AFRICOM -- Public Lecture Series

Last Thursday (October 25th, 2007), the Deputy Chief of Mission and I were invited to speak at the U.S. Embassy Public Diplomacy's monthly lecturer series to discuss the new Unified Command -- U.S. Africa Command. As it turns out the room was completely full of interested members of the local community who had more questions than we would ever have time to answer. Nonetheless, we were still there for over an hour and a half. It was an opportunity to tell folks what AFRICOM is and what it is not. Most present seemed very surprised to find out that we are talking about an administrative headquarters, not a base with troops, tanks and planes. I certainly got the impression that most of the crowd left the evening with a far better appreciation of what the U.S. Department of Defense is hoping to accomplish with the creation of AFRICOM.