Mali mainly, 2012 coup, drugs & more

[Dayuhan]

African governments and the African public are not as interested in the relationship between US corporations and the US govt as they are in who is most likely to bring in the investment that will provide them jobs.

I'm sure they are, but neither American corporations nor the US Government have any obligation to provide jobs and investment to anyone. Nations who wish to attract investment have to seek it out and adjust their own policies and practices to make themselves attractive investment destinations. Investors don't compete for the opportunity to invest, nations compete to attract investors. Nations that delude themselves into thinking they're the belle of the ball and all the investor boys are going to come begging them to dance with no effort on their part will end up spending a lot of time an the edge of the dance floor, and at the end of the night the only guy who comes round is likely to be the sleazy date rapist with a roofie in his pocket.

Of course it's easy to blame investors for not investing and creating jobs, and that makes everyone feel good and diverts responsibility from where it belongs... but anyone who really wants investment and jobs needs to take action locally, not whine about what someone else is or isn't doing.

This may be selfish, myopic and uninformed, but it is just the way things are. And if the US was in a similar situation, Americans would feel the same way.

Very true, but how is that any of our business? How Africans feel is not our problem.

Just like corporations compete, nations compete. At this point in time, China Inc has certain advantages over US Inc in Africa.

Why would we want to compete with the Chinese for the dubious privilege of getting involved with that mess? There will be exceptions, but for the most part we're better off letting them deal with it. It's not as if African investment is somehow analogous to oceanfront real estate, something everybody desperately wants to be involved with.

If the US government thinks that the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act hinders the competitiveness of US businesses in Africa - well, that's the State Department's call.

State has nothing to say about it. It's a law, passed by Congress and signed by the President. Congress could repeal it, but there's close to zero chance of that happening in the current political environment.

I accept that AFRICOM training may not have been responsible for Mali's coup, but it isn't that difficult for enemies of the US (and they are quite a few) to suggest that there is a link between the two. Secondly, the Congolese Army also claims to be AFRICOM trained - and it also fell like a pack of cards in the face of M23 rebels.

No matter what the US does or doesn't do, enemies of the US will find ways to suggest that everything bad that happens anywhere is somehow a consequence of US action or inaction. Many people will believe it. That is given and irreversible. It's been that way for so long that most of us have become impervious. If we blamed ourselves for everything we're blamed for we'd either commit physical suicide or the intellectual suicide of joining the Chomsky faction of the left.

A good foreign policy should limit the number of unforced errors. Presently there are just too many unforced errors for anyone to conclude that US policy is wise.

If anything that goes wrong after engagement with the US is going to be seen as a US error, we have to either stop engaging or ignore those perceptions. Anyone who thinks a few months of US training will make an army function or that US engagement is going to transform dysfunctional nations is barking at the moon. Again, if engagement is going to create irrational expectations, the choices are to stop engaging or ignore the expectations and live with the blame from those who hold them. Living up to the expectations is not possible in the real world.

Finally, I don't really care - I've seen the writing on the wall. Whatever the US does or doesn't do will have very little impact on the future of my generation of Africans.

I wish more people realized that.