Africans' Perception of the United States' Post-9/11 Africa Policy and Africom

The United States' post-9/11 global strategy demonstrates an interest in Africa that contrasts with decades of relative indifference. The 2006 National Security Strategy has stated the United States' commitment to promote security, stability, democracy, and economic prosperity in the continent. Yet, beyond these idealist declarations of good intentions, some foreign policy experts consider that the turnaround in the United States' Africa policy stems from the rising value of the continent for tangible American economic and security interests. They hold the actual objectives of the United States to be to secure its access to energy sources, to counter global terrorism, and to contain the influence of China. In that regard, they see the creation of a dedicated combatant command, the United States Africa Command (AFRICOM), as the reflection of the dramatic evolution in the US policymakers' perceptions of US interests in Africa." However, the deployment of that unprecedentedly vigorous strategy is facing the reluctance of significant segments of the African intellectual and political elite, due essentially to China's increasing influence, the push-back effect of the War on Terror, AFRICOM's weak security concept, and the continent's marked preference for collective security systems built around its regional organizations and the United Nations.