Tag Archives: counter piracy

U.S. Coast Guard support for maritime security in Africa; looking for news on Kenyan Coast Guard Service

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U.S. Coast Guard’s Mission to Africa from U.S. Naval Institute Press, by

Thetis departed Key West for Africa in late February, making it the first Coast Guard cutter to deploy in support of U.S Africa Command since 2012 and the first to participate in an African maritime exercise since 2011, according to Coast Guard news releases. Thetis participated in exercise Obangame Express and made port calls in Nigeria, São Tome and Principe and Cote d’Ivoire, among other work during the deployment.

U.S. military engagement with African nations is critical to protecting U.S. interests and helping stabilize governments on the continent, Adm. James Foggo, the commander of U.S. Forces Africa, explained during a recent edition of his podcast.

Having the U.S. Coast Guard deploy to Africa is useful, Foggo said, because the U.S. Coast Guard’s maritime law enforcement mission aligns with what he said African nations frequently cite as their most significant needs: enhancing their maritime security operations to protect fishing rights, stop smuggling and interdict human and drug trafficking.

For many of the nations, Chong said their navies perform missions similar to those of the U.S. Coast Guard. For the most part, the African navies and coast guards protect their fisheries resources from illegal fishing, search for smugglers and and combat the region’s ongoing piracy problems.

In many cases, the African nations use equipment very similar to what the U.S. Coast Guard employs. Smaller nations have patrol boats similar to those used by the U.S. Coast Guard, Chong said. Larger nations have frigates which are the same size as the U.S. Coast Guard’s national security cutters.

“The technology is very comparable to us as far as doing those type of boardings off a smaller platform or off a frigate,” Chong said.

In the case of Nigeria, Chong said Thetis operated with a former U.S. Coast Guard cutter. Current Nigerian navy frigate NNS Thunder (F90) is the former Hamilton-class high endurance cutter USCGC Chase(WHEC-718). Chase was transferred to Nigeria after being decommissioned in 2011.

“We’re helping a lot of these countries and their navies and coast guards to do boarding and security type functions,” Chong told USNI News. “We’re working with them jointly in their own maritime security zones.”

The US Coast Guard has been providing joint training for six Kenyan agencies involved in maritime/waterfront security for some years, and Kenya announced that was forming its own Coast Guard back in 1999, but did not pass legislation to do so until 2018. The Kenya Coast Guard Service was then “launched by the President last November in Mombasa:

Based at the Liwatoni Fisheries Complex in Mombasa, where the ceremony was held [commissioning of Offshore Patrol Vessel purchased from Bangladeshi shipyard as first vessel], the KCGS is tasked with protecting fisheries, enforcing maritime security and safety, preventing smuggling, protecting the maritime ecosystems, search and rescue, and supporting the military in times of war.

See the Ministry of Defense announcement here.

The Kenya Coast Guard Service was established under the Kenya Coast Guard Service Act 2018 and was operationalized on 22 October 2018. The Service, which will be commanded by a Director General, a position currently held by Kenya Navy’s Brigadier Vincent Loonena, has a role of ensuring safety in Kenya’s territorial waters, safeguarding Kenya’s ports and prevention of dumping of harmful wastes and pollutants in Kenya’s waters. It will also offer search and rescue services and prevent illegal commercial activities like fishing on Kenya’s waters. The service shall have its headquarter at Liwatoni, Mombasa and will operate mainly in Mombasa, Kisumu and Lamu.

The launch takes place only a week before the first Global Blue Economy Conference to be held in Nairobi in which over 8000 participants are expected to turn up.

News has been scarce since the Commissioning so I would be pleased to hear from anyone with an update.

Ten years into the major multinational counter piracy missions off the Horn of Africa, are China and India paying their fair share?

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Operation Atalanta of the European Union (EUNAVFOR) commenced in December 2008 and was joined by the Combined Maritime Forces (CMF) Combined Task Force for counter piracy force (CTF-151) in 2009.

The Combined Maritime Forces are a multinational security venture based in Bahrain, with U.S. and U.K. top command.

  • 33 member nations: Australia, Bahrain, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Iraq, Italy, Japan, Jordan, Republic of Korea, Kuwait, Malaysia, The Netherlands,  New Zealand, Norway, Pakistan, The Philippines, Portugal, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Seychelles, Singapore, Spain, Thailand, Turkey, UAE, United Kingdom, United States and Yemen.

China and India do send ships independently to cooperate in the CTF-151 mission. But given the volume of Chinese and Indian trade and shipping at this point, are they bearing their fair share of the cost?

Piracy has been radically reduced in recent years off Somalia and in the bab-el-Mandeb, Gulf of Aden region patrolled by CTF-151.

For the United States to solve the “free rider” problem for trade competitors, especially the PRC, the best approach it seems to me is to increase our own trade and investment in East Africa, as well as globally where we have facilitated the rise of the PRC as a trading power through free global maritime security, direct and indirect foreign investment, lax cybersecurity and intellectual property protections, etc.

While it has been our policy since my childhood to facilitate the rise of China, although under slightly varying rationales at different times over the years, President Trump has sometimes, along with a few of his advisors, expressed a desire to change this policy and our formal National Security Policy calls for recognition of “great power competition” as the superseding longterm priority to the ongoing war with al-Queda and progeny or similar groups.

National Security Advisor Bolton announced a “New Africa Policy” suggesting some rethinking back in December, but it seems to have been largely overcome by events since then. Bolton’s “back to the 80’s” focus on Cuba and Nicaragua to add to the standoff involving Venezuela, along with primary redirection of focus to the permanent “shadow war” with Iran, takes bandwidth, already constrained, away from African issues. Meanwhile rapidly unfolding events in Sudan, Algeria, Libya and Egypt at a time of increased uncertainty in much of Central Africa with limited clear U.S. engagement suggest that we are very much in flux about whether we are serious about recalibrating our overall reticence to compete in Africa.

Powerful forces of bureaucratic inertia and domestic American politics suggest that we are likely to continue deficit spending to help secure Chinese trade with Africa without get much further toward making it pay for itself at least through the 2020 election.

As of 2017, US exports to Sub-Saharan Africa were $ 11.7B., or somewhat less than the cost of an aircraft carrier or two amphibious assault carriers, with a trade deficit of $3B. Chinese exports were $37.4B with imports of $18.5B. (India had exports of $13.1B and imports of $19.7B.) The Chinese trade surplus with Sub-Saharan Africa approximately equals the annual U.S. Navy Shipbuilding and Conversion budget.