U.S. assembling secret drone bases in Africa, Arabian Peninsula, officials say
By Craig Whitlock and Greg Miller, Published: September 20
The Obama administration is assembling a constellation of secret drone
bases for counterterrorism operations in the Horn of Africa and the
Arabian Peninsula as part of a newly aggressive campaign to attack
al-Qaeda affiliates in Somalia and Yemen, U.S. officials said.
One of the installations is being established in Ethiopia, a U.S.
ally in the fight against al-Shabab, the Somali militant group that
controls much of that country. Another base is in the Seychelles, an
archipelago in the Indian Ocean, where a small fleet of
“hunter-killer” drones resumed operations this month after an
experimental mission demonstrated that the unmanned aircraft could
effectively patrol Somalia from there.
The U.S. military also has flown drones over Somalia and Yemen from
bases in Djibouti, a tiny African nation at the junction of the Red
Sea and the Gulf of Aden. In addition, the CIA is building a secret
airstrip in the Arabian Peninsula so it can deploy armed drones over
Yemen.
The rapid expansion of the undeclared drone wars is a reflection of
the growing alarm with which U.S. officials view the activities of
al-Qaeda affiliates in Yemen and Somalia, even as al-Qaeda’s core
leadership in Pakistan has been weakened by U.S. counterterrorism
operations.
The U.S. government is known to have used drones to carry out lethal
attacks in at least six countries: Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Pakistan,
Somalia and Yemen. The negotiations that preceded the establishment of
the base in the Republic of Seychelles illustrate the efforts the
United States is making to broaden the range of its drone weapons.
The island nation of 85,000 people has hosted a small fleet of MQ-9
Reaper drones operated by the U.S. Navy and Air Force since September
2009. U.S. and Seychellois officials have previously acknowledged the
drones’ presence but have said that their primary mission was to track
pirates in regional waters. But classified U.S. diplomatic cables show
that the unmanned aircraft have also conducted counterterrorism
missions over Somalia, about 800 miles to the northwest.
The cables, obtained by the anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks, reveal that
U.S. officials asked leaders in the Seychelles to keep the
counterterrorism missions secret. The Reapers are described by the
military as “hunter-killer” drones because they can be equipped with
Hellfire missiles and satellite-guided bombs.
To allay concerns among islanders, U.S. officials said they had no
plans to arm the Reapers when the mission was announced two years ago.
The cables show, however, that U.S. officials were thinking about
weaponizing the drones.
During a meeting with Seychelles President James Michel on Sept. 18,
2009, American diplomats said the U.S. government “would seek discrete
[sic], specific discussions . . . to gain approval” to arm the Reapers
“should the desire to do so ever arise,” according to a cable
summarizing the meeting. Michel concurred, but asked U.S. officials to
approach him exclusively for permission “and not anyone else” in his
government, the cable reported.
Michel’s chief deputy told a U.S. diplomat on a separate occasion that
the Seychelles president “was not philosophically against” arming the
drones, according to another cable. But the deputy urged the Americans
“to be extremely careful in raising the issue with anyone in the
Government outside of the President. Such a request would be
‘politically extremely sensitive’ and would have to be handled with
‘the utmost discreet care.’ ”
A U.S. military spokesman declined to say whether the Reapers in the
Seychelles have ever been armed.
“Because of operational security concerns, I can’t get into
specifics,” said Lt. Cmdr. James D. Stockman, a public affairs officer
for the U.S. Africa Command, which oversees the base in the
Seychelles. He noted, however, that the MQ-9 Reapers “can be
configured for both surveillance and strike.”
A spokeswoman for Michel said the president was unavailable for comment.
Jean-Paul Adam, who was Michel’s chief deputy in 2009 and now serves
as minister of foreign affairs, said U.S. officials had not asked for
permission to equip the drones with missiles or bombs.
“The operation of the drones in Seychelles for the purposes of
counter-piracy surveillance and other related activities has always
been unarmed, and the U.S. government has never asked us for them to
be armed,” Adam said in an e-mail. “This was agreed between the two
governments at the first deployment and the situation has not
changed.”
The State Department cables show that U.S. officials were sensitive to
perceptions that the drones might be armed, noting that they “do have
equipment that could appear to the public as being weapons.”
To dispel potential concerns, they held a “media day” for about 30
journalists and Seychellois officials at the small, one-runway airport
in Victoria, the capital, in November 2009. One of the Reapers was
parked on the tarmac.
“The government of Seychelles invited us here to fight against piracy,
and that is its mission,” Craig White, a U.S. diplomat, said during
the event. “However, these aircraft have a great deal of capabilities
and could be used for other missions.”
In fact, U.S. officials had already outlined other purposes for the
drones in a classified mission review with Michel and Adam. Saying
that the U.S. government “desires to be completely transparent,” the
American diplomats informed the Seychellois leaders that the Reapers
would also fly over Somalia “to support ongoing counter-terrorism
efforts,” though not “direct attacks,” according to a cable
summarizing the meeting.
U.S. officials “stressed the sensitive nature of this
counter-terrorism mission and that this not be released outside of the
highest . . . channels,” the cable stated. “The President
wholeheartedly concurred with that request, noting that such issues
could be politically sensitive for him as well.”
The Seychelles drone operation has a relatively small footprint. Based
in a hangar located about a quarter-mile from the main passenger
terminal at the airport, it includes between three and four Reapers
and about 100 U.S. military personnel and contractors, according to
the cables.
The military operated the flights on a continuous basis until April,
when it paused the operations. They resumed this month, said Stockman,
the Africa Command spokesman.
The aim in assembling a constellation of bases in the Horn of Africa
and the Arabian Peninsula is to create overlapping circles of
surveillance in a region where al-Qaeda offshoots could emerge for
years to come, U.S. officials said.
The locations “are based on potential target sets,” said a senior U.S.
military official. “If you look at it geographically, it makes sense —
you get out a ruler and draw the distances [drones] can fly and where
they take off from.”
One U.S. official said that there had been discussions about putting a
drone base in Ethiopia for as long as four years, but that plan was
delayed because “the Ethiopians were not all that jazzed.” Other
officials said Ethiopia has become a valued counterterrorism partner
because of threats posed by al-Shabab.
“We have a lot of interesting cooperation and arrangements with the
Ethiopians when it comes to intelligence collection and linguistic
capabilities,” said a former senior U.S. military official familiar
with special operations missions in the region.
An Ethiopian Embassy spokesman in Washington could not be reached for
comment Tuesday night.
The former official said the United States relies on Ethiopian
linguists to translate signals intercepts gathered by U.S. agencies
monitoring calls and e-mails of al-Shabab members. The CIA and other
agencies also employ Ethiopian informants who gather information from
across the border.
Overall, officials said, the cluster of bases reflects an effort to
have wider geographic coverage, greater leverage with countries in the
region and backup facilities if individual airstrips are forced to
close.
“It’s a conscious recognition that those are the hot spots developing
right now,” said the former senior U.S. military official.
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