Kenya important to US war effort

Rowan Scarborough:

A destabilized Kenya would deprive the United States of one of its staunchest allies in Africa, because Nairobi since September 11 has provided military bases, communications networks and intelligence-sharing to prevent al Qaeda from making inroads on the continent.

"For the eastern portion of Africa, Kenya is critical," said retired Marine Lt. Gen. Michael DeLong, a former deputy commander of U.S. Central Command, which oversees U.S. military operations on the Horn of Africa.

"They are strategically located in the area bordering Somalia," he said. "They were critical for us in Somalia in the early 1990s. Without them, we could not have operated. They allowed us to use their bases while we were conducting operations in and out of Somalia, and they still allow us to use those bases today."

A failed state in Kenya, as exists in Somalia, would erase "one of the top friendly militaries to the United States in Africa," the retired three-star general said.

The prospect of a destabilized Kenya arose in recent weeks in the aftermath of a contested Dec. 27 election that kept President Mwai Kibaki in power. International observers reported ballot-counting irregularities. Street violence broke out in the capital of Nairobi, killing more than 300.

Alarmed, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice dispatched her top African diplomat to Kenya to urge reconciliation between the opposing parties. U.S. envoy Jendayi E. Frazer met Saturday with Mr. Kibaki, who announced a power-sharing proposal in an effort to end the crisis.

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Nairobi had already suffered one of al Qaeda's most daring and deadly attacks. The August 1998 car bombing of the U.S. Embassy there killed 212 persons and injured more than 4,000, most of them Africans. The attack underlined al Qaeda's desire to topple governments in North and East Africa, and establish strict Islamist rule.

Three years later, Mr. Kansteiner heard Kenyan officials say their chief fear was not necessarily disease or poverty, but a growing Islamist movement that could wreck the country. U.S. economic and military aid soon started flowing in.

"Kenya had already been looked on as one of the key, large, stable nations of Africa," said Mr. Kansteiner, now an adviser at the Scowcroft Group in Washington. "From independence [in 1963], through the Cold War, through post-9/11, Kenya has always been a very good ally. Kenya has been a regional anchor of stability. It has provided infrastructure, everything from communications, to transportation, to medical facilities."

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Kenya was also helpful in rounding up the al Qaeda remnants fleeing from Somalia after Ethiopian troops routed them last year. One of those captured was an American who had joined the al Qaeda effort in Somalia. He has since plead guilty in a Houston Federal Court. It appears that the two sides are going to step back from the brink of anarchy at this point.

Mike "Rifle" DeLong was Tommy Franks' deputy commander of Centcom during the Afghan and Iraq invasions. He is a good guy.