In a telephonic press briefing Thursday, Marine Corps Gen. Michael Langley, commander of U.S. Africa Command, shared recent developments on the security conditions in the Sahel and elsewhere. He also shed light on his team’s new approach to enable more African-led solutions that confront contemporary risks, at a time when the continent is seen as an “epicenter” for terrorism, and insurgencies continue to make strides against local forces.

“We are leaning into empowerment over dependency. The United States is actively supporting African militaries through targeted training, advanced intel-sharing and help building institutions that can endure over time,” he told reporters.

Africom continues to evolve since it became a fully operational combatant command in 2008. The organization is primarily responsible for overseeing and conducting U.S. military operations, exercises, and security cooperation in its area of responsibility, which covers 53 African states that encompass more than 800 ethnic groups.

Building on policy shifts at the end of the Biden administration — and in alignment with President Donald Trump’s second-term vision to reduce the U.S. military’s global footprint in favor of homeland defense and a focus on the Indo-Pacific — Africom in recent months has been pulling back its physical presence around certain African nations and pushing those partners to assume more responsibility for their security. 

Langley briefed reporters Thursday from Nairobi, Kenya, where he is participating in the annual African Chiefs of Defense Conference with representatives from 37 African countries. There, he’s been engaging in what he referred to as “powerful dialogue.”

“These conversations reaffirm something critical: African nations are not waiting to be saved. They’re stepping up to take control of their own futures,” he said.

One topic addressed during the conference sessions was African militaries’ intent to “match” technological capabilities to existing threats — and ultimately counter them across multiple domains.

“Most pressing was the information domain, and being able to operate at the speed of relevance and getting information out there to shape the operational environment, to shape the strategic environment. They see their ability to be able to do that for stability and security as important. And then also capabilities to protect the force, whether it be because of the asymmetric capabilities that violent extremist organizations can bring to bear, especially through [unmanned aerial systems] and drone technology. Our partners really want the leading edge-type technologies to protect the force,” Langley told DefenseScoop. “So, that forum gave the opportunity for a number of countries to talk about their initiatives going forward and how they can collaborate on sharing information and intelligence.”

While Africom pivots its approach to more directly assist its partners with becoming more self-sufficient, the commander noted, China is trying to “replicate every type of thing” the U.S. military is doing on the continent. Both China and Russia are also influencing African communities by offering short-term economic gains that could impact America’s national security interests in the years to come.

However, Langley said the command’s top strategic priority at this time involves countering threats to the U.S. homeland from terrorist factions — “the most dangerous of which are based in Africa.”

“Let me speak plainly about the threats we’re facing, especially in the Sahel region, including Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger. It is the flashpoint of prolonged conflict and growing instability. It is the epicenter of terrorism on the globe. Terrorist networks affiliated with ISIS and Al Qaeda are thriving, particularly in Burkina Faso, where the government no longer controls vast parts of its own territory,” Langley explained.

Extremist groups are simultaneously gaining ground across the Lake Chad regions as attacks are resurging.

“Throughout my travels across West Africa and through dialogue here at the conference, the concerns shared by my peers match my own. One of the terrorists’ key goals now is access to the West Coast of Africa. If they gain access to the vast coastline, they can diversify their revenue streams and evolve their tactics more easily — exporting terrorism to American shores. These terrorists conduct illicit activity like smuggling, human trafficking and arms trading. All these activities that fund their nefarious actions and destabilize the region,” Langley said. 

“That’s why our coastal partners, like Ghana, Cote d’Ivoire and Benin, are relentlessly fighting along their northern borders to keep these threats at bay. Africom has and will continue to support them,” he added.

Since 2022, according to Langley, some terrorist factions have multiplied by up to fourfold around the continent.

In response to these threats and in line with its new strategic approach, Africom has been encouraging its international partners outside of Africa to increase burden-sharing. The command is also focused on helping its allies confront instability and other root causes of terrorism.

Further, early into his second administration, Trump made a policy change that empowered combatant commanders with expanded authorities that allow them to take faster action against “violent extremist organizations,” or VEOs.

“When [Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth] gave me guidance on Africa, he really said his number one priority for me to execute was to be able to hit ISIS, who is inextricably linked to global capabilities, and has a high aspiration and capabilities through their networks to attack the homeland. That was the first priority for me — and yes, with those authorities we’ve been able to execute operations to be able to turn them, degrade them, or affect deterrence of their operations. So, that’s in the name of him telling us to match capabilities to the threat,” Langley told DefenseScoop.

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The operation was the latest in a recent surge of attacks carried out by Africom since the Trump administration took office earlier this year.

Chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell briefly mentioned the recent op during the Defense Department’s first on-camera press briefing under the new administration on Monday. Pointing to the initial assessment, he said that enemy combatants were killed and that no civilians were injured or fatally harmed.

On Wednesday, a source familiar with those airstrikes shared new information with DefenseScoop.

“The vast majority of [Africom’s] strikes are out in the open. This strike did not include structures,” the official said on the condition of anonymity.

Somalia is located on the Horn of Africa. The nation’s extensive coastline borders the Gulf of Aden to the north and the Indian Ocean to the east. 

The militant organization al Shabaab, an al-Qaeda ally, frequently launches terrorist attacks against Somali civilians and officials. In recent years, the group has increasingly threatened the Somali government’s hold on its territory.

And tensions continue to escalate this week. On Tuesday, members of the group targeted the Somalian president’s motorcade with a bomb attack in Mogadishu.

Early into his new administration, President Donald Trump made a policy shift that eased restrictions on U.S. commanders in a way that enables them to authorize strikes and certain special operation raids beyond conventional battlefields — and essentially expanded the pool of people who can be targeted.

The new authorities have empowered commanders to take faster action against terrorist threats, the official who spoke to DefenseScoop said.

So-called “self-defense airstrikes” like the one on March 15 are conducted when an Africom partner or its own forces are under attack and request assistance, they noted.

They declined to identify or talk about any of the technical systems or unmanned aerial vehicles deployed in the March 15 operation. However, they noted that “99% of the time these are conducted with UAV.”

“Most engagements last under an hour, but that includes monitoring, assessing and with very few shots actually taken,” the official said. 

They confirmed that battle damage assessments are ongoing. Generally, those can go on for days, weeks or months depending on the location of the operations, they added.

The official also noted that the airstrike operations that Africom has conducted so far in 2025 potentially mark one of the largest — if not the most — numbers of strikes the command has done in a short period of time, “compared to the last four years” under the Biden administration.

Information published on Africom’s official website indicates an uptick.

For instance, between Feb. 1 and March 15, the command reported conducting at least eight airstrikes in its area of responsibility. Africom reported completing a total of 10 airstrikes for the entire year of 2024, six of which were conducted in the first part of that year through March 15, 2024.

“U.S. forces will continue to partner with Somali armed forces to take the fight to these terrorists and degrade their ability to plan and conduct attacks that threaten the U.S. homeland, our forces and civilians abroad,” Parnell told reporters Monday.

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Briefing the media in Stuttgart, Germany, during his first official overseas trip as the Pentagon chief, Hegseth shared new details about the Trump administration’s vision for DOGE-related disruption and modernization pursuits — and how they may or may not impact military and civilian personnel in the near term.

“There’s plenty of places where we want the keen eye of DOGE, but we’ll do it in coordination. We’re not going to do things that are to the detriment of American operational or tactical capabilities,” Hegseth said.

Mirroring promises he made on the campaign trail, President Donald Trump set DOGE up the same day he was officially sworn in, Jan. 20.

An executive order formalizing its establishment stated that the organization’s purpose is “to implement the President’s DOGE Agenda, by modernizing Federal technology and software to maximize governmental efficiency and productivity.”

Trump immediately tapped Musk — a politically vocal billionaire businessman whose company SpaceX has contracted with the Pentagon and other agencies — to steer DOGE under the designation of “special government employee.” 

Since its launch, the Musk-led team has attracted widespread attention for its controversial probes into federal hubs including the Treasury Department and U.S. Agency for International Development.

“USAID has got a lot of problems that I talked about with the troops — pursuing globalist agendas that don’t have a connection to ‘America First.’ That’s not the Defense Department. But we’re also not perfect either,” Hegseth told reporters on Tuesday.

He confirmed that he hopes to welcome Musk and the DOGE team to the Pentagon “very soon.”

“There are waste redundancies and headcounts in headquarters that need to be addressed. There’s just no doubt. Look at a lot of the climate programs that have been pursued at the Defense Department. [The DOD] is not in the business of climate change, solving the global thermostat. We’re in the business of deterring and winning wars,” Hegseth said. “We want to look forward to finding efficiencies, and many others [including] the way we acquire weapon systems.”

The new SecDef also responded to questions from reporters about the new administration’s strategic military aims in Africa, Europe and the Indo-Pacific.

“As far as external threats, there’s just no doubt the communist Chinese ambitions are robust. Their view of the world is quite different than ours, and whoever carries that mantle is going to set the tone for the 21st century,” he said. 

Hegseth emphasized that Trump “ran on being a peace president” and therefore does not want conflict with China under his leadership. 

“But being strong — peace through strength — is how you deter that. And we want to posture for that, just like we believe the Europeans alongside our support need to on the continent, as well,” he said. 

“The [People’s Republic of China’s] intentions are pernicious, not just in their part of the world, but also in South America and then on the African continent. And America’s posture there, along with allies and partners, is going to matter about contesting that space. So, it certainly remains a priority,” Hegseth added.

In response to reporters’ questions regarding whether the administration is planning to reduce U.S. troops’ presence abroad any time soon, he acknowledged that there’s a broad understanding across DOD that officials are going to review force posture around the world. 

However, he said there “are no plans right now in-the-making to cut anything.”

After meeting with senior military leaders from U.S. European Command and U.S. Africa Command at their joint headquarters in Germany on his first international trip as SecDef, Hegseth will head to Brussels, Belgium, to attend the NATO Defense Ministerial and the Ukraine Defense Contact Group meeting.

The defense secretary suggested that, in those engagements, he’ll push for “a rapid peace deal” to end the war between Russia and Ukraine, and urge NATO allies to each spend 5 percent of their GDP on defense (though the U.S. has not pledged to make the same percentage level of investment).

“We’re going to have straight talk with our friends. This kind of urgency of this moment requires friends talking to friends about capabilities, about leadership, about stepping up, about burden-sharing and the incentives to say, ‘The European continent deserves to be free from any aggression, but it ought be those in the neighborhood investing the most in that individual and collective defense.’ That’s common sense, as the president talks a lot about. Common sense is you defend your neighborhood, and the Americans will come alongside you in helping in that defense if and when that happens. And I believe it will,” Hegseth said.

Before concluding the weeklong trip, Hegseth is slated to meet with his counterparts in Poland, where he plans to discuss furthering bilateral defense cooperation and deterrence opportunities along NATO’s eastern flank.

“This is a very important part of the world for us. The president feels that way as well,” Hegseth told reporters.

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Signed by military leaders from both nations on Jan. 22, the new U.S.-Algeria Defense Cooperation Memorandum of Understanding paves the way for closer bilateral collaboration between troops. Some predict it also holds potential to curtail Russia’s influence in northern Africa. 

“This is a first-of-its-kind agreement between the U.S. and Algeria, and a major shift in Algerian foreign policy,” a U.S. defense official said on the condition of anonymity.

Generally for the Pentagon, MOUs refer to legally non-binding arrangements that describe the intentions, roles and responsibilities of the entities that opt to be involved. 

The commander of U.S. Africa Command, Marine Corps Gen. Michael Langley, signed the new MOU during his third official visit to Algeria alongside the country’s minister delegate to the minister of national defense and chief of staff to the National People’s Army, Gen. Saïd Chanegriha.

On Wednesday, a military spokesperson told DefenseScoop that the agreement “states the intention of both parties to explore potential opportunities for cooperation in areas that include maritime search and rescue,  counterterrorism, military training, and military healthcare initiatives.”

Without providing further details on those possibilities, they confirmed that a Joint Military Commission is poised to connect “annually to identify, guide, and review discrete opportunities and proposals for military cooperation.”  

“The first JMC will occur in 2025, with dates to be determined,” the spokesperson said. 

In a separate conversation, a U.S. defense official said that — with the deal officially set — Africom’s Office of Security Cooperation will begin puzzling out next steps and engage with their Algerian counterparts to begin planning future events for personnel to collaborate and jointly participate in.

“Both militaries commit to meeting on a regular basis and to find ways for us to assist one another,” the U.S. defense official said.

At this point, it’s “still to be determined” whether the new U.S.-Algeria pledge will result in expanded data-sharing and technology exchanges between the two militaries, they noted.

The MOU initiates a process to identify areas where the troops can more closely cooperate. 

It also instructs both sides to start meeting on “everything from foreign military sales, exercises, military trainings, etc.,” the official said, noting that “it does not confirm those things will happen — but it does get the ball rolling.”

While the Algerian military “lightly participated in or observed exercises, and attended conferences” on the sidelines over the last couple of years, in the U.S. defense official’s view, the new MOU signals that Algiers is now “opening the door wide open for more engagement and cooperation” with Africom.

According to the official, the agreement had “been in the works for sometime, but slow processes and lack of desire to see it happen on the Algerian side delayed it.” 

However, “the November timeframe is when it got kicked into high gear,” they noted, which was also around the same time Donald Trump won the U.S. presidential election. 

“Some are calling this part of the ‘Trump effect’ on foreign policy. Not until very recently Algerians kept us at arms length — now it’s completely different,” the official told DefenseScoop.

Leaders from the U.S. and Algeria have interacted since the late 1700s, though permanent diplomatic relations weren’t shaped until after Algeria emerged from subsequent French rule in the early 1960s. Relations between the nations were severed amid the Arab-Israeli conflicts between 1967 and 1974, but they’ve been relatively re-engaged in the recent past. 

Algeria is the largest country on the African continent. A small portion of the nation is located in the conflict-ridden Sahel region, where many people face severe challenges around political instability, violence and food insecurity.

Martin Pimentel, a research associate for the Center for Strategic and International Studies’ Middle East Program, noted that in the modern era both governments have a “transactional orientation” and view enhanced cooperation as an element that can mutually serve their near-term demands.

“The Trump administration needs partners to reduce U.S. troop presence abroad. The United States and Algeria share important interests reducing instability in the Sahel, and that makes them natural partners as President Trump seeks to draw down the U.S. military presence in the region,” Pimentel said in an interview on Wednesday.

The two nations are already partnering up on stabilization and counterterrorism efforts, which are ongoing and will likely grow under the new MOU.

“The big question is whether security cooperation can spill over into other domains,” Pimentel said. “With more technical cooperation, intelligence sharing and training, we might see this spilling over into a narrow rapprochement between Algeria and Morocco over security cooperation in the Sahel.”

He explained how Algeria used to be close to the Soviet Union, and to this day it continues to rely on a lot of Russian military equipment. But, he noted, Algiers has also been “recalibrating” its relationships with Washington and Moscow for decades.

“It’s been interested in growing its U.S. relationship for a long time, partly so it’s not over-reliant on Russia, and partly to get things it wants from the United States. Cooperation has been especially strong in stabilization operations, security sector reform, and combatting transnational crime,” Pimentel told DefenseScoop.

“This new agreement continues that pattern of cooperation, but it also comes at a unique moment for U.S.-Algerian relations. After Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, Algeria seized on European efforts to diversify their energy supply chains. Russia has also been slow producing and supplying defense systems to Algeria, and Algeria is concerned about the Wagner Group’s destabilizing presence in Mali. The United States sees a real opportunity in this moment to reduce Russian influence in Algeria,” he said.

In a separate conversation, a U.S. defense official also pointed to how Russia’s losses in Syria have caused Algeria to only be able to depend on Libya in regards to port control on the entire Mediterranean Sea.

“Algeria was ‘a hope’ for Russia — but due to the amount of instability that Russia has brought to the Sahel, they and many Arab nations see Russia as a destabilizer,” the official said.

The signing of this new MOU also follows the U.S. military’s recent withdrawal of all its troops and assets that were previously deployed in Niger.

“Our presence fluctuates pending what is going on around the world, and administration to administration. This agreement shows a shift of Arab countries looking to the U.S. for partnership and stability,” the U.S. defense official said.

In response to DefenseScoop’s questions on Wednesday about what sparked this new commitment, the military spokesperson said the MOU is a result of negotiations between the Defense Department and the Algerian Ministry of National Defense that were held over a period of more than two years.

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In a telephonic briefing from Botswana on Monday, the Africom commander previewed his plans for the African Chiefs of Defense Conference that kicks off there Tuesday. Langley also shared new updates on the U.S.’s security posture and near-term operational plans in Africa.

“When I talk to all these countries, they’re not asking for U.S. troops on the ground, if you will, to any scope or magnitude. They say it’s their fight. They’re looking for capabilities — whether it be exquisite capabilities for intel-sharing, or being able to achieve the capability to identify indications and warnings for themselves — and that benefits both countries, because I’m charged to be able to identify indications and warnings of those that can hurt the homeland,” Langley said.

In May, the Defense Department announced that it had reached an agreement with the Nigerien military to remove all U.S. weapons and personnel from the West African nation — per the recent direction of the military junta that overthrew the elected government of Niger and installed the National Council for the Safeguard of the Homeland in July 2023. 

Before then, American service members had been working directly with the Nigerien military for more than a decade. Inside the country, they’ve operated across two military bases known for their drone arsenal and associated missions, called Air Base 101 and Air Base 201.

“There’s a joint statement out between the U.S. government and Niger on us being able to complete the movement of equipment and personnel by 15 September. Right now, we’re on pace, on plan, moving heavy equipment out of Air Base 101, and it will conclude with Air Base 201,” Langley told reporters. 

Following a similar demand from Chad’s leaders on the heels of Niger’s call, the U.S. military is now also removing forces from that nation as well.

In terms of his team’s overarching plan now, the general said Africom aims to work more closely with its partners in the region on tech-enabled activities to deter threats and respond to crises. 

“I don’t measure that in the amount of equipment, or the relocation of equipment. I measure it by capabilities,” Langley explained. “So, with that … I went on a listening tour [across West Africa] to ensure that I understood and I learned what capabilities they need going forward.”

DefenseScoop asked the commander whether Africom will move to invest in more terrestrial, space-based, or other intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) technologies to expand situational awareness and provide military leaders with a clear picture of the region — particularly once there are no longer U.S. boots on the ground.

“We’re assessing what we need to do to continue the counterterrorism fight. Our overall strategy, of course, to our ends are to deter threats and crisis response, but we’re also doubling down and bolstering partnership capacity and maintaining access and influence in a number of countries, and positive influence in a number of countries across the Sahel [region] and close to West Africa, because we see what direction the threat is going,” he responded.

In parallel with this “ongoing assessment,” Langley noted, the command also wants to help strengthen the capabilities of America’s African partners, who demonstrate “a shared interest and a shared threat that they’d like to counter themselves.” 

“So building up their capability by, with, and through, is what is going to be our primary objective. It’s not measured in how much ISR that we have — but collectively how much capability and capacity our partners have to fight terrorism. And then we’ll determine what additive [types] of exquisite capabilities we do [need] to be able to give an overall advantage of being able to identify indications or warnings against the threat,” the commander told DefenseScoop. 

Notably, against the backdrop of this transition, Langley also pointed to multiple ways Russia and China are each working fervently to outflank America and the West’s economic and military involvement and influence across Africa.

“The [People’s Republic of China] — they are very active on the African continent,” Langley told DefenseScoop.

Now that China has set up a naval base in Djibouti, the general said he knows they’re also “actively seeking and engaging with a number of other countries on the periphery of coastal West Africa, both in the East and in the West.” 

“So, we’re actually watching it and trying to determine what their overall objectives are. Is it power projection? Is it air denial and anti-access? That is something to be considered, and we’re watching that all the time to determine what China’s overall intentions are engaging with these other countries,” Langley noted.

During the briefing, he also confirmed that the summit this week marks the first time the annual African Chiefs of Defense Conference is being held on the continent of Africa.

“It’s African-led and U.S.-enabled,” Langley added.

More than 30 nations will be involved in the event.

“Every country has their different types of challenges and drivers of instability. That’s what’s going to be [on the table] for discussion,” the Africom commander said.  

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