Djibouti Government Forces US Drones To Leave Airport After Tense Summer For American Troops At Camp Lemonnier
Posted on 10/04/2013 7:00:25 PM PDT by Pan_Yan
Safety concerns have shuttered one of the United States' most important -- and most secretive -- bases for drone operations, forcing the American military to move its fleet of unmanned craft away from the international airport in the tiny desert country of Djibouti.
Djibouti, whose capital city goes by the same name, is an arid country of just 8,880 square miles (23,000 square kilometers) tucked between Ethiopia, Eritrea and Somalia. Its port lies at the nexus of the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, along one of the world's busiest shipping routes. And, since 2002, the U.S. military has made Camp Lemonnier "the primary base of operations for U.S. Africa Command in the Horn of Africa."
It is the central hub for surveillance drones and armed drone operations into Yemen, where al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula is based; and Somalia, home to the al-Shabab, whose fighters perpetrated the gruesome massacre in Nairobi, Kenya, this weekend.
There are about 4,000 U.S. troops, contractors and personnel at Camp Lemonnier, which was first established as a colonial outpost by the French Foreign Legion and is situated next to the Djibouti-Ambouli International Airport, at the edge of the capital city.
(Excerpt) Read more at ibtimes.com ...
The Frogs never should have surrendered the Territory of Afars and Issas. The old name was much cooler.
Shake Djibouti.
Ping.
While we’re in the neighborhood ...
Yep/
I even spelled it right when I did a search.
lol
LOL!
More results of Hillary’s vaunted “smart power”?
I’m impressed.
/ sarc
Yeah, I liked that name better, too.
You could at least ping the guy if you're going to talk about him!
I apparently haven’t seen the sheik around much....
Sir, extremely we’ll done- he he he
And I thought I had some crappy duty stations.
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