The Truth about Kony 2012: Is USAID (the CIA) Behind Kony 2012? (archive)

(archived from March 11, 2012)

by Scott Creighton

I noticed the other day that the NGO behind the Kony 2012 campaign, Invisible Children, doesn’t publish in their financial statements where their funding has been coming from. Just check out their “financials” page and pull up their 2011 statement and you will quickly see they don’t include that information.

They recently had a huge increase in funding from somewhere (according to their numbers they increased their operating budget from 2010 to 2011 by a multiplier of 6 (roughly a million per year to 6 million)

Since Invisible Children seems to support putting boots on the ground in Africa and therefore AFRICOM (U.S. military control over the continent) I decided to look at AFRICOM’s website for a little more information. This is what I found in a PDF (U.S. Military Support to African Efforts to Counter the Lord’s Resistance Army) on the front page of their website:

The role of the U.S. military

It is widely recognized that there is no purely military solution to the efforts of African security and administrative officials from throughout the region to protect the civilian population from the threat posed by Joseph Kony and the LRA. The U.S. military role is in support of a combined effort that involves the U.S. embassies in the affected countries, U.S. Agency for International Development’s programs, as well as contributions from nongovernmental organizations.

Looks like their financial boondoggle happened to neatly dovetail into the same year that AFRICOM was given the green light to expand their reach into other nations in Africa. AFRICOM mentions that they are getting help from USAID “programs” to this end and as we all know, USAID is just a front organization for the CIA.

‘Heavy gunfire’ in African capital after Chinese FM visit

(Seems like our USSOCOM proxies are busy in Chad trying to keep their government from getting closer to China)

from RT

Tanks have been deployed on Wednesday night to the streets of Chad's capital N’Djamena and heavy gunfire can be heard in the heart of the city, as the presidential palace has reportedly came under attack by unidentified militants, sources have told RT.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi visited N’Djamena earlier on Wednesday to discuss “advancing bilateral cooperation” with Chadian President Mahamat Deby.

The French news agency AFP first reported “heavy gunfire” on Wednesday evening. AFP cited a Chadian security source, who said that “armed men had attacked the presidential palace.”...

read more here

Shutting down AFRICOM and the New Scramble for Africa

by Netfa Freeman, from Black Agenda Report

“U.S. Special Forces troops now operate in more than a dozen African nations.”

Marking exactly 10 years after the establishment of AFRICOM, short for U.S. Africa Command, the Black Alliance for Peace (BAP) has launched “U.S. Out of Africa!: Shut Down AFRICOM,” a campaign designed to end the U.S. invasion and occupation of Africa.

Although U.S. leaders say AFRICOM is “fighting terrorism” on the continent in reality AFRICOM is a dangerous structure that has only increased militarism. The real reason for its existence is geopolitical competition with China.

When AFRICOM was established in the months before Barack Obama assumed office as the first Black President of the United States, a majority of African nations—led by the Pan-Africanist government of Libya—rejected AFRICOM, forcing the new command to instead work out of Europe. But with the U.S. and NATO attack on Libya that led to the destruction of that country and the murder of its leader, Muammar Gaddafi, in 2011, corrupt African leaders began to allow AFRICOM forces to operate in their countries and establish military-to-military relations with the United States.

 Today, those efforts have resulted in 46 various forms of U.S. bases as well as military-to-military relations between 53 out of the 54 African countries and the United States. U.S. Special Forces troops now operate in more than a dozen African nations.

“The real reason for AFRICOM’s existence is geopolitical competition with China.”

Vice Admiral Robert Moeller, the head of AFRICOM, declared in 2008 , “Protecting the free flow of natural resources from Africa to the global market is one of Africom’s guiding principles.”...

[read more here]