By Dr. Binoy Kampmark
(Opinion) To get where they are, imperial powers will deceive, distort and distort. The most brilliant of evil powers, the US empire, has spread across the globe, often unbeknownst to its citizens.
In a report published by the New York University School of Law’s Brennan Center for Justice titled The Secret War: How the US Uses Partnerships and Proxy Forces to Wage War Under the Radarthere is little to shock, though much to worry about.
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The author of the report claims that the list of countries offered by the Pentagon in US military partnerships is wildly cut.
The list is so wrong that 17 countries are left out.
Katherine Yon Ebright, an adviser at the Brennan Center’s Freedom and National Security Program, betrays an unforgettable naivete by saying that “the proliferation of secret warfare is a relatively recent phenomenon,” something she considers “undemocratic and dangerous.”
She is definitely right about the last two points, but definitely wrong about innovation.
The United States, from its inception, has planned, by purchase, conspiracy, and force of arms, to spread its power and embrace an empire without declaring it.
Along with that embrace came the perceived need to wage a covert war.
The illegal and covert engagement of US forces in Laos was one of the most brutal examples of a clandestine conflict unwittingly waged by many politicians at home.
As the dark title of Joshua Kurlantzick’s book on the subject suggests, it was a great place to have war.
It began with the training of a Central Intelligence Agency group and the arming of members of the Hmong ethnic minority who, some 14 years later, would participate in large-scale engagements with the communist allies of the North Vietnamese.
This development was accompanied by an air campaign that saw more bombs dropped by the US than used by its air force in the entirety of World War II.
Between 1964 and 1973, more than 2.5 million tons of munitions were dropped from over 580,000 bombing raids.
American lawmakers tend to express great surprise that American forces should mysteriously appear in places they can barely find on a map. But to a large extent the circumstances were created by their own accord.
The authorizing background for such commitments centers on several instruments that have grown since September 11, 2001:
- US Title 10 authorities,
- 2001 Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF),
- notifications of deployment under the War Powers Resolution, and
- the supposed idea of the right to self-defense.
The broad umbrella of “security cooperation” programs that Congress authorizes under the AUMF against certain terrorist groups is troubling.
Codified as 10 USC§ 333, the provision allows the DOJ to train and equip foreign forces in any part of the globe.
Section 127e, or 10 USC §127e, stands out, as it authorizes the DOJ to “provide support to foreign forces, irregular forces, groups, or individuals engaged in supporting or facilitating ongoing military operations by United States special operations forces United to fight terrorism”.
The 2001 AUMF has become a highly flexible instrument, stretched by each administration since its inception to cover a list of terrorist groups that remains secret to the public.
The executive had long withheld the list from Congress, something it was forced to do given its cavalier interpretation of what “affiliated forces” are in the context of terrorist groups.
The DoD has also been tight-lipped about the specific circumstances of US forces operating under these authorities.
As Ebright puts it, the rationale at play is “that the incident was too minor to trigger legal reporting requirements.”
Confrontations considered as “episodic” and partly “irregular” war do not constitute “hostilities”.
Another extension of secrecy, and aided by its essential deniability premise, is the Presidential Authorization and Reporting of Covert Actions, 50 USC § 3093 (1991).
Again, the 9/11 terrorist guy has been featured in targeted killings and assassinations, despite claims to the contrary.
(Political Science Distinguished Professor John J. Mearsheimer explains how the US was created)
Perhaps the most surprising nature of such cooperative programs is the scope provided by Section 1202 of the National Defense Authorization Act of 2018.
While it mirrors section 127e in some respects, the focus here is not on counterterrorism, but on supporting “irregular warfare operations” against “rogue states.”
Ebright strikes a somber note. “Far beyond the confines of the war on terrorism, §1202 can be used to engage in low-level conflict with powerful, even nuclear, states.
The veil of secrecy in such operations has been pierced time and time again.
In 2017, four US Army Green Berets and four Nigerian soldiers were killed in an ambush outside the village of Tongo Tongo.
It was the largest loss of life for US military personnel since 1993, when 18 Army Rangers lost their lives in the Somalia Black Hawk Down incident.
What was very strange about the whole affair was not merely the surprise shown by members of Congress at this engagement.
However, the incomplete manner that the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Joseph Dunford, called for an investigation.
Its sole objectives were to ascertain whether US forces had “adequate intelligence, equipment and training” and whether there was “a pre-mission assessment of the threat in the area” with sufficient accuracy.
Indeed, the more important question would have been what these modern Roman legionnaires were doing without a wider awareness at home.
The summary report’s findings, and those of Pentagon officials, were that militants in the area had “superior firepower.”
For every American and Nigerian soldier, three attackers came. Again, this misses the whole point about covert operations that even some at the highest levels of Washington know little about.
Despite some public statements claiming that the US military role in theaters like Africa is limited to “advising and assisting” local militaries, operational reality has occasionally intervened.
In 2018, now-retired General Donald Bolduc, who commanded US special forces in Africa until 2017, had enough boastful candor to reveal that the military had “guys in Kenya, Chad, Cameroon, Niger. [and] Tunisia who are doing the same things as the guys in Somalia, exposing themselves to the same kind of danger not only in 127 echoes.”
“We’ve had guys get injured on all kinds of missions that we do.”
Ebright recommends that simply reforming “outdated and stretched AUMFs” will not work.
“Congress should repeal or reform the Department of Defense’s security cooperation authorities. Until it does so, the nation will continue to be at war – without, in some cases, the consent or even the knowledge of its people.”
This is unlikely to happen.
The Washington security establishment and a group of amnesiacs are keen to keep a lid on the fact that the US has been a garrison, belligerent state since 1941.
And the next important conflict is just around the corner.
Appearances must be kept.
* Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge. He currently teaches at RMIT University. Email: [email protected]
This post was first published here.
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