From Military Times:
“Upcoming
merger gives Army Africa more advocacy in Washington, two-star says”
A plan to merge
U.S. Army Africa with the newly elevated four-star command of U.S. Army Europe
will give soldiers on the African continent more influence back in Washington,
D.C., according to Maj. Gen. Andrew Rohling, who took over the Italy-based Army
component this summer. Having a four-star general overseeing both commands and
regularly making trips to Congress, the Pentagon and think tanks in D.C. will
“give us greater advocacy,” Rohling told Army Times during a recent telephone
interview. “In my last job, I was the deputy commander for United States Army
Europe,” Rohling said. “So I’ve been involved in this discussion since its
beginning. … If I didn’t think it was good, knowing that I was coming to be the
commander of United States Army Africa, I’d never have been for it.”
The merger
won’t change the number of soldiers assigned to Army Africa, Rohling said. What
merging will do is eliminate some of the administrative burdens on his command
and help synchronize exercises with Army Europe and tap into some of its
resources, Rohling explained. “There’s always been a way to do it, but you had
to go between two different [combatant commands],” he added. “They can [now]
make that transition in a much easier bureaucratic manner than you could’ve in
the past, and it’s given a lot of flexibility for both commands.”
The merger
comes on the heels of some combat incidents around outposts on the Horn of
Africa, including a May 9 attack on U.S. soldiers assigned to a coordination
cell in Mogadishu, Somalia. Seven soldiers received Combat Action badges
following the attack, the details of which were not elaborated on during the
telephone call. Rohling’s predecessor, Maj. Gen. Roger Cloutier Jr., obtained
wartime awards approval authority after a brief but complex al-Shabab attack
was repelled by U.S. soldiers at Baledogle Airfield, in southern Somalia, on
Sept. 30, 2019. The approval authority allowed the awarding of combat badges
for some 120 soldiers at the airfield. “I personally have retained that
authority and I have signed combat awards since I’ve been in command,” Rohling
said. “And has there been small-scale combat? Yes. Major combat? I would say
no.” Army Africa approved 160 combat badges in fiscal 2020. About two-thirds of
those were from the Baledogle incident, according to command spokesman Col. Ryan
Dillon. A Jan. 5 attack by al-Shabab at Manda Bay Airfield in Kenya claimed the
lives of a U.S. soldier and two Pentagon contractors. The investigation into
that incident remains ongoing, but some recommendations have already been
implemented, Rohling said, though he declined to discuss what those were until
the investigation is released.
Army advisers
in Africa following spike in combat “Special Forces is very good at
training tactical-type units; They’re very good at accompanying tactical-type
units," McConville said. “But SFABs build a professional military force,
which is different." U.S. Africa Command boss Gen. Stephen Townsend
characterized Manda Bay as a place that both the Americans and Kenyans
incorrectly viewed as a safe haven. He told Congress earlier this year that the
Kenyans had family housing there for their military members and considered it
"a resort area.” “We’re working hard to make sure we’ve integrated
the lessons-learned from that investigation,” Rohling added. “I get a brief on
it routinely, [and] I brief Gen. Townsend on it routinely.” In the days
following the Manda Bay attack, roughly 120 infantrymen from the 101st Airborne
Division were sent to secure the area, lay concertina wire and build defensive
positions. Force protection is one of Rohling’s leading priorities going
into his tenure leading Army Africa. “That means that we continually
work to make sure that if we put a United States Army soldier onto the African
continent that they’ve got everything they need in terms of their preparation,
their training and then once they get there, [ensuring] that they’re in a safe
place, they’re not going to get harmed [and] they have access to medical
care," Rohling said.
Under a new
regional alignment model for the Army’s security force assistance brigades, the
2nd SFAB, out of Fort Bragg, North Carolina, will soon start rotating teams to
Africa, providing dedicated advisers to military units from countries like
Tunisia, Djibouti and Somalia. Those partnerships with African militaries have
been limited these past few months due to the coronavirus pandemic. So far,
SFAB teams have been mostly dispatched to places where there is already a U.S.
footprint, like East Africa. “As we make our assessments in accordance with
what AFRICOM and the Department of Defense wants to do, we’ll position them
elsewhere across the continent,” Rohling said.
The U.S.
National Defense Strategy argues that some sort of U.S. presence on the
continent prevents terror groups aligned with the Islamic State and al Qaida
from gaining ground there. A U.S. presence also provides a counterweight
against other non-African powers, like China, which are interested in the
region’s emerging markets and raw materials. Africa is “the emerging front of
global power competition,” Rohling said during the telephone call with Army
Times. “The Army has a role in Africa, and we’re operating there every single
day."
^ Hopefully,
this merger will help the US Troops in Africa as well as the African Troops we
work with there. ^
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