months ago, i wrote a post making fun of the bush administration for burning so many diplomatic bridges that it couldn't find an african country willing to host its new african command center for u.s. military operations.
there are 46 countries in africa, more than in any other continent in the world. and that number bumps up to 53 if you include the disputed western sahara and island nations like cape verde, são tomé and príncipe, madagascar, the comoros, the seychelles, and mauritius. together that's about 25% of the total number of nations on earth. and yet, even among some of the poorest countries of the world who would surely reap economic benefits from a large first world military base, we could find not a single taker.
until now that is. yes, africom has finally found a home: the african nation of germany.
of course, stuttgart just being called its "temporary home", they're still debating where the permanent home will be. as africom spokesman vince crawley explained: "you could move it to somewhere else in Europe, you could move it to somewhere else in the United States, or to some other area that hasn’t even been discussed yet."
the whole idea behind africom was to give the u.s. a presence on the african continent so that it could coordinate anti-terrorism and humanitarian missions without having to ship personnel from a different part of the world. so once it finds its permanent home in the united states or europe, africom is sure to be a spectacular success!
