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Belgian Commandos in Africa: Secretive and highly effective

Belgian commandos from the Special Forces Group (Photo courtesy of Wikipedia Commons).

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The deadly ambush in Niger in 2017, which resulted in the deaths of four Americans, revealed to a dumbfounded public the silent war that has been taking place in the Sahel. Aside from U.S. troops, several other countries have a strong presence in the area. Belgium is one of them. And its Special Forces Group appears to have been devastatingly efficient.

According to a report authored by Dr. Nina Wilén, research director of the Africa Program at the Egmont Royal Institute for International Relations and an assistant professor at the department of political science at the Free University of Brussels, the Belgian commandos have been conducting crucial training and advising operations with minimum manpower commitment.

The partnership between the Belgian commandos and their Nigerien counterparts began after the two groups established connections during the annual Flintlock exercises of the last few years. Flintlock is the largest special operations exercise in Africa, drawing special operators from across the world.

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Comments

Join our community. To comment on this article please join/login. Here's a sample of the comments on this post.

  • Alan t

    Lol

  • Jeds

    Africa is becoming a complete mess due to mercenaries , failed states and increasing footprint of Jihadist networks who are seeking to attack US and its allies on home soil.

  • Stanley H

    Check the 1960's.

  • Thomas G

    This is news to me. In the days of yore, the Belgians used to solve their African problems via the French Foreign Legion or SA mercenaries.

  • Stavros Atlamazoglou

    Tim, Good point, but for better or worse, the Belgians have a very different cultural environment. Also, the bigger the bear, the bigger its turds.