The first wave of United States military personnel has arrived in Nigeria, marking the beginning of a deployment of approximately 200 American intelligence analysts, advisers and trainers to assist the country’s armed forces in targeted counterterrorism operations aimed in part at protecting Nigerian Christians, officials from both countries confirmed on Friday.
A U.S. military plane landed in the northeastern city of Maiduguri on Thursday night, according to Nigerian officials. Officials from both countries confirmed that the first tranche of roughly 100 American troops will steadily arrive over the weekend. On Friday evening, three planes could be seen at the base, with equipment being offloaded from one, supervised by several U.S. military personnel.
These initial flights are the vanguard of what will be a stream of C-17 transport flights into three main locations across Nigeria, according to a U.S. Defense Department official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss operational matters. Several additional aircraft carrying troops and equipment are expected to land this weekend, with the flow continuing over the next couple of weeks, the Defense Department official said.
Maj. Gen. Samaila Uba, a Nigerian defense spokesman, said the arriving U.S. troops would focus exclusively on training and technical matters.
“These personnel do not serve in a combat capacity and will not assume a direct operational role,” said General Uba. “Nigerian forces retain full command authority, make all operational decisions and will lead all missions on Nigerian sovereign territory.”
General Uba said the deployment followed the recommendations of a U.S.-Nigeria joint working group, and that the troops would provide advisory support at various locations.
The U.S. Defense Department official corroborated this noncombat focus, noting that the Americans will operate primarily from command posts.
The footprint of the joint operations will span several volatile regions. A Nigerian official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss security matters, said the troops would be sent to northern states in Nigeria where jihadist groups like Boko Haram have been active, as well as to several states comprising the Middle Belt, the region where violence against Christians has been particularly pronounced.
The troop deployment follows months of escalating pressure from President Trump, who has sharply criticized the Nigerian government for failing to protect the country’s Christians from deadly attacks by Islamist militants and armed militias. While Christians have suffered horrific attacks in Nigeria, Muslims are also routinely killed in large numbers.
Late last year, Mr. Trump ordered a surprise U.S. missile strike in Nigeria on Christmas Day, targeting what he called “terrorist scum” that were killing Christians.
Because the U.S. troops are landing in remote locations with little infrastructure, much of their early work will involve setting up secure communications, base infrastructure and operational security done alongside their Nigerian counterparts, the Defense Department official noted.
The new forces augment a small team of American advisers already on the ground in Nigeria. According to the anonymous Nigerian official, the U.S. advisers already in place have been training Nigerian special forces in warfare tactics, including map reading and interpretation, as well as strike and rescue support operations.
The first batch of the newly trained Nigerian special forces was deployed to Plateau State this week, the Nigerian official added.
Moving forward, the combined U.S.-Nigerian forces will build out joint mission planning capabilities, relying on intelligence gathered from both Nigerian and American sources. This includes data from U.S. surveillance flights currently operating from a base in neighboring Ghana, according to the Defense Department official.
While General Uba declined to say how long the American troops would be deployed in Nigeria, the Pentagon has suggested that this specific mission is temporary. The flow of forces is scheduled to last for a couple of months to support a specific set of operations, the Defense Department official said, though the official added that successful joint operations could lead to further deployments in the future.
Ismail Auwal and Saikou Jammeh contributed reporting.
Ruth Maclean is the West Africa bureau chief for The Times, covering 25 countries including Nigeria, Congo, the countries in the Sahel region as well as Central Africa.
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