Coast Guard aids effort to secure African coasts

[unhappycamper]

Coast Guard aids effort to secure African coasts
By John Vandiver, Stars and Stripes
European edition, Monday, October 13, 2008

STUTTGART, Germany — When Adm. Thad Allen starts his speeches, oftentimes he likes to kick things off with the same line: "If you looked at this planet from space, you wouldn’t call it Earth, you would call it ‘Ocean.’ "

And in the case of Africa, a continent with nearly 19,000 miles of coastline, water also looms large when it comes to security concerns such as piracy, drug trafficking and the economic scourge of illegal fishing.

"There are significant maritime issues in Africa," said Allen, commandant of the U.S. Coast Guard.

On Thursday, Allen was in Stuttgart to meet with leaders of the newly established U.S. Africa Command, which officially became the military’s sixth unified command on Oct. 1.

The Coast Guard, which functions as both a law enforcement agency and counts as one of the military’s five armed services, is uniquely positioned to help in the AFRICOM effort to assist smaller countries in securing their coastlines, Allen said.


Rest of Africom article at: http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=58104