US Builds Up Bases in Italy for African Ops
TRIPOLI -- The U.S. deployment of 200 Marines to a naval base in Sicily for possible operations in Libya, a short hop across the Mediterranean, underlines how the Americans have been building a network of bases in Italy as launch pads for military interventions in Africa and the Mideast.
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But small units are deployed across Africa. Meantime, the Americans have established a network of bases in Italy, involving a significant manpower shift southward from the old Cold War bastion of Germany.
The Marines moved to Italy from Spain this month are the vanguard of a larger force dubbed Special Purpose Marine Air-Ground Task Force-Crisis Response.
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According to U.S. security specialist David Vine, the Pentagon has spent around $2 billion -- and that's just construction costs -- "shifting its European center of gravity south from Germany" and transforming Italy "into a launching pad for future wars in Africa, the Middle East and beyond."
http://www.military.com/daily-news/2013/10/16/us-builds-up-bases-in-italy-for-african-ops.html