The Wall Street Journal featured an article this weekend announcing that the United States “aims to thwart China’s plan for Atlantic base in Africa,” as it supposedly encroaches on America’s “home turf.” The Journal published this just days after the Biden administration ridiculed the very notion of spheres of influence when Russia raised it in the Ukraine context.
It is quite stunning to see how the WSJ in its reporting — let alone its opinion section — pushes for American global military domination by creating a narrative that other countries are expansionist. Consider the numbers: the United States has more than 750 military bases worldwide. China has two.
Yet, according to the WSJ, it is China that pursues an aggressive "expansionist" policy by seeking a base (unclear whether it is military) in West Africa — which WSJ goes on to declare America's "backyard."
This is not about whether China is right or wrong on this issue. If indeed the base is military, there are good arguments as to why Equatorial Guinea should reject it. But one can oppose a Chinese military base in Africa without justifying continued American military hegemony globally — or mislead the readers to not even become aware of that broader context.
WSJ is entirely silent on what the United States itself does, leaving the readers with the impression that China is seeking global military domination while America’s 750 military bases are nothing more than Disneyland-style amusement parks. Though U.S. military bases outnumber Chinese ones by a factor of +300, it’s America that is playing defense, while China is "expansionist"? Perhaps both are?
And though Washington has encircled China with military bases throughout East Asia, some less than 100 miles away from the Chinese mainland, this reporting suggests it is China that is the aggressor by potentially building one in America's "backyard" — West Africa — more than 6000 miles from Florida. The point is not whether China's actions are problematic or not, but rather how the mainstream media often uncritically advances a narrative designed to strengthen U.S. military hegemony, which increases the likelihood of war, and ultimately makes the United States itself less secure.
As I wrote for MSNBC last week, the hard truth is that America's endless wars could not have happened without the media failing to systematically scrutinize the foundational assumptions of American foreign policy. This is a true case in point.
Trita Parsi is the co-founder and Executive Vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft.
A Soldier from Senegal observes the firing range with a Marine, assigned to India Company, 3rd Battalion, 23rd Marine Regiment out of Little Rock, Ark., during Exercise Western Accord 14, June 19, 2014. ((U.S. Army Africa photo by Sgt. William Gore)
Foundation for the Defense of Democracies CEO Mark Dubowitz shared a graphic on the X platform this week purporting to place blame on President Biden for Iran’s increasing stockpile of high enriched uranium — material that can be used in nuclear weapons — when in reality it’s Dubowitz, his organization and their allies in the Trump administration that are largely responsible.
“Facts are stubborn things,” Dubowitz said before showing the graphic. “Iran’s nuclear expansion has occurred under the Biden administration’s failed Iran policy of maximum concessions.”
It’s unclear what “maximum concessions” Dubowitz is referring to, but facts are indeed stubborn things and the reality is that this graphic is nowhere near close to providing the full picture of how we got to where we are today with Iran’s nuclear program. In fact, Iran’s nuclear expansion actually began before Biden took office after President Trump withdrew from the Iran deal (or JCPOA, as the nuclear agreement is known) in 2018. While Iran’s program has grown since Biden took office in the absence of any re-agreed upon limits, it would still largely be frozen where it was in 2015 had Trump remained in the deal.
So let’s look at the stubborn facts: Under the terms of the 2015 deal, Iran limited its uranium enrichment purification to 3.6% — or the amount needed for civilian energy purposes — and capped its stockpile of low enriched uranium to no more than 300 kg. In July 2019, or approximately one year after Trump withdrew from the JCPOA, Iran began to increase its stockpile of low enriched uranium above that 300 kg limit and announced that it was enriching to 4.5%, or slightly closer to the 90% needed for nuclear weapons. Dubowitz’s graph does not provide this information.
In other words, “Iran’s nuclear expansion” as Dubowitz put it, began during the Trump administration’s “maximum pressure” campaign that Dubowitz and FDD played a major role in crafting. FDD also played an outsizedrole in pushing Trump to withdraw from the JCPOA.
So Dubowitz ignores this fact entirely and instead misleadingly focuses on Iran’s enrichment of uranium to 20% and 60% purity, or near weapons-grade. But here again, what Dubowitz’s graph doesn’t show is that Iran began enriching uranium to 20% before Biden came into office, a move the U.S. intelligence community has attributed to the assassination of a top Iranian nuclear scientist in November, 2020. After that, the U.S. Intelligence Community’s Annual Threat Assessment states, Iran “accelerated the expansion of its nuclear program [and] stated that it is no longer constrained by any JCPOA limits.”
Another stubborn fact that Dubowitz omits is that by November 2020, Iran had increased its stockpile of low enriched uranium by 12 times the limit allowed by the JCPOA and shortened its break out time — or the time that Iran would need to produce the materials for one nuclear weapon — from one year under the JCPOA terms to between three to four months.
There are a myriad other ways in which Iran expanded its nuclear program after Trump withdrew and before Biden took office, including using more advanced centrifuges to enrich uranium and other measures which you can read about here.
The bottom line is that this is another one of Dubowitz’s brazen attempts to absolve himself and his organization from the responsibility for the failures of withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal and the subsequent “maximum pressure” campaign that failed to bring Tehran to its knees and eliminate its nuclear program (and perhaps even foment regime change).
Political outsider Bassirou Diomaye Faye will officially be declared the next president of Senegal Friday after cruising to victory in this week’s elections just 10 days after being released from prison.
Faye won 54% of the vote, allowing him to avoid a second round matchup with former Prime Minister Amadou Ba, the Dakar Court of Appeals announced Wednesday. Ba has conceded defeat and congratulated Faye, as has current President Macky Sall.
Experts say the peaceful transition of power is a welcome indication of stability in Senegal and a positive sign for West Africa as a whole amid a string of coups that have rocked the region’s relations with Western countries.
Senegal’s democracy, analysts say, came under threat last month after Sall made a controversial decision to postpone elections, citing corruption allegations against the Constitutional Council that decides which candidates are eligible to run in the elections, a fact he said would question the integrity of the results.
The decision drew public outrage, as well as concern from the United States, a historically close diplomatic partner with Senegal. The U.S. State Department said last month that it was “deeply concerned” about the postponement in a statement urging Senegal’s government to “move forward with its presidential election in accordance with the Constitution and electoral laws.”
It was the first time an election has been postponed in Senegal’s history, and Sall’s actions were “a jolt and a shock to the system” due to Senegal's long-held position as a stable democracy in West Africa, said Dr. Joseph Siegle, director of research at the Africa Center for Strategic Studies.
Senegal has historically promoted democratic norms, free speech, opposition party participation, and security in the region, Siegle said. It’s a stark contrast to surrounding states in the region — military coups have destabilized the governments of neighboring Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger and Guinea in recent years. Siegle said the recent election reiterates Senegal’s role as an exemplar of democratic leadership in the region.
“Senegal provides a very important counterpoint that this is how you realize change. You do it through legal means, through constitutional means, through transparent means,” Siegle said.
The election was also a significant indication of the strength of Senegal’s democratic institutions, as the judiciary promptly interpreted the constitution and rescheduled the elections in response to the postponement, said Adele Ravidà, senior election systems advisor and country director for Senegal at the International Foundation for Electoral Systems. She added that, given that these events were unforeseen, the judiciary’s actions created a precedent that increased its capabilities to respond to incidents of instability.
“This was the strength of the judiciary in Senegal, the fact that even in a situation in which there is no law, that they can find a solution to the situation,” Ravidà said.
Faye’s presidency could bring about further strengthening of Senegal’s democratic institutions. Faye has campaigned on an anti-establishment platform, stating that he plans to reduce corruption in the government and strengthen checks on presidential power.
Ravidà says it is still early to say what the potential of this new government is in fulfilling these claims. Siegle said Faye’s policies may be cause for cautious optimism that democratic norms will be further bolstered.
“That's encouraging, and given the strain to some of these norms we’ve seen in the last couple of years, that’s welcome and would be much valued across Senegal,” he said.
Ravidà added that the election demonstrates the power of civil society in mobilizing to enact change.
“[The Senegalese people] are giving the chance now to this new generation of leaders to show if they can really rule the country well. But the population is mature enough to consider that if they are not doing well, in the next five years they give the opportunity to another party or a different leader.”
President Biden congratulated Faye for his victory in a statement on Wednesday. In a press conference on Monday, U.S. State Department Spokesperson Matthew Miller said “the commitment of the Senegalese people to the democratic process is part of the foundation of our deep friendship and strong bilateral ties.”
Faye has iterated his intention to continue to maintain Senegal’s bilateral partnerships with its diplomatic partners. The U.S. currently maintains close military ties with Senegal, Siegle told RS. The countries’ militaries are partners in peacekeeping operations in the region, with the U.S. supplying aid and deploying troops to Senegal to help counter crises in the region.
Faye will be officially declared the next president of Senegal on Friday, in the event that no complaint against the electoral process is filed by Thursday night, an event Ravidà says is not anticipated. The official transfer of power will take place on April 2, the day Sall’s presidential mandate ends.
The Army and Navy ships that have left the U.S. for a massive humanitarian aid project in Gaza are still making their way across the Atlantic, with two still at ports in Florida and Virginia. It will likely take until mid-April for the vessels to reach Gaza and begin building a temporary causeway to facilitate the entry of life-saving aid into the strip.
Looking at real-time satellite imagery tracking military vessels, it looks like the USAV Gen. Frank Besson Jr., an Army support vessel that left Fort Eustis, Virginia, on March 10, has been moored and presumably refueling at a port in the Azores, Portugal, since Friday. It is at the half-way point between the U.S. and its final destination of Cyprus (nearly 5,000 nautical miles total). At an average speed of 10 knots, its journey will take nearly two more weeks, depending on weather conditions, once it gets going again.
The rest of the vessels are behind and, as of Tuesday, halfway across the Atlantic, though they can travel at slightly higher speeds than the Besson. They include the Army support vessels Loux, Matamoros, Monterrey and Wilson Wharf, which are all traveling together and were between Bermuda and the Azores Tuesday morning.
They all left U.S. ports around March 15. They are carrying modules and equipment to build the “trident” causeway — about 800 by 1200 feet — which will be anchored at the beach in Gaza to unload humanitarian aid.
The USNV Roy Benavidez, which, once in place, will help construct the floating pier and serve as a “roll on, roll off” facility two miles off the coast of Gaza, is the fastest of all the military vessels and is now ahead of the smaller Army landing craft on their way to the Azores, even though it left Newport News, Va., on March 21. When complete, aid will be ferried from Cyprus to the floating pier and then to the causeway at Gaza.
Meanwhile, two other Navy vessels that will be assisting with the floating pier, the USNSs Lopez and Bobo, are readying and still docked in Navy ports at Jacksonville and Norfolk respectively. Once on their way these particular vessels will take at least two weeks to reach Cyprus, depending on the weather and refueling at the Azores.
All told these vessels (carrying about 500 U.S. military personnel) won’t be realistically building anything until mid-April, which appears to be in line with a May completion date for the pier and the causeway. Considering that, according to experts, Gazans will be fully in the throes of famine by then, it is still hard to contemplate why the Biden administration has backed the massive JLOTS project instead of ratcheting up pressure on Israel to let in the thousands of trucks of aid that are stopped at borders and checkpoints.
The Pentagon has not returned calls regarding whether the military has hired contractor Fogbow to engage in the logistics on the beach, as the Biden administration insists there will be no boots on the ground. The Times of Israel reported a day ago that Fogbow, which is led by recently retired U.S. Special Forces, Marines and intelligence officers, has already been hired for the job and that the Israel Defense Forces will likely handle security at the aid staging areas. This, too, has yet to be confirmed.
Some are already questioning whether the U.S. military operation will be used to assist a massive refugee camp at the beach once the fighting begins in Rafah. Israel insists the millions of people now sheltering in the city will have to evacuate. The Pentagon has not yet said where the causeway and operations will take place. Stay tuned.