By: Sophia Akram |on 10th March 2016
Experts have commentated that conflict is now more protracted and marred with brutal and ‘dirty’ strategies
The nature of war has well and truly changed. Experts have commentated that conflict is now more protracted and marred with brutal and ‘dirty’ strategies. That applies to the conflicts we know about – what about those we don’t. War seems to be acting out in more covert ways supposedly in the pursuit of national security.
That has certainly been the argument by key players that have their fingers in other people’s pies.
Recently, Le Monde reported that French special forces had been spotted in Eastern Libya, conducting a secret operation involving targeted strikes against the Islamic State (IS). France’s pledge to fight terrorism was not simply a pledge to commit defence capabilities in Syria, it includes covert operations conducted by the Service of the General Directorate for External Security (DGSE).
The discreet operation apparently has the objective of curbing the rise of IS by hitting its infrastructure and has involved a number of key outcomes. Recent action includes a joint London, Paris and Washington operation on 19 February against a Tunisian cell of IS in Sabbath, in Western Libya. The most senior member of IS in Libya, Abu Nail was also apparently killed in Derna last year in November by a Paris strike.
The leek that exposed the operation has not been taken lightly however and will be investigated – a criminal prosecution is being sought out by the Directorate for the Protection and Security of Defense (DPSD) and Jean-Yves Le Drian, French Defence Minister.
France’s presence in Libya has not been limited of course to the recent covert op, it’s had a leading role in the 2011 NATO operation against Gaddafi and led reconnaissance missions at the time.
France is not the only country to be carrying out covert wars against IS or other terrorist organisations. The US involvement in various hotspots across the world has been exposed over the years. It has also admitted very recently that they killed 150 individuals while targeting Al Shabaab militants in a drone strike in Somalia.
The White House now claims that it will move towards more transparent operations except where there are active hostilities such as Iraq, Syria and Yemen.
A book and documentary written by Jeremy Scahill in 2013 revealed the extent of US covert operations, as America has been deploying special operation forcesto incrementally to 134 nations (it started from 60 during the Bush administration and increased by 123 percent under Obama). Its been described as an aded dynamic to US power projection but was hidden away from public oversight and scrutiny, increasing the chances of unforeseen blowback.
Commentators and researchers are also highlighting NATO involvement in Syriaand a covert war there long before the narrative of violence was crafted by the media.
Revelations of previously unidentified activity by states in other countries always brings up uneasy contestations and questions to answer. When something is conducted away from prying eyes, there is a lack of scrutiny, which creates an enabling environment for transgressions of moral and legal standards of conduct, particularly if it provides for advantage.
Making a presence overt takes away that advantage completely and could hinder an operation as well as national security. Its a claim that is made and is also true at times.
This provides a difficult balancing act – how much can our Governments be allowed to get away with? This makes the White House statement welcome in some respect.
More transparency where they are operational in non-combat zones. This gives them circa 130 countries and operations to disclose and apparently an annualrecord of civilian casualties vis a vis militants will be released. The 150 civilians in Somalia have implicitly been assumed militants as they are confident that they have degraded al Shabaab’s ability, although no evidence of this is being offered of this.
This new dynamic of conflict should be something that is acknowledged. While public oversight may not always be possible, some sort of framework should be provided, perhaps by an intelligence watchdog to ensure that blanket assertions or excuses of ‘national security’ are not basely applied.
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