AFRICOM AND KAGAME:With end of Qaddafi, AFRICOM readies its permanent military presence in Africa

By Wayne Madsen
Previously published in the Wayne Madsen Report by Wayne Madsen

(WMR)—As the so-called “Christian” leaders of the Western nations continue to celebrate the brutal execution of Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi at the hands of Libya’s NATO-armed rebels, the bulldozers and other heavy equipment are building what is expected to become the permanent military headquarters for the U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) in the heart of the African continent.
Informed WMR sources report that construction is now underway for a large U.S. air base near Bangoka International Airport in Kisangani, Democratic Republic of Congo. The main contractor being employed is a long-time Belgian businessman, arms dealer, and mercenary in Congo who once supported the regime of Mobutu Sese Seko.
With Qaddafi’s wealth and aid largesse no longer a factor in blocking the Pentagon’s push into Africa, the AFRICOM air base in Kisangani will serve as the hub for U.S. military operations in Africa, with the primary mission being the protection of U.S. oil and mining interests that are tasked, along with AFRICOM, with the securing of African oil, natural gas, precious metals and gems, and rare earth minerals from control by China.
The northern regional headquarters for AFRICOM is planned for an annex to the new Tripoli International Airport, a project begun by Qaddafi to turn Tripoli into the major air hub for Africa.
The CIA and its George Soros-funded “democracy manipulators” have gotten behind Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, the only African leader who has invited AFRICOM to set up its headquarters and main base in her country. For that reason, the CIA, National Endowment for Democracy, and Soros’s network of election and media manipulators have descended on Monrovia to ensure that Johnson Sirleaf is elected in the second round of presidential voting over her opponent Winston Tubman. The Liberian opposition has already claimed massive vote fraud by Johnson Sirleaf, a recent winner of the Nobel Peace Prize. AFRICOM is looking at Liberia as the regional West African headquarters for AFRICOM, with Tripoli International Airport serving as the North African headquarters, Addis Ababa as the Horn of Africa headquarters, and Botswana as the southern African headquarters.
African nations that have received large aid grants and subsidies from Qaddafi and which now stand to suffer economically—Niger, Mali, Burkina Faso, and Chad—are now being offered standard usurious World Bank aid grants with the provision that they succumb to the dictates of AFRICOM and Western multinational firms.
The U.S. base construction activity was tipped off in a leaked State Department cable, dated February 2, 2010, from the U.S. embassy in Kinshasa to the Department of State, with copies to the CIA; Defense Intelligence Agency; US European Command in Vaihingen, Germany; and the Joint Analysis Center at Royal Air Force Base Molesworth, UK—a major U.S. intelligence base. With the subject of “A U.S.-trained Infantry Battalion: Cornerstone of GDRC National Defense Strategy?” the cable states: “A USG [U.S. government] effort to construct a training facility in Kisangani to train a professional light infantry battalion appears to be a major cornerstone of developing the Kisangani zone. Construction of the training center continues, with phase II training scheduled to commence at the facility on February 17. Cooperation with the Kisangani area military and political officials has been far better than expected. A local contractor showed poloff the blueprint for a planned new presidential retreat near Kisangani, an indication that the President [Kabila] may plan to spend more time in this strategic city.”
The “local contractor” whom the U.S. embassy “poloff” [political officer] met, was, according to our sources, the Belgian weapons smuggler who previously worked for Mobutu, the dictator installed by the CIA after the assassination of Congolese nationalist Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba in 1961.
The cable continues: “The USG program, implemented by AFRICOM and private contractors, called for a multi-phase training regimen beginning with FARDC [armed forces of the DRC] officer and non-commissioned officer leadership and staff training followed by battalion maneuvers integrating junior soldiers.”
The cable then proceeds the describe what was billed as a training facility but what, in fact, will become a massive military air base and AFRICOM’s continental headquarters:
“(C) The training installation, currently referred to as Camp Base, is situated 10 kilometers northeast of Kisangani city center along the main road leading from the Kisangani International Airport. The site is approximately two kilometers from the main road, connected by a hard-packed red dirt road at the intersection of which is a squad-sized 10-person canvas tent with cots for FARDC military police who maintain internal security. Local contractors with FARDC engineer support constructed the road, which is capable of two-way traffic at speeds of between 60–80 kilometers per hour and remains passable even during heavy rains. Camp Base is a rudimentary site with ongoing renovations and new construction projects. Engineers razed approximately eight buildings in various KINSHASA 00000031 002 OF 003 stages of disrepair in addition to leveling terrain for bivouac sites. Clearing of tall grasses and clumps of trees uncovered colonial roads, two of which were refurbished for use as interior roads. The physical plant will eventually consist of a bivouac site with cement floors, an internal cantonment area for family members accompanying soldiers-in-training, a firing range, and an administrative building for instructors. Another portion of the site houses an agricultural project that will enable the training center to produce their own provisions, thus removing a potential source of strain between soldiers and the nearby community.”
The cable also reveals that the Americans are masking their base construction operations by using local, for-hire transportation rather than official military or diplomatic vehicles: “USG visitors and American contractors use local for-hire vehicles at that remote location”
No matter how much the U.S. has tried to hide the massive base construction project from the locals, the cable also reveals that the local residents of Kisangani have not been fooled: “(SBU) During poloff’s visit to Kisangani, Mayor Guy Shilton Baendo Tofuli Molanga said he welcomed the training site on the outskirts of his city. There have been no problems with the recently arrived officers and NCOs, though some in local civil society misperceive (and some, perhaps, mischievously so) Camp Base as a U.S. military installation.”
The CIA Kinshasa station chief, known in the cables as “poloff,” believes that it is “mischievous” for the true nature of Camp Base to be revealed.
However, the remainder of the “smoking gun” cable reveals the entire base operation, along with the name of the Mobutu-era businessman who is building the AFRICOM headquarters in the jungle.
“Poloff noted that the U.S. training program emphasizes citizen skills as well as soldier skills and suggested the Camp Base flag pole, which naturally flies the Congolese flag, should be extended to visibly address concerns of the surrounding population. Orientale Province Governor Medard Autsai Asenga’s assistance resolved a politically sensitive problem: cutting the grass at the airport. Only one runway met safety specification standards for takeoff and landing of U.S. military cargo aircraft, but that runway was overrun with undergrowth. Airport authorities rejected USG requests to clear the airstrip citing understaffing and competing priorities. Governor Autsai personally intervened with the administrators resulting in an airfield able to receive USG planes with necessary equipment to complete a fully operating base. The full contingent would also exceed field expedient methods of sanitation, leading to a local contract for mess and latrine facilities with the owner of a wide-ranging local enterprise, BEGO-Congo.
(C) BEGO-Congo is owned by Jean-Marie Bergesio, a Belgian and life-long resident of the DRC. American contractors and USG officials stay at his atmospheric hotel in Kisangani. Bergesio is well connected in provincial politics and has an adopted Congolese son well-placed in the national police headquarters in Kinshasa contributing to both police protection and political access. Indeed, an American contractor in Kisangani showed poloff photos of a site under construction by Bergesio for President Kabila. Once completed, the sprawling complex would be a presidential retreat approximately 10–15 kilometers upriver from Kisangani.”
Known before independence as Stanleyville, Kisangani is an historic city where the Lingala-speaking and Swahili-speaking regions of the Congo converge. Until recently it was also the lynchpin of the nation’s economy and served as Kinshasa’s main nexus to the eastern provinces because it is home to the Congo River’s last port before the river is no longer navigable. To be truly effective, the plan requires currently nonexistent force projection and/or air reconnaissance assets.”
There is one fly in the ointment for the AFRICOM plans. Apparently, Rwanda’s U.S.-installed client-dictator, Paul Kagame, is not keen on seeing AFRICOM located in the DRC. Kagame has, for well over a decade, been the Pentagon’s point man and contract pass-through (with a handsome percentage) for U.S. military operations in the DRC. Because of Kagame’s meddling in AFRICOM’s plans, the CIA recently decided that it is time for Kagame to be overthrown in a coup. However, Kagame’s use of the Rwandan genocide to burnish his international public relations and “human rights” credentials has earned him powerful friends in the Holocaust arena and the Israel Lobby/Jewish community. For that reason, the CIA has contracted with a well-known Mossad front company with offices in the Georgetown area of Washington, DC, and close links to the American Jewish Committee and the US Holocaust Memorial Museum, and the White House Public Liaison Office to organize the deposing of Kagame without a push-back from Kagame’s influential Jewish friends in Washington and New York political, financial, and media circles.