The United States is expanding military cooperation with Nigeria as part of a broader effort to counter Islamic State–linked militant networks across Africa, signalling a more assertive counterterrorism posture under President Donald Trump’s second administration and a renewed emphasis on intelligence-driven operations.
The shift follows a surprise series of US air strikes on Christmas Day targeting Islamic State–affiliated militants in north-western Nigeria, and reflects growing alarm in Washington over the southward spread of jihadist groups from the Sahel into coastal West African states. US officials increasingly describe the region as a single, interconnected theatre rather than a collection of isolated insurgencies.
A Networked Jihadist Threat Across Africa
Lieutenant General John Brennan, a senior Pentagon official, said the United States was intensifying its partnership with Nigeria while maintaining limited security engagement with junta-led governments in Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger.
“We’ve gotten a lot more aggressive and are working with partners to target, kinetically, the threats, mainly ISIS,”
Brennan said in an interview on the sidelines of the inaugural US–Nigeria Joint Working Group meeting in Abuja last week.
He described the jihadist landscape across Africa as deeply interconnected, stretching from the Horn of Africa to the Atlantic coast.
“From Somalia to Nigeria, the problem set is connected. So we’re trying to take it apart and then provide partners with the information they need,”
Brennan said.
US defence officials estimate that Islamic State affiliates now operate in at least a dozen African countries, with West Africa emerging as one of the group’s fastest-growing theatres following sustained military pressure in Iraq and Syria.
Nigeria’s Expanding Conflict Zones
The renewed cooperation follows increased diplomatic pressure from Washington on Nigeria, particularly regarding the rising levels of violence in the country, but in the northern and the north-west in particular. For more than a decade, the West African country has battled a security crisis, ranging from the deadly extremism of Boko Haram and its break-off camps, which have claimed the lives of tens of thousands, displacing more than 3 million people, beginning in 2009.
In the international community, more than 350,000 people have died due to violence prompted by jihadist groups, criminal bandits, or ethnic clashes. In the north-west, apart from cattle rustling incidents, the terrorist cells affiliated with the Islamic State movement are taking advantage of the poor government. Kidnapping has become more common.
Religious Sensitivities and Diplomatic Friction
That tension surfaced at the Abuja meeting, where senior US State Department official Allison Hooker urged Nigerian authorities to protect Christian communities in remarks that did not reference Muslim victims of armed groups.
Nigeria is roughly evenly split between a predominantly Muslim north and a largely Christian south, making religious identity a politically sensitive issue. Armed groups have targeted both communities, including Muslim clerics and Christian pastors, often for tactical rather than ideological reasons.
Brennan sought to play down concerns over religious bias, stressing that US intelligence support would not be limited to any one group or region.
“Our focus is on the threat actors,”
he said, adding that Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) remains the most capable and concerning jihadist organisation in Nigeria, particularly in the north-east, where it has repeatedly overrun military bases and seized weapons.
Intelligence-Led Operations and Air Power Limits
Following the Christmas Day strikes in Sokoto State, US assistance will focus on intelligence sharing to support Nigerian air operations in both the north-west and the long-troubled north-east, Brennan said.
Analysts have observed an increase in US intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance flights over Nigeria in recent months, part of a wider effort to compensate for the loss of American drone bases in Niger. However, security experts caution that air power alone is unlikely to decisively weaken militant groups operating in areas marked by extreme poverty, limited state presence, and deep mistrust of security forces.
The strikes reportedly targeted militants linked to Islamic State Sahel Province, a faction traditionally active in Niger and Mali but increasingly feared to be pushing south into Nigeria and potentially towards Benin, Togo, and Ghana. Their immediate impact remains unclear, as journalists have been unable to independently verify casualties. Nigeria’s information minister, Mohammed Idris, described the operation as “still a work in progress.”
Sahel Coups and Quiet Cooperation
Beyond Nigeria, Brennan confirmed that the United States continues to share intelligence with military authorities in Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger, despite the collapse of formal security partnerships following a wave of coups between 2020 and 2023.
“We have actually shared information with some of them to attack key terrorist targets,”
he said, adding that communication with Sahelian militaries continues even in the absence of official defence agreements.
This quiet cooperation underscores Washington’s concern that a security vacuum in the Sahel has allowed jihadist groups to expand rapidly, with some areas seeing a doubling of attacks over the past three years.
No Return to Permanent US Bases
Brennan ruled out the establishment of new US military bases in West Africa, following the closure of American drone operations in Niger after the ruling junta ordered US forces to leave.
“We’re not in the market to create a drone base anywhere,”
he said.
“We are much more focused on getting capability to the right place at the right time and then leaving.”
For Nigeria—Africa’s most populous nation, with more than 220 million people, and a key regional military power—the deepening partnership highlights its growing strategic importance in Washington’s recalibrated Africa security strategy. As Islamic State–linked groups adapt, fragment, and expand across the continent, the United States appears increasingly willing to rely on Nigeria as a cornerstone of its counterterrorism efforts in West Africa.
