The Central African Republic, Burkina Faso & Mali are essentially now fully Russian colonial states
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A ‘New Cold War’ Looms in Africa as U.S. Pushes Against Russian Gains (Published 2023)
The U.S. is reprising its playbook in Ukraine, where it has used classified information to expose plans by Russia. Next target: Chad.
A ‘New Cold War’ Looms in Africa as U.S. Pushes Against Russian Gains
The U.S. is reprising its playbook in Ukraine, where it has used classified information to expose plans by Russia. Next target: Chad.
March 19, 2023
Chadian soldiers in a military parade, holding flags and wearing red berets.
An independence celebration in Ndjamena, Chad, in 2021, the year the country’s autocratic leader of three decades was killed in battle with rebels.Djimet Wiche/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
NAIROBI, Kenya — Fueled by guns, gold and social media, the rivalry between Russia and the West in Africa is rapidly escalating. The latest flashpoint is Chad, a sprawling desert nation at the crossroads of the continent, now a plum target for Russia’s expanding effort.
The United States recently warned Chad’s president that Russian mercenaries were plotting to kill him and three senior aides and that Moscow was backing Chadian rebels massing in the neighboring Central African Republic. At the same time, Moscow is courting sympathizers inside Chad’s ruling elite, including cabinet ministers and a half brother of the president.
The decision by the U.S. government to share sensitive intelligence with the head of an African state — a disclosure it then leaked — reveals one way in which the Biden administration is moving more assertively in Africa and using new tactics to stymie Russian gains on the continent.
The United States is taking a page from its playbook in Ukraine, where it has used classified information to expose Russian military plans and pre-empt what it says are Chinese plans to supply Russia with new weapons.
In Africa, the more forceful American approach aims partly to shore up the crumbling position of France, which in recent years has ceded ground to Russia in former colonies like Mali and the Central African Republic. Now the Russians are looking to topple more French dominoes in central and western Africa, and the United States is responding.
A U.S. official, who like others interviewed for this article spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss matters of national security, said the assassination plot in Chad represented “a new chapter” in efforts by Wagner, the Kremlin-backed private military force, to advance Russian interests in Africa.
Until now, Yevgeny Prigozhin, who leads Wagner, has established footholds in vulnerable African countries by sending his fighters to prop up tottering authoritarian rulers, usually in exchange for payment, or licenses to mine diamonds or gold.
The plot in Chad suggests that he is now ready to topple leaders who stand in his way. That change has prompted the United States to adopt more forward-leaning measures, like those used in Ukraine, that are intended “to slow, to curb, constrain and reverse” Mr. Prigozhin’s expansion in Africa, the official said.
Two men in camouflage outfits, hats and face masks in an upscale supermarket.
Russian mercenaries shopping in October at Bangui Mall, a supermarket used mostly by embassies’ staff and nongovernmental organizations based in the Central African Republic.Mauricio Lima for The New York Times
“Where Wagner has been present, bad things have inevitably followed,” Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken said on a visit to Niger on Thursday.
What Is the Wagner Group?
A paramilitary group with ties to Russia. The Wagner Group is a private military force with close links to President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia. It gained prominence in recent months when its forces began appearing in Ukraine, to fight alongside Russian troops.
How did Wagner get its start? Wagner operatives were first deployed during Russia’s annexation of Crimea. The U.S. government has said that the organization is financed by Yevgeny V. Prigozhin, a Russian businessman and a close associate of Mr. Putin.
How did the group get its name? The group is reportedly named after the nom de guerre of its leader, Dmitry Utkin, a retired Russian military officer. Mr. Utkin is said to have chosen Wagner to honor the composer.
Where is the group based? The group is not registered as a legal entity anywhere in the world, and mercenaries remain illegal under Russian law. According to analysts, Wagner is a “proxy force” of Russia’s ministry of defense; its shadowy existence allows the Kremlin to play down its battlefield casualties and distance itself from atrocities committed by Wagner fighters.
Where do they recruit? Some of the fighters appeared to have been recruited from Syria and Libya, according to the Pentagon. Russia appears to have used mercenaries from those countries to bolster its troops in the east of Ukraine because of their experience fighting in the Donbas region for the past eight years.
Where have Wagner forces been deployed? Wagner operatives have fought in Syria, Libya, Central African Republic, Ukraine, Sudan, Mali and Mozambique. U.N. investigators and rights groups say these mercenary troops have targeted civilians, conducted mass executions and looted private property in conflict zones.
The visit, during which Mr. Blinken pledged $150 million in aid to the Sahel region, was the fourth to Africa by a senior U.S. figure this year. Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen; Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the ambassador to the United Nations, and the first lady, Jill Biden, preceded him. Vice President Kamala Harris will begin a trip to Ghana, Tanzania and Zambia this month, and President Biden has promised to visit Africa later this year.
To many in Africa and beyond, the heightening great-power rivalry smacks of the Cold War, when the United States and the Soviet Union backed rival African leaders, including dictators. It’s a comparison the Biden administration desperately wants to avoid because its strategy in Africa, announced by Mr. Blinken to fanfare in South Africa last year, presents African countries as valued partners, not pawns in a global rivalry.
For their part, African leaders have made it clear that they do not want to be forced to choose sides.
“Africa has suffered enough from the burden of history,” Macky Sall, the African Union chairman, told the U.N. General Assembly in September. “It does not want to be the breeding ground of a new Cold War.”
Men with long guns wearing camouflage, their faces covered, near what looks like a helicopter rotor.
A photograph handed out by the French military purportedly showing Russian mercenaries in central Mali at Mopti airport in February last year. The New York Times geolocated this photo to the airport.French Army, via Associated Press
Russian ties to Africa stretch back to the Soviet era, when Moscow backed sympathetic governments and independence movements, and have endured in recent years as Russia became the continent’s largest arms supplier.
But its latest drive for influence started in earnest about five years ago, when Mr. Prigozhin’s Wagner mercenaries — many Russian but also Syrian, Serbian and Lebanese — began to appear in some of the continent’s most turbulent corners.
In response to questions, Mr. Prigozhin said in a statement, “We have nothing to do with either the Chadian rebels or Mr. Hemeti,” a nickname for the deputy leader of Sudan, Gen. Mohamed Hamdan, who also wields influence in Chad.in
The Russian effort spans the continent but has had the greatest impact in the Sahel, the semiarid region bordering the Sahara. Wagner fighters are battling Islamist rebels in Mali, are bodyguards to the Central African Republic’s president and mine gold in several countries, including Sudan. Social media campaigns seek to burnish the image of President Vladimir V. Putin or to tap into wellsprings of anti-French resentment.
The arrival of Russian mercenaries prompted the French military to withdraw from several countries. In November, France formally ended Operation Barkhane, its eight-year military drive against Islamist insurgents in the Sahel that, at its peak, included troops from five African countries. One of them, Mali, is now firmly in the Russian orbit.
Lines of soldiers in protective gear walking among covered trucks.
French Foreign Legion soldiers from the Operation Barkhane counterterrorism force in northeastern Mali, near the border with Niger, in 2020.Finbarr O'Reilly for The New York Times
The war in Ukraine did not blunt Russia’s push into Africa. American officials say that Wagner has maintained between 3,500 and 4,500 personnel on the continent, even as the group also throws troops and prison conscripts into the “meat grinder” of Ukraine’s longest, most brutal battles.
Instead of retracting, Russia is probing for new toeholds in Africa.
On a recent visit to Mali, Russia’s foreign minister, Sergey V. Lavrov, mentioned Guinea, Burkina Faso and Chad in a speech as countries where Russia hoped to use counterterrorism to get its foot in the door. U.S. officials have detected signs of new Wagner links in Eritrea, suggesting a desire for a coast-to-coast sphere of influence from the Atlantic Ocean to the Red Sea.
Mr. Lavrov has visited seven African countries this year, seeking to capitalize on ambivalence over the war in Ukraine and openly acknowledging Russia’s link with Wagner. While 30 African countries condemned Russian aggression in a recent vote at the United Nations, 22 chose not to.
Russia has also obtained a powerful partner in General Hamdan of Sudan, whose paramilitary forces have received weapons and training from Wagner, and who travels widely across the region. Last week, he flew to Eritrea, one of a handful of countries that consistently votes in favor of Russia at the United Nations.
Two men clasping hands.
A photograph released by the Russian Foreign Ministry press service showing the foreign ministers of Russia and Mali, Sergey V. Lavrov, and Abdoulaye Diop, last month in Bamako, Mali.Russian Foreign ministry press service/EPA, via Shutterstock
Experts caution against overestimating the impact of Russia’s African forays. The countries where Moscow operates are among the world’s poorest, and on the ground, its efforts often appear scattershot, poorly resourced and motivated by a desire to poke the West in the eye. Ultimately, Russia is unlikely to deliver on the grand security promises it has made to African countries, said Michelle Gavin, an Africa expert at the Council on Foreign Relations.
But in the short term, its actions are proving highly disruptive, and Western powers have struggled to find a response.
In the West African nation of Burkina Faso, soon after Capt. Ibrahim Traoré, a young army officer, seized power in a coup last fall, Victoria Nuland, a senior State Department official, showed up to strongly urge Mr. Traoré not to turn to Wagner for help, a senior State Department official said.
In January, the last French troops left Burkina Faso, under orders from Captain Traoré, prompting speculation that they would be replaced by Russians.
But it was the assassination plot in Chad, first reported by The Wall Street Journal, that spurred American efforts to a new level.
Larger by area than Britain, France and Germany combined, Chad has been a key French ally for decades, used by the French military for training and as a hub of operations. In the 1980s, the C.I.A. supported its brutal leader, Hissène Habré, who was later convicted as a war criminal.
Chad’s current leader, Mahamat Idriss Déby, came to power in 2021 after his father, Chad’s autocratic leader of three decades, was killed in battle with rebels. Mr. Déby has stayed close to France, but the alliance has been frayed by a brutal crackdown on democracy protesters in October that left 128 people dead, according to Chad’s national human rights body.
People in formal military dress on the steps of a stately building, with two leaders waving in the background.
Mahamat Idriss Déby of Chad and President Emmanuel Macron of France in Paris last month.Mohammed Badra/EPA, via Shutterstock
Now, some members of Mr. Déby’s inner circle appear to be tilting toward Russia.
A senior Chadian official who spoke on condition of anonymity said that Mr. Déby’s half brother, Seid, a former head of Chad’s state energy company, visited Moscow three times in the past year, meeting at least once with Mr. Prigozhin. On his Facebook profile, Seid Déby is pictured standing outside the Kremlin.
In January, Russia denied accusations that Wagner was seeking to topple the president and announced that Mr. Déby planned to attend the second Russia-Africa summit in July, hosted by Mr. Putin.
About four weeks later, U.S. officials presented Mr. Déby with declassified evidence of Wagner’s plans to assassinate him, the Chadian official said. Also on the hit list were Mr. Déby’s chief of staff, a minister of state and the chief of the presidential guard, he added.
Seid Déby and the spokesman for Chad’s president did not respond to requests for comment.
Washington has continued to use its usual tools against Mr. Prigozhin’s network in Africa, imposing new sanctions in January that target his business ventures and associates in several countries. The French, meanwhile, have begun to acknowledge that deep resentment toward them in their former colonies opened the door to Russian intervention.
A crowded, colorful covered market, with clothing, hats and a large Russian flag.
A Russian flag on display at a market in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, last year.Olympia De Maismont/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
On a recent tour of four African countries, President Emmanuel Macron acknowledged the rising wave of anti-French sentiment and promised a new era of partnership.
For some Africans, the show of humility has come too late. “The people of Chad do not want the French,” said Hallowak Haoua, 29, a street vendor in the Chadian capital, Ndjamena. “At least the Russians want to help us. With the French, it’s just for their own interests.”
Others worry that a return to Cold War-style confrontation could doom their democratic aspirations. The United States should not cozy up to authoritarians like President Déby of Chad to prevent him from tumbling into the Russian orbit, said Succès Masra, the main opposition leader.
“It would be a big mistake for President Biden to side with Déby,” said Mr. Masra, speaking by phone from the United States, where he fled after the massacre of protesters in October. He added, “In the long run, the best way for the United States to protect its interests in Chad is to bet on democracy.”
Eric Schmitt contributed reporting from Washington, and Mahamat Adamou from Ndjamena, Chad.
Where have Wagner forces been deployed? Wagner operatives have fought in Syria, Libya, Central African Republic, Ukraine, Sudan, Mali and Mozambique. U.N. investigators and rights groups say these mercenary troops have targeted civilians, conducted mass executions and looted private property in conflict zones.
The visit, during which Mr. Blinken pledged $150 million in aid to the Sahel region, was the fourth to Africa by a senior U.S. figure this year. Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen; Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the ambassador to the United Nations, and the first lady, Jill Biden, preceded him. Vice President Kamala Harris will begin a trip to Ghana, Tanzania and Zambia this month, and President Biden has promised to visit Africa later this year.
To many in Africa and beyond, the heightening great-power rivalry smacks of the Cold War, when the United States and the Soviet Union backed rival African leaders, including dictators. It’s a comparison the Biden administration desperately wants to avoid because its strategy in Africa, announced by Mr. Blinken to fanfare in South Africa last year, presents African countries as valued partners, not pawns in a global rivalry.
For their part, African leaders have made it clear that they do not want to be forced to choose sides.
“Africa has suffered enough from the burden of history,” Macky Sall, the African Union chairman, told the U.N. General Assembly in September. “It does not want to be the breeding ground of a new Cold War.”
Men with long guns wearing camouflage, their faces covered, near what looks like a helicopter rotor.
A photograph handed out by the French military purportedly showing Russian mercenaries in central Mali at Mopti airport in February last year. The New York Times geolocated this photo to the airport.French Army, via Associated Press
Russian ties to Africa stretch back to the Soviet era, when Moscow backed sympathetic governments and independence movements, and have endured in recent years as Russia became the continent’s largest arms supplier.
But its latest drive for influence started in earnest about five years ago, when Mr. Prigozhin’s Wagner mercenaries — many Russian but also Syrian, Serbian and Lebanese — began to appear in some of the continent’s most turbulent corners.
In response to questions, Mr. Prigozhin said in a statement, “We have nothing to do with either the Chadian rebels or Mr. Hemeti,” a nickname for the deputy leader of Sudan, Gen. Mohamed Hamdan, who also wields influence in Chad.in
The Russian effort spans the continent but has had the greatest impact in the Sahel, the semiarid region bordering the Sahara. Wagner fighters are battling Islamist rebels in Mali, are bodyguards to the Central African Republic’s president and mine gold in several countries, including Sudan. Social media campaigns seek to burnish the image of President Vladimir V. Putin or to tap into wellsprings of anti-French resentment.
The arrival of Russian mercenaries prompted the French military to withdraw from several countries. In November, France formally ended Operation Barkhane, its eight-year military drive against Islamist insurgents in the Sahel that, at its peak, included troops from five African countries. One of them, Mali, is now firmly in the Russian orbit.
Lines of soldiers in protective gear walking among covered trucks.
French Foreign Legion soldiers from the Operation Barkhane counterterrorism force in northeastern Mali, near the border with Niger, in 2020.Finbarr O'Reilly for The New York Times
The war in Ukraine did not blunt Russia’s push into Africa. American officials say that Wagner has maintained between 3,500 and 4,500 personnel on the continent, even as the group also throws troops and prison conscripts into the “meat grinder” of Ukraine’s longest, most brutal battles.
Instead of retracting, Russia is probing for new toeholds in Africa.
On a recent visit to Mali, Russia’s foreign minister, Sergey V. Lavrov, mentioned Guinea, Burkina Faso and Chad in a speech as countries where Russia hoped to use counterterrorism to get its foot in the door. U.S. officials have detected signs of new Wagner links in Eritrea, suggesting a desire for a coast-to-coast sphere of influence from the Atlantic Ocean to the Red Sea.
Mr. Lavrov has visited seven African countries this year, seeking to capitalize on ambivalence over the war in Ukraine and openly acknowledging Russia’s link with Wagner. While 30 African countries condemned Russian aggression in a recent vote at the United Nations, 22 chose not to.
Russia has also obtained a powerful partner in General Hamdan of Sudan, whose paramilitary forces have received weapons and training from Wagner, and who travels widely across the region. Last week, he flew to Eritrea, one of a handful of countries that consistently votes in favor of Russia at the United Nations.
Two men clasping hands.
A photograph released by the Russian Foreign Ministry press service showing the foreign ministers of Russia and Mali, Sergey V. Lavrov, and Abdoulaye Diop, last month in Bamako, Mali.Russian Foreign ministry press service/EPA, via Shutterstock
Experts caution against overestimating the impact of Russia’s African forays. The countries where Moscow operates are among the world’s poorest, and on the ground, its efforts often appear scattershot, poorly resourced and motivated by a desire to poke the West in the eye. Ultimately, Russia is unlikely to deliver on the grand security promises it has made to African countries, said Michelle Gavin, an Africa expert at the Council on Foreign Relations.
But in the short term, its actions are proving highly disruptive, and Western powers have struggled to find a response.
In the West African nation of Burkina Faso, soon after Capt. Ibrahim Traoré, a young army officer, seized power in a coup last fall, Victoria Nuland, a senior State Department official, showed up to strongly urge Mr. Traoré not to turn to Wagner for help, a senior State Department official said.
In January, the last French troops left Burkina Faso, under orders from Captain Traoré, prompting speculation that they would be replaced by Russians.
But it was the assassination plot in Chad, first reported by The Wall Street Journal, that spurred American efforts to a new level.
Larger by area than Britain, France and Germany combined, Chad has been a key French ally for decades, used by the French military for training and as a hub of operations. In the 1980s, the C.I.A. supported its brutal leader, Hissène Habré, who was later convicted as a war criminal.
Chad’s current leader, Mahamat Idriss Déby, came to power in 2021 after his father, Chad’s autocratic leader of three decades, was killed in battle with rebels. Mr. Déby has stayed close to France, but the alliance has been frayed by a brutal crackdown on democracy protesters in October that left 128 people dead, according to Chad’s national human rights body.
People in formal military dress on the steps of a stately building, with two leaders waving in the background.
Mahamat Idriss Déby of Chad and President Emmanuel Macron of France in Paris last month.Mohammed Badra/EPA, via Shutterstock
Now, some members of Mr. Déby’s inner circle appear to be tilting toward Russia.
A senior Chadian official who spoke on condition of anonymity said that Mr. Déby’s half brother, Seid, a former head of Chad’s state energy company, visited Moscow three times in the past year, meeting at least once with Mr. Prigozhin. On his Facebook profile, Seid Déby is pictured standing outside the Kremlin.
In January, Russia denied accusations that Wagner was seeking to topple the president and announced that Mr. Déby planned to attend the second Russia-Africa summit in July, hosted by Mr. Putin.
About four weeks later, U.S. officials presented Mr. Déby with declassified evidence of Wagner’s plans to assassinate him, the Chadian official said. Also on the hit list were Mr. Déby’s chief of staff, a minister of state and the chief of the presidential guard, he added.
Seid Déby and the spokesman for Chad’s president did not respond to requests for comment.
Washington has continued to use its usual tools against Mr. Prigozhin’s network in Africa, imposing new sanctions in January that target his business ventures and associates in several countries. The French, meanwhile, have begun to acknowledge that deep resentment toward them in their former colonies opened the door to Russian intervention.
A crowded, colorful covered market, with clothing, hats and a large Russian flag.
A Russian flag on display at a market in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, last year.Olympia De Maismont/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
On a recent tour of four African countries, President Emmanuel Macron acknowledged the rising wave of anti-French sentiment and promised a new era of partnership.
For some Africans, the show of humility has come too late. “The people of Chad do not want the French,” said Hallowak Haoua, 29, a street vendor in the Chadian capital, Ndjamena. “At least the Russians want to help us. With the French, it’s just for their own interests.”
Others worry that a return to Cold War-style confrontation could doom their democratic aspirations. The United States should not cozy up to authoritarians like President Déby of Chad to prevent him from tumbling into the Russian orbit, said Succès Masra, the main opposition leader.
“It would be a big mistake for President Biden to side with Déby,” said Mr. Masra, speaking by phone from the United States, where he fled after the massacre of protesters in October. He added, “In the long run, the best way for the United States to protect its interests in Chad is to bet on democracy.”
Eric Schmitt contributed reporting from Washington, and Mahamat Adamou from Ndjamena, Chad.
Henri Christophe
Son Of Afrika
This back-and-forth with you gets simpler if you admit you're OK with them taking orders from Russians over Frenchmen. They swapped out masters. They're not independent.
Henri Christophe
Son Of Afrika
Ghana says China has worse loans and stricter deals than the USA does
Told you
China has stricter deals and doesn't restructure debt like the USA does. They admit they thought they were gonna get favorable treatment too
Told you
China has stricter deals and doesn't restructure debt like the USA does. They admit they thought they were gonna get favorable treatment too
Russia takes 70% of Sudan's gold 
www.wsj.com
Stakes in Sudan’s War Include Russian Gold, Nile Dam, Key Shipping Lane
The fate of some of Africa’s most important strategic resources is hanging in the balance as Sudan’s top two generals vie for supremacy.
www.wsj.com
I'm thinking if the US spent so much blood and treasure in Somalia there's no way they'd let Sudan go without a fight.Russia takes 70% of Sudan's gold
Stakes in Sudan’s War Include Russian Gold, Nile Dam, Key Shipping Lane
The fate of some of Africa’s most important strategic resources is hanging in the balance as Sudan’s top two generals vie for supremacy.
Russia takes 70% of Sudan's gold
Stakes in Sudan’s War Include Russian Gold, Nile Dam, Key Shipping Lane
The fate of some of Africa’s most important strategic resources is hanging in the balance as Sudan’s top two generals vie for supremacy.
You're back
The West aint no saints but China & Russia could be worse for the continent.
If China genuinely cares for Africa, why dont they bring peace to DRC or Zimbabwe and improve their economies to assure people in Africa that they are the best economic partner? All they do is loot and plunder minerals then bounce!
Family Man
Banned
This is par for the course for a people that enslaved and sold their own people to foreigners for trinkets. I don't know why black people show so much reverence to Africa other than some part of it being our ancestral land.
African Peasant
Veteran
How? DRC elite is corrupted and Rwanda, close ally to the West, keeps invading the eastern part of DRC. How do you want China to bring peace there? By nuking Kigali and killing the congolese elite? The UN has been there for 20 years with its biggest peace mission in the world: 0 result.
China’s goal is to help africa with infrastructure projects that would further their belt and road initiative regardless if there is a net benefit for the country.
I don’t know enough about Russia to understand their long play but we can bet it’s not for the good of these African countries.
I don’t know enough about Russia to understand their long play but we can bet it’s not for the good of these African countries.
