Conducted by the Africa Center for Strategic Studies, the Pentagon’s premier analysis branch for the region, the report noted a staggering 300 percent increase in militant Islamist violence over the course of the last decade.
More than 6,200 violent events were attributed to terrorist groups in 2022, a 21 percent increase from the previous year, the report noted. Almost 15,000 deaths were linked to the increase in terrorist-related activity.
Nearly 95 percent of the incident surge since 2019 has come from two areas — Somalia and the western Sahel, a semi-arid region crossing northern Africa between the Sahara to the north and tropical savannas to the south.
Both Somalia and the Sahel are actively hosting U.S. troops, but if the aforementioned statistics are any indication, that military presence has not stemmed the violence, bringing into question the effectiveness of U.S. operations in Africa, training or otherwise.
When it comes to threats throughout the continent, meanwhile, the greatest number come from al-Shabab, Boko Haram and the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara, according to a recent report by the Africa Center for Strategic Studies. In the Sahel, the Macina Liberation Front was noted as being largely responsible for an attack incident rate that has quadrupled since 2019, according to the report.
From The Shadows Emerges Knowledge