U.S. spends billions on African counterterrorism as jihadist groups expand
Despite $355 billion in U.S. aid since 2001, jihadist factions like JNIM have deepened their grip across the Sahel, with fighting ongoing in Mali.
JNIM militants launched a major offensive in Mali in April, assassinating Defense Minister Sadio Camara, breaking open a prison and surrounding the capital, Bamako. Their leader, Iyad Ag Ghali, a former rock-band percussionist, now heads a campaign against what he calls the "music of Satan" and fights a parallel war with the Islamic State Sahel Province. The United States has poured $355 billion into African counterterrorism since 2001, yet a Pentagon-run study reports a 101,300 percent surge in terrorism fatalities between 2002 and 2022, concentrated in the Sahel and Somalia.
U.S. airstrike levels under the Trump administration far exceeded those of the previous four years, while military aid has bolstered authoritarian regimes and facilitated coups by U.S.-trained officers. These juntas have turned to Russian mercenaries, whose brutal tactics have failed to halt JNIM advances, leading to repeated battlefield setbacks for the juntas and their foreign allies.
Why it matters
The growing jihadist threat in Africa challenges the effectiveness of massive U.S. counterterrorism spending and destabilizes the region.
In this story
