US Africa Command chief details high price of doing business with Russian mercenaries

While a Russian mercenary force has become famous for leading battles against the Ukrainian army, its work in various African countries predates that conflict.

General Michael Langley, chief of the U.S. Africa Command, spoke to senators on the Senate Armed Services Committee Thursday about the Wagner Group’s activities in Mali, Burkina Faso and Libya, among others.

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“Wagner’s short-term promises can be enticing, but the long-term outcome for African clients are nations mired in corruption and crime that stunt economic growth. Wagner’s financial price tag is exorbitant,” He stated it in his written testimony. “The full Wagner bill is even worse: the failure of government institutions, the withdrawal of stalwart security allies, the extraction of mineral wealth, and long-term resource concessions and debt that chips away at Africans’ future.”

“Wagner mercenaries have been quick to turn” Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal Muslimin (an al Qaeda affiliate in Mali) and Burkina Faso has caused chaos “into opportunity,” He wrote.

“Wagner’s draconian operations with its partner in Mali both add to the human cost of terrorism and create more openings for terrorist groups,” Langley stated. “Wagner exploits political fractures in Libya, where Russia seeks to threaten NATO’s southern flank. Wagner benefits from Libya’s fragmentation, and its interference in parts of Libya risks hindering efforts to form the unified national government and security forces that the Libyan people want and deserve.”

According to Brookings Institution, Wagner contractors were deployed to Syria and Yemen, Libya and Sudan, Mozambique and Madagascar. In many cases, they are used to suppress local uprisings, but it comes with a price. Brookings reported that 500 soldiers were sent to Sudan by the mercenary group in 2017 to put an end to Omar al Bashir’s rebellions. The group’s founder Yevgeny Privgozhin was also granted rights to the country’s gold mining.

Antony Blinken, Secretary of State, is currently in Niger. He also discussed the danger that the paramilitary organization poses to the continent.

“Where Wagner has been present, bad things have inevitably followed,” During a press conference, he spoke with Niger’s Foreign Ministry Hassoumi Massoudou. “The — it has not proven to be an effective response to insecurity, and at the same time we’ve seen countries that find themselves weaker, poorer, more insecure, less independent as a result of an association with Wagner. And we’ve also seen Wagner engage in the exploitation of a country’s resources, bring corruption with it, bring violence with it — overall worsening security, not improving it – and engaging in human rights abuses at the same time.”

Nearer to home, the Wagner Group was on the frontlines in the battle between the Russian military and the Ukrainian army in Bakhmut. Both sides have suffered terrible casualties in fighting that raged for months, but they were unable to seize the city’s center.

Prigozhin took advantage of a series of Russian military defeats to seize power within Russian President Vladimir Putin’s inner circle and for his organization, at the expense of Russia’s Ministry of Defense. Bakhmut was not captured by the Wagner Group, and the sides have remained at odds. “likely reached a boiling point,” According to the Institute for the Study of War, the Institute for the Study of War’s Sunday rundown of the most recent events in the war was published last Sunday.

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Prigozhin accused Sergei Shoigu, Russian Defense Minister, and Chief of Russian General Staff Gen. Valery Georasimov of treason. He claimed that they had intentionally provided his forces with fewer resources which led to unnecessary deaths.

“Putin and the Russian MoD may use Prigozhin as a scapegoat for the costly drive on Bakhmut once the offensive culminates. ISW assessed on February 5 that Putin relies on a group of scapegoats to publicly take risks in his place and shoulder the blame for Russian military failures and unpopular policies,” ISW has concluded. “Putin will likely use Wagner’s high casualties, reports about poor morale, and war crimes to deflect from likely equal or possibly worse problems within the Russian Armed Forces. Kremlin-affiliated milbloggers have ambushed Prigozhin with interviews that exposed numerous Wagner controversies regarding the ineffectiveness and mistreatment of the Wagner convict force — likely in an effort to set conditions in the Russian information space to discredit Wagner.”