FUNDING DEFENSE: CHALLENGES OF BUYING MILITARY CAPABILITY IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA

The American military, particularly the Army, plays a
modest but significant role in helping the nations of
Sub-Saharan Africa build regional security systems. Some
of the most important U.S. efforts focus on assisting
Africans as they improve their civil-military relations,
strategic planning methods, and defense budgeting
procedures. All of these are interlinked: stable
civil-military relations and coherent strategic planning
depend on a transparent budgeting process that builds
consensus among military and civilian leaders, and ties the
allocation of resources to strategic objectives, military
missions, and threats.
In this monograph, Martin Rupiya, Director of the
University of Zimbabwe’s Centre for Defence Studies, and
Daniel Henk of the Air War College provide one of the first
comprehensive studies of defense budgeting practices in
Africa. They assess both the problems with these practices,
and fruitful avenues of reform. By doing so, they provide a
solid roadmap both for African leaders and for Americans
concerned with the development of greater security in the
region.
The Strategic Studies Institute is pleased to publish this
monograph as a contribution to the analysis of the Army
role in regional security.