A spokesman for the U.S. Africa Command, the combined command of all military branches operating in Africa, says “AfriCom,” as the command is known, won’t be coming to Georgia anytime soon.
“The Secretary of Defense said about a week ago that he was postponing any decision on a location of AfriCom until 2012,” says Vince Crawley, spokesman for AfriCom in Stuttgart, Germany, where the command is currently located. “There is long range interest in a base on the [African] continent, but also in having a substantial number of staff based somewhere not on the continent.”
Crawley, who spoke with the Sunday Paper this morning, points out that there was “a considerable amount of interest from members of Congress in the run up to the presidential election in office space in Georgia,” but the secretary of defense has said the command’s focus should be on bolstering partnerships with officers on the continent and also among others in the international community and concerns over a move would distract from those efforts. So, for the time being, home for AfriCom is in Stuttgart.
“One of the concerns is having good air connection and Atlanta, with Hartsfield, would have that, but no decision will be made until 2012,” says Crawley.