Beating The Drums Of War

With a Note on Prigozhin

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Beating the drums of war

President Tinubu of Nigeria is also chairman of ECOWAS, of which Nigeria is the most prominent member. He’s beating the American drum for war with gusto. Boom. Boom. But who’s listening?  

Tinubu—let’s just call him, Tinny—began by cutting electricity to Niger – which appalled many Nigerians in the border regions with tribal connections across the Niger. Family matters aside — it’s also a treaty violation since the electricity is supplied by a dam built on the Niger River as a result of an agreement with Niger.   Not that it really means much to a country where over 90% of people are not on the grid anyway although their uranium keeps the air conditioning running in France.

Now Tinny says it is “activating” its “standby force” for war. And “D Day” has been decided. Of course, Burkina Faso and Mali previously declared an attack on Niger would mean war with them. 

Remember Poland 1939?

Can one trust Tinny’s pronouncements?

He is not the most honest of people. According to the Grayzone he spent many years laundering cash for Chicago heroin dealers and has otherwise been involved in all kinds of corruption scandals. Now it seems he launders money for the Washington Cartel.

Why Nigeria won’t go to war

If you are a war junky you may not get your fix.

If Nigeria goes to war, it faces a Sahelian force, mostly US-trained and battle-hardened after years fighting Islamic jihadists, not to mention the Wagner Group.  Russia has been supplying weapons to Mali and Burkina Faso.  Niger claims to have 25,000 troops, which probably means 15,000 combat ready. Mali and Burkina Faso could supply as many as an additional 30,000 combat-ready troops.

That adds up to more than the Ukrainian “counteroffensive” which just used 40,000 assault troops.

Not only would an ECOWAS intervention be slaughtered without Western help, but it would also inevitably cause a cascade of other problems, just like all other “interventions” in Africa.

In any case, ECOWAS doesn’t have the means to even try.

For one thing, this organization which was set up for economic rather than military cooperation doesn’t really have a “standby force”.

In 2020, ECOWAS estimated that it needed $2.3 billion for a permanent brigade of 5000.  For“troops on demand” (probably the same number) if needed $230 million 00 a year.  

ECOWAS it didn’t’ get the money back then. Obviously, it’s hoping this time will be different.  Hey, US Aid made Zelensky a billionaire.

Drums are indeed beating – but for money.

Tinny can safely talk up war without having to walk the talk.

The Nigerian military opposes intervention in Niger as does the Nigerian Senate, Tinubu’s own party—and public opinion generally.  

Democracy is in the eye of the beholder

In Africa, democracy is in the eye of the beholder— or some other organ or orifice. Maybe we just say it’s in the wallet of the beholder. If it’s empty, fuck democracy. If it’s full, yay for freedom!

One must ask just how a man like Tinubu got to be president. I guess you could say the same about Joe Biden.

Another example of democracy as a joke is President Alassane Ouattara, of the Ivory Coast whose electoral—not to mention moral legitimacy— is doubtful. “Quat’ is gibbering support for Tinny. And wants millions for a huge force of …wait for it — 800 men.

Look guys I will volunteer if you just buy me a coffee!

Again, the Ivorian military are no happier about the prospects of war with their cousins next door in Burkina Faso, than the Nigerians are about of war with their cousins across the river in Niger.

Money, money, money.

Scenario

A reasonable scenario is this:

ECOWAS uses American cash to buy Tinubu and Quattara villas next to Zelensky’s in France—with a little left over for a standby force, which cannot be ready for 2 years – a long time in African politics—by which time—Niger holds new elections after trying Basoum for kickbacks from the hated French, finds him guilty and exiles him to London.  Some of the money goes to getting Tinny and Quat’.

Everything settles down.  A new government is elected in Niger, which will not be recognized by the West, of course. Niger boots the French out of the country, while demanding the Americans leave.  The Americans refuse because they do not recognize the new government.  

Complicated? Nah…. Just a rerun of a show we’ve all seen so many times before.

The African Union

The African Union wants money too. Right now, it’s still American (and French) money. On the other hand, it is cognizant that the sun is setting on the West’s Day in Africa and rising for Russia and Africa. How to have your cake and eat it too?

First, argue against military intervention and come out in favor of a “negotiated settlement”.

Then pledge support for ECOWAS and impose sanctions on Niger as already done with no effect on Mali.

The sanctions, of course, just provide opportunities for Russia and China. Studies show that African countries owe three times as much to Western creditors as to China and pay them over twice as much interest, with almost no debt restructuring available. In addition, Western aid almost comes with various strings attached — which open African economies to neoliberal exploitation and political control. China and Russia offer a better deal. Win-win solutions. 

The BRICS summit is being held in South Africa and the earlier African summit in St Petersburg underscored Russia and its allies more principled approach to fostering African development.    

Mali has already approached the Russians for help in the Sahel. Algeria has closed airspace to the French. Egypt is getting Russia-friendly. Ethiopia is an ally. Russia is making gains incrementally, and with it, China.

ECOWAS is just West Africa. Now sadly reduced in size and influence.

And the Nigerians have announced return to civilian rule in three years, explicitly showing support for constitutional government – but without neocolonial interventions, hard – or soft.

History matters - but most of all when it continues into the present, as it does with Western powers trying to preserve colonialist exploitation under the guise of neoliberalism. Western propaganda is intense in Africa — but it only reaches elites and those few communities who have access to electronic media. Ordinary African people just care about food and water. They don’t care what Joe Biden tells the New York Times.

The Age of Nonsense

Don’t believe everything you read in the Western Media—especially about Africa.

Despite what Western propaganda says, Wagner is a lot more popular in Africa than the French or Western peacekeepers, often accused of rape and robbery. Prigozhin was at St Petersburg too – doing business with African leaders.

As of today, the Western media was ecstatic about Prigozhin’s death in a plane crash. Newsweek says the Kremlin shot down a passenger jet with him on it. Shades of Lukashenko’s “poisoning” in Moscow! The Novichok attack on the Skripals by two Fitness Instructors? Oh, and shooting down Flight 17 in a snit about overbooking.

Can we include the assassination of JFK? No matter. Putin done it! He was only a kid when JFK died—but he was precocious.

With Priggy free to shake hands with prospective customers in Africa, it didn’t seem that he was on Putin’s list of undesirables. Rather the opposite.

A bomb? Maybe…. But on the other hand, people do die in air crashes all the time. Embraer had cut off maintenance service to Wagner in 2019, which means that the jet might have been well over it service limits.

In any case, Prigozhin and Utkin’s deaths will make no difference to Russia’s military cooperation in Africa, nor to Wagner’s other activities.

This is indeed the Age of Nonsense.

WWIII is being fought with words, threats, and sanctions which inevitably hurt the West more than anyone else — but mostly with increasingly delusional propaganda— for the real battlefield is your heart and mind if you have still have them.

Nonsense generates what is sneered at as “conspiracism” but is really skeptical speculation, born of the fact that we simply don’t know! Ours is a probabilistic world.

Nothing is certain….. But don’t expect a shooting war in the Sahel anytime soon.

Other Stuff

If you liked this article buy me a coffee. Back at the zoo, we had a lot of baby bears. There were four of them, all of them black. And they all needed to be bottle-fed. They were noisy, competitive, wrestled a lot and cried a lot. But eventually they grew up. the smallest one of the four was Sam. I had to give him special attention because otherwise the others would barge in to try and get his milk. Eventually he got…. Big. I didn’t try to play with him then. Bears are mercurial. They have their moods. But he always remembered me.

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