retreat from Africa.

–-----

Russia to increase military presence in Central African Republic | Central African Republic News | Al Jazeera
▻https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/11/russia-increase-military-presence-central-african-republic-18111909031651
/mritems/images/2018/11/19/665003303001_5968862195001_5968848897001-th.jpg

Russia to increase military presence in Central African Republic

With an arms embargo in place on the Central African Republic, Russia is ready to send military trainers to the country.

#afrique #russie #états-unis #armement #présence_militaire

U.S. Special Ops Forces Deployed in 135 Nations - 2015 Proves to Be Record-Breaking Year for the Military’s Secret Military
▻http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/176048/tomgram%3A_nick_turse%2C_a_secret_war_in_135_countries

This year, U.S. Special Operations forces have already deployed to 135 nations, according to Ken McGraw, a spokesman for Special Operations Command (SOCOM). That’s roughly 70% of the countries on the planet. Every day, in fact, America’s most elite troops are carrying out missions in 80 to 90 nations, practicing night raids or sometimes conducting them for real, engaging in sniper training or sometimes actually gunning down enemies from afar. As part of a global engagement strategy of endless hush-hush operations conducted on every continent but Antarctica, they have now eclipsed the number and range of special ops missions undertaken at the height of the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. 

In the waning days of the Bush administration, Special Operations forces (SOF) were reportedly deployed in only about 60 nations around the world. By 2010, according to the Washington Post, that number had swelled to 75. Three years later, it had jumped to 134 nations, “slipping” to 133 last year, before reaching a new record of 135 this summer. This 80% increase over the last five years is indicative of SOCOM’s exponential expansion which first shifted into high gear following the 9/11 attacks.

Special Operations Command’s funding, for example, has more than tripled from about $3 billion in 2001 to nearly $10 billion in 2014 “constant dollars,” according to the Government Accountability Office (GAO). And this doesn’t include funding from the various service branches, which SOCOM estimates at around another $8 billion annually, or other undisclosed sums that the GAO was unable to track. The average number of Special Operations forces deployed overseas has nearly tripled during these same years, while SOCOM more than doubled its personnel from about 33,000 in 2001 to nearly 70,000 now.

The real politics behind the US war on IS | Middle East Eye
▻http://www.middleeasteye.net/columns/real-politics-behind-us-war-1739057128

In fact, it is all about domestic political and bureaucratic interests.

(...)

After thirteen years in which administration and national security bureaucracies have pursued policies across the Middle East that are self-evidently disastrous in rational security and stability terms, a new paradigm is needed to understand the real motivations underlying the launching of new initiatives like the war on IS. James Risen’s masterful new book, Pay Any Price: Greed, Power and Endless War, shows that the key factor in one absurdly self-defeating national security initiative after another since 9/11 has been the vast opportunities that bureaucrats have been given to build up their own power and status. 

 
(...)

... the military services and the counter-terrorism bureaucracies in the CIA, NSA and Special Operations Command (SOCOM) viewed a major, multi-faceted military operation against ISIL as a central interest. Before ISIL’s spectacular moves in 2014, the Pentagon and military services faced the prospect of declining defence budgets in the wake of a US withdrawal from Afghanistan. Now the Army, Air Force and Special Operations Command saw the possibility of carving out new military roles in fighting ISIL. The Special Operations Command, which had been Obama’s “preferred tool” for fighting Islamic extremists, was going to suffer its first flat budget year after 13 years of continuous funding increases. It was reported to be “frustrated” by being relegated to the role enabling US airstrikes and eager to take on ISIL directly.

On 12 September, both Secretary of State, John Kerry and National Security Adviser, Susan Rice were still calling the airstrikes a “counterterrorism operation”, while acknowledging that some in the administration wanted to call it a “war”. But the pressure from the Pentagon and its counter-terrorism partners to upgrade the operation to a “war” was so effective that it took only one day to accomplish the shift.

The following morning, military spokesman, Admiral John Kirby told reporters: “Make no mistake, we know we are at war with [IS] in the same way we are at war, and continue to be at war, with al-Qaeda and its affiliates.” Later that day, White House press secretary, Josh Ernst used that same language. 

Under the circumstances that exist in Iraq and Syria, the most rational response to IS’s military successes would have been to avoid US military action altogether. But Obama had powerful incentives to adopt a military campaign that it could sell to key political constituencies. It makes no sense strategically, but avoids the perils that really matter to American politicians.

#effrayant

Deux types d’information :

– Très gravement amputée, qui peut laisser croire que le régime étasunien s’apprête à se calmer,

Aux Etats-Unis, l’armée de terre va être sévèrement réduite
▻http://www.lemonde.fr/ameriques/article/2014/02/24/l-armee-de-terre-americaine-ramenee-a-son-plus-bas-niveau-depuis-1940_437269

USA : le Pentagone veut sabrer les effectifs de l’armée de Terre
▻http://www.rtbf.be/info/monde/detail_usa-le-pentagone-veut-sabrer-les-effectifs-de-l-armee-de-terre?id=820934

La plus petite armée de Terre américaine depuis 1940
▻http://www.lapresse.ca/international/etats-unis/201402/24/01-4741991-la-plus-petite-armee-de-terre-americaine-depuis-1940.php

– non amputée,

Hagel Urges Less Money for U.S. Army, More for Special Forces
▻http://www.ipsnews.net/2014/02/hagel-urges-less-funding-u-s-army-special-forces

(...)

At the same time, however, he urged an increase in the size of the Special Operations Forces (SOF), the elite military personnel charged with training foreign counterparts and carrying out often-secret missions, including assassinations and raids such as the one that killed Osama bin Laden in Pakistan in 2011.

(...)

“The real question is whether we can roll back the ‘go anywhere, fight any battle’ mentality of the Pentagon,” Hartung [said] in an email exchange. “Whether it’s drones, Special Forces, or precision bombs, war is war, and it’s time to take the United States off of a perpetual war footing and craft a truly defensive military force.”

Indeed, in his remarks, Hagel stressed that Washington’s SOF will continue to grow – from roughly 66,000 today to just shy of 70,000 in 2015 – an increase of almost 300 percent compared to just a decade ago.

Each of the military services and each of the regional commands (SouthCom for Latin America, Africom for Africa, CentCom for the Near East and parts of South and Central Asia, and PaCom for the Asia-Pacific) – have their own elite SOF units.

In addition, a North Carolina-based Special Operations Command (SOCOM), presided over by Adm. William McRaven, who oversaw the bin Laden raid, can dispatch troops to virtually anywhere in the world. He also commands the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), which works closely with the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in carrying out highly classified operations against specific targets.

McRaven, whose efforts at easing human-rights restrictions on training foreign militaries and circumventing State Department oversight of some aid programmes have proved controversial, has nonetheless been effective in building his “empire” in major part because of its compatibility with Obama’s desire to lighten the U.S. military’s “footprint” in conflicted regions without reducing its effectiveness and lethality.

“In his State of the Union address, the President declared that our nation must move off a permanent war footing, and Secretary Hagel’s speech today took one major step in that direction.” noted Miriam Pemberton, another defence analyst at the Institute for Policy Studies here. “But, while long-term occupations are off the table now, the expansion of Special Forces means that under-the-radar invasion are not .”

Ironically, Hagel’s budget proposal reflects in many ways the strategic vision of former Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld , who strongly favoured the development of high-tech combat systems, heavy reliance on air power, and small, nimble ground forces who could strike from so-called “lily pads” (or temporary bases) anywhere on the globe within a short period of time. His so-called “Revolution in Military Affairs,” or RMA, however, was side-tracked enormous costs of the Iraq occupation.

The Obama administration has revived that vision, without explicitly admitting it, with the priority it has accorded to cyber-warfare capabilities, SOF, ever-more sophisticated drone technology, its intended retention of all 13 aircraft carriers, and its ongoing efforts to negotiate access agreements to foreign military facilities, particularly in the Asia-Pacific, East African, and Sahelian regions

Pity the poor interrogator
Etre un tortionnaire, une bonne carte de promotion en Israël

By Gideon Levy | Jan. 2, 2014
Haaretz
▻http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-1.566586

A new victim is born: Doron Zahavi, better known as Captain George.

An earlier Zahavi, Yaron, one of the heroes of the “Hasamba” series of adventure books for juvenile readers, died long ago. In 1966, Yigal Mossinson, author of the series, appointed him to serve as an officer in the Israel Defense Forces as a member of SOC, short for Special Operations Command.

Today’s Zahavi, Doron, served in a similar military unit, with the hush-hush number 504; the unit is today known by the euphemistic name Human Military Intelligence Formation. Nearly 20 years ago, in an interrogation facility with another hush-hush number, 1391, Doron Zahavi interrogated Lebanese militia operative Mustafa Dirani in an effort to learn the fate of missing Israel Air Force navigator Ron Arad. Whether or not he actually inserted a baton into Dirani’s rectum, Zahavi-George is suing the State of Israel for damages on the grounds that the state tarnished his reputation. This week, Captain George’s true identity was revealed – at his own request.

In a coincidence that could be called poetic justice, two lawsuits against the state are now being deliberated in the courtroom: George’s and Dirani’s. In an installment of Channel 2’s investigative journalism program, “Uvda,” which was broadcast in late 2011, video clips of Dirani’s interrogation were screened: Captain George, who says the state besmirched his “good name,” can be seen in those video tapes in an arrogant Israeli pose, his feet on the desk, sitting opposite Dirani, who is in his underpants, hunched over, looking humiliated and frightened. The commander, Col. S., threatens to sodomize Dirani; the soldier who will commit the act of sodomy is on his way. “What a lovely skirt you are wearing, you mother-fucker … just open your legs wide” is the utterance made in the name of the State of Israel when Dirani is forced to stand on a chair, naked, before the watchful eyes of his investigators. At Base 1391, Israel’s version of Guantanamo, this was – and perhaps still is – just a routine questioning session.

According to testimonies that have become public over the years, a chilling picture of Base 1391 emerges: a canister of shaving foam emptied into the interrogated person’s mouth, water mixed with ash that Dirani and other people being investigated were forced to drink from an ashtray, along with the usual repertoire of sleep and food deprivation, beatings, abuse and other acts intended to humiliate the subject. This is how the work was carried out. There are still some people around who defend it. This week, Israel’s singer-philosopher, Idan Raichel, called on Instagram for the IDF to award Zahavi a medal of honor.

The bottom line today is that despite all of the sophisticated and disgusting “acts” performed by the interrogators, their actions made no contribution whatsoever to the efforts to find out what happened to Arad. However, one cannot remain indifferent in the face of the campaign to clear Zahavi’s name; the big interview on “Uvda” is already in the works.

Today Zahavi is an adviser on Arab affairs with the Jerusalem District of the Israel Police. His lawyer has stated that his client is a “talented individual” and that the “Israel Police has benefited, and will continue to benefit, from his fine skills and from his understanding of the population with which the police must deal.” Whether or not the Israel Police really benefits from Zahavi’s services, this expert on Arab affairs has already referred to the “well-developed Arab imagination” that gave rise to Dirani’s accusations about the baton allegedly inserted into his rectum. “If there are so many complaints,” Captain George once boasted, “that’s a sign that I was doing my job diligently.”

Zahavi the victim says that he received full authorization and permission to do what he did. The video tapes prove that Col. S. also wallowed in that garbage. Even Maj. Gen. (res.) Amos Gilad personally visited the interrogation rooms. We are left with only one unequivocal fact: The abuser has become the victim and the victim has become a senior officer with the Israel Police.

No one is denying that Captain George committed contemptible acts and no one seems appalled by them. Chief Superintendent Zahavi is today an expert on Arab affairs, advising the commander of the Jerusalem District police how to “deal with” Arabs. Need anything more be added to this depiction of the mood that prevails today in Israel, this Georgetown, this district of filth and decay?

Somali American caught up in a shadowy Pentagon counterpropaganda campaign
▻http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/somali-american-caught-up-in-a-shadowy-pentagon-counterpropaganda-campaign/2013/07/07/b3aca190-d2c5-11e2-bc43-c404c3269c73_story.html

With the Iraq war over and U.S. combat operations scheduled to finish in Afghanistan by the end of next year, however, the Pentagon has begun shifting psy-ops missions to other parts of the world to influence popular opinion. Many of the missions are overseen by the Special Operations Command, which plays a leading role in global counterterrorism efforts.

In the past, psychological operations usually meant dropping leaflets or broadcasting propaganda on the battlefield. Today, the military is more focused on manipulating news and commentary on the Internet, especially social media, by posting material and images without necessarily claiming ownership.

Much of the work is carried out by military information support teams that the Special Operations Command has deployed to 22 countries. The command, which is based in Tampa, also operates multilingual news Web sites tailored to specific regions.

The Southeast European Times covers the Balkans with original news dispatches and feature stories written in 10 languages. Magharebia covers North and West Africa in Arabic, French and English. Readers have to scour the Web sites to find an acknowledgment that they are sponsored by the U.S. military.

[…]

In 2010, the U.S. military stopped using the phrase “psychological operations” because of its negative connotations. Instead, it adopted a blander term, “military information support operations,” or MISO.

U.S. commander seeks to ease human-rights rules that limit training | Reuters
▻http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/03/06/us-usa-military-rights-idUSBRE9251NB20130306

Si le #SOCOM veut réduire les (soit disant) exigences en matière de respect des droits humains pour former les troupes militaires des pays étrangers ce n’est pas parce qu’il veut ses propres #SOB, mais parce que, sans rire, c’est le meilleur moyen de favoriser les droits humains.

The head of the U.S. military’s Special Operations Command is seeking to ease restrictions preventing elite American forces from training foreign units linked to human rights violations, saying limiting such help can sometimes be counter-productive.

...

The top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, Adam Smith, appeared sympathetic to McRaven and said the committee needed to examine the issue.

“I support the human rights concerns,” Smith said. “I just think that (Special Operations Command) being able to go in and do train-and-equip missions is a way to improve human rights.”