The Associated Press contributed to this report. The drones, with surveillance and added striking capabilities, will have a range enabling them to reach a number of West and North African countries. To the extent thisreport highlights tactical decisions made by Soldiers in the heat of battle, it should notbe overlooked that American and Nigerien forces fought courageously on 4 October2017. The base will eventually also house fighter jets. Three hangars and the first layers of a runway have been completed at Niger Air Base 201, which is expected to be fully functional early next year. The nine-minute video is shot from the helmet cams of the Americans who died on October 4 in Tongo Tongo after being attacked by 50 jihadis, according to The Sun. They are expected to target several different al-Qaida and Islamic State group-affiliated fighters in countries throughout the Sahel, a sprawling region just south of the Sahara, including the area around Lake Chad, where Nigeria’s Boko Haram insurgency has spread. ISIS has released a horrific video appearing to show the final moments of four US soldiers who were ambushed in Niger. MQ-9 Reapers, operated by the Air Force’s 323rd Expeditionary Reconnaissance Squadron, are reportedly already flying out of the base in Agadez, but eventually, the entire drone operation in Niamey will move there. The reconnaissance drone had been “soaking” the village where he was thought to be for roughly six hours.Īir Force officials have described the construction of Niger Air Base 201, on the edge of the Sahara Desert, as the largest US troop labor construction project in history. drones to fly with armed warheads, even for defensive missions.ĭuring the October mission, the team was participating in a capture or kill operation against a high-value militant leader named Dondou Chefou. But before December, Nigerien officials were not allowing U.S. The Niger mission originally did have ISR drone coverage. So we have beefed up a lot of things posture wise with regard to these forces.” “But it provides adequate and more resourceful force protection measures in order to still keep up with the enemy forces on the ground. WASHINGTON Multiple failures led up to the deadly Niger attack last October, but top military leaders said Thursday that none directly caused the overwhelming enemy ambush that killed four. “And what this has done is it’s allowed these teams perhaps to not to do the tempo that they would like,” he added. AFP PHOTO / DOMINIQUE FAGET (Photo credit should read DOMINIQUE FAGET/AFP/Getty Images) Operation Barkhane is an anti-Islamist operation in Africa's Sahel region beginning in July 2014 which consists of a 3,000-strong French force. The results are expected to be released this month.Ī team of 12 soldiers was on a mission with a team of Nigerien troops.Īrmy Sergeant La David Johnson and Staff Sergeants Bryan Black, Jeremiah Johnson and Dustin Wright were killed in the ambush.French soldiers of the aerial detachment of the Operation Barkhane stand guard near a Reaper drone about to take off from the Nigerian military airport Diori Hamani in Niamey on January 2, 2015. 4, 2017, prompted an investigation by the Pentagon into whether the soldiers were appropriately trained and armed for a mission in the west African nation. The helmet cam footage is a piece of hard evidence, one which depicts factual events. An ISIL propaganda video showing the deadly ambush of American troops in Niger raised questions on Monday as to the nature of the mission and why the soldiers had been left so vulnerable. "The release of these materials demonstrates the depravity of the enemy we are fighting," it said. Newly-released video showing the deadly ambush of American soldiers in Niger is raising new questions about the U.S. The ambush in Niger has also been subject to myths, rumors, and propaganda as were events in Jordan and Benghazi. This Department of Defense video explains the events that led to the death of four U.S. The Tongo Tongo ambush or the Niger ambush occurred on 4 October 2017, when armed militants from the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara (ISGS) attacked. The Pentagon on Monday said it was aware of the video. The video ends with the soldier wearing the camera falling and being surrounded by militants who shoot at him. That segment shows two other soldiers shooting and running beside an SUV while taking fire near the village of Tongo Tongo. Part of the nine-minute recording appears to be taken from the helmet camera of one of the fallen soldiers. In the video, three American soldiers have few resources to fight off dozens of militants armed with machine guns and grenades. A propaganda video released by Islamic State appears to show an ambush in Niger that killed four American soldiers last year.
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