{"id":4806,"date":"2020-02-01T14:45:47","date_gmt":"2020-02-01T21:45:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/the-war-diaries.com\/?p=4806"},"modified":"2020-02-01T14:47:08","modified_gmt":"2020-02-01T21:47:08","slug":"irans-footprint-in-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/the-war-diaries.com\/?p=4806","title":{"rendered":"Iran&#8217;s Footprint in Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><a href=\"https:\/\/newafricadaily.com\/african-asymmetry-soleimanis-legacy-continent\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"521\" src=\"http:\/\/the-war-diaries.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/Screen-Shot-2020-02-01-at-3.38.04-PM-1024x521.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-4807\" srcset=\"http:\/\/the-war-diaries.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/Screen-Shot-2020-02-01-at-3.38.04-PM-1024x521.png 1024w, http:\/\/the-war-diaries.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/Screen-Shot-2020-02-01-at-3.38.04-PM-300x153.png 300w, http:\/\/the-war-diaries.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/Screen-Shot-2020-02-01-at-3.38.04-PM-768x391.png 768w, http:\/\/the-war-diaries.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/Screen-Shot-2020-02-01-at-3.38.04-PM-1536x781.png 1536w, http:\/\/the-war-diaries.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/Screen-Shot-2020-02-01-at-3.38.04-PM.png 1604w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/a><figcaption>My current piece for the New Africa Daily.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>New York- <\/strong>With the extrajudicial assassination of Iran&#8217;s Major-General Qassem Soleimani outside Baghdad International Airport last month, I wanted to look at his strategic legacy a bit beyond the obvious headlines in Iraq and Syria. I decided to do a piece for a new all-Africa news portal startup <em><a href=\"https:\/\/newafricadaily.com\">New Africa Daily<\/a><\/em> on his Oods Force&#8217;s operations in Africa, with an emphasis on those in a cluster of dilapidated Red Sea littoral states opposite the Arabian Peninsula. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Much has been written of late on the 21st century edition of the &#8216;scramble for Africa,&#8217; much of it focused on Chinese inroads on the continent. I wanted to look at a lesser discussed player: Iran. For the now the pendulum has swung out of Tehran&#8217;s favour as Saudi and Emirati promises and projects have supplanted Iranian aims, particularly since the onset of the Saudi-led intervention in Yemen&#8217;s civil-turned-international war. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The so-called &#8216;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/indepth\/opinion\/saudi-uae-axis-destabilising-plans-gulf-190620174959333.html\">Arab axis<\/a>&#8216; is currently in ascendance in states where the Qods Forces had been active for years, or in the case of Sudan, decades. The Iranian foothold in Africa&#8217;s east has been mostly eviscerated for the time being. But looking at history in terms of decades rather than months, none of this is to indicate things couldn&#8217;t possible swing back toward Tehran should another was trigger yet another accompanying geopolitical shift. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>  <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>New York- With the extrajudicial assassination of Iran&#8217;s Major-General Qassem Soleimani outside Baghdad International Airport last month, I wanted to look at his strategic legacy a bit beyond the obvious headlines in Iraq and Syria. I decided to do a&hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"more-link-p\"><a class=\"more-link\" href=\"http:\/\/the-war-diaries.com\/?p=4806\">Read more &rarr;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4807,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[129,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4806","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-africa","category-iran"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.1.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Iran&#039;s Footprint in Africa - The War Diaries<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/the-war-diaries.com\/?p=4806\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Iran&#039;s Footprint in Africa - The War Diaries\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"New York- With the extrajudicial assassination of Iran&#8217;s Major-General Qassem Soleimani outside Baghdad International Airport last month, I wanted to look at his strategic legacy a bit beyond the obvious headlines in Iraq and Syria. 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