Lessons From Marines’ Special Africa Force: Juba, The Anti-Bengahzi

[unhappycamper]

http://breakingdefense.com/2014/02/lessons-from-marines-special-africa-force-juba-the-anti-bengahzi/



After the US Ambassador to Libya, J. Christopher Stevens, was murdered in Benghazi, the call went out to beef up America’s ability to respond rapidly to smaller attacks and crises. The Marines created a new Special Purpose force. This is the first time anyone has gotten interviews with anyone but the commander in the Marines’ new SP-MAGTF force. The unit, temporarily based in Spain but designed to operate throughout Africa, is also part of the Marines’ campaign to build rapid reaction forces throughout the world’s nastiest regions — Africa, the Middle East and the Pacific. The Army is doing much the same as the two services vie to become essential and thus protect their force structure and budgets. The news peg for this piece is the Marines and Special Forces’ flights from Djibouti to Juba to evacuate Westerners. Murielle Delaporte looks at the training, gear and international cooperation (think Beau Geste and his Spanish cousins) that the new Marine force relies on and how they were used during the Juba rescue. The Editor.

Over $200,000,000 of Ospreys in the pic. unhappycamper.

Lessons From Marines’ Special Africa Force: Juba, The Anti-Bengahzi
By Murielle Delaporte
on February 11, 2014 at 3:04 PM

The evacuation of several hundred Westerners from South Sudan in early January, after the country slowly collapsed into warring factions, was a success, judged on at least three criteria: decide and act quickly; prepare and train appropriately alone and with allies; work with and rely on regional partners.

The decision to secure the embassy and do evacuations was taken on December 15 and on December 22. Some 160 Marines and sailors from the Special-Purpose Marine Air Ground Task Force-Crisis Response were flown in two KC-130s and four MV-22B Ospreys from their temporary base in Spain to Djibouti and on to Uganda. At 3,400 nautical miles (a distance equivalent to Anchorage to Miami), this was the longest range insert ever performed by this force. (Readers will remember that three AFSOC MV-22s were fired on when they tried to land at the South Sudanese town of Bor. Four on board were wounded. The Editor.)

Air Force Lt. Col. Glen Roberts, spokesman for the Djibouti-based joint force, explained the sequence of events following the worsening of the domestic situation in South Sudan on December 15.

“On December 15, there was in South Sudan a very small contingent of Marines ensuring the security of the US Embassy in Juba, as Marines traditionally guard US embassies across the world. The decision was made to evacuate part of the personnel from the embassy, and, in order to do that, that mission was given to US AFRICOM, which then confided its execution to the CJTF-HOA (Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa).”