Opinions

If the bases come, the missiles will follow

March 9, 2026

By Babayola M. Toungo

The widening arc of confrontation between the United States and Iran has once again revealed a recurring pattern in the architecture of modern power: wars fought by great powers rarely remain confined to their own territories. Instead, they are exported – geographically, strategically, and politically – to the territories of allies, partners, and client states that host the infrastructure of power projection. Military bases, radar installations, and logistical hubs scattered across the world become extensions of American force. And once they assume that role, they also become legitimate targets in the eyes of Washington’s adversaries.

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This is precisely the dilemma confronting the Gulf states today. From Qatar to Bahrain, from Kuwait to the United Arab Emirates, American military facilities dot the landscape as pillars of Washington’s security architecture in the Middle East. These bases are not merely symbolic presences; they are operational platforms from which surveillance is conducted, missiles are launched, aircraft are deployed, and wars are managed. In the event of escalation with Iran, these installations are indistinguishable from American soil. Consequently, they become substitute targets – proxies for a distant superpower whose own population remains thousands of miles away from the immediate theatre of retaliation.

The cruel irony is that the ordinary people of the Gulf pay the price of decisions taken elsewhere. They become the frontline casualties of strategic calculations made in Washington and Tel Aviv. While American cities remain shielded by oceans and distance, the towns and infrastructure surrounding these bases sit directly under the shadow of retaliation. What appears as “security cooperation” in diplomatic language is, in practice, a transfer of risk from the metropolitan centre of power to its peripheral hosts.

This dynamic becomes even more troubling when one considers the origins of the present confrontation. The current cycle of escalation did not arise from an unavoidable collision of civilizations or an inevitable clash of geopolitical interests. Rather, it is the product of deliberate political choices – choices shaped by ideological hostility toward Iran and by the strategic calculations of actors who have long sought to neutralize Tehran as a regional power. The aggressive posture adopted during the administration of Donald Trump, encouraged and amplified by the strategic anxieties of Israel under Benjamin Netanyahu, laid the groundwork for a confrontation that now threatens to engulf an entire region.

Thus the Gulf states find themselves in a paradoxical situation: allies of the United States, yet potential victims of wars initiated by American strategic doctrine. Their territories serve as platforms for American power projection, but that same role exposes them to retaliation from America’s adversaries. They host the machinery of war but do not control the political decisions that trigger it.

This is not a new phenomenon. It is a classic feature of imperial strategy. Throughout history, empires have sought forward bases not merely to extend their reach but also to externalize the risks of conflict. By dispersing military infrastructure across allied territories, the imperial centre ensures that any retaliation will fall first on distant peripheries rather than on the homeland itself. The host countries, willingly or otherwise, become buffers – absorbing the initial shocks of conflicts they did not originate.

It is within this broader framework that Africa must examine its own emerging entanglement with external military powers. For years, the Sahel has become a theatre of intense geopolitical competition, with Western powers establishing military footholds under the banner of counterterrorism. The American drone base in Agadez, Niger, once stood as the most prominent symbol of this strategy – a vast installation from which surveillance and strike operations were conducted across the Sahel.

But that era is now over. The political transformations in Niger and the wider Sahel have led to the expulsion of Western military forces, effectively dismantling one of Washington’s most important operational hubs in the region. Deprived of this strategic foothold, the United States has been forced to search for alternative platforms from which it can continue its surveillance and counterterrorism operations. Inevitably, attention has begun to shift toward Nigeria.

From a purely military standpoint, Nigeria offers several advantages: its geographic position at the crossroads of West and Central Africa, its extensive infrastructure, its large armed forces, and its proximity to the volatile Sahel region. For planners in Washington, Nigeria presents an attractive substitute for the lost base in Niger – a new anchor for American operational presence in the region. But what appears advantageous from the perspective of American strategy could be profoundly dangerous for Nigeria itself.

Hosting a foreign military base is never a neutral act. It alters a country’s geopolitical posture and redefines its strategic identity. Once a nation becomes a platform for external military operations, it inevitably becomes entangled in the conflicts and rivalries of the power that occupies that base. Its territory ceases to be merely national space; it becomes part of a global military network. For Nigeria, the implications of such a development are deeply troubling.

First, there is the question of sovereignty. A foreign military base, no matter how it is packaged diplomatically, inevitably dilutes national autonomy. Operational decisions, intelligence priorities, and strategic objectives are shaped not by the host country but by the external power whose forces occupy the facility. The host government may claim partnership, but the asymmetry of power ensures that control ultimately resides elsewhere.

Second, there is the question of security vulnerability. Once Nigeria hosts American military infrastructure, it automatically becomes a potential target for the adversaries of the United States. In a world of expanding geopolitical rivalries – where powers such as Russia, China, and Iran increasingly contest American influence – foreign bases transform their hosts into nodes within a global confrontation. In other words, Nigeria risks inheriting enemies that are not its own.

The country already faces enormous internal security challenges: insurgency in the northeast, banditry in the northwest, communal conflicts across the Middle Belt, and rising economic pressures that strain national cohesion. Introducing a foreign military presence into this fragile environment could further complicate an already volatile security landscape. It could attract new threats, intensify propaganda narratives among extremist groups, and deepen the perception that Nigeria’s sovereignty is being subordinated to external interests.

Third, there is the ideological dimension. Africa’s long history with foreign military intervention – from colonial occupation to Cold War proxy conflicts – should have taught painful lessons about the dangers of becoming a staging ground for great power rivalries. Yet the temptation to trade sovereignty for short-term security assistance continues to haunt many African governments. This is precisely the trap Nigeria must avoid.

True national security cannot be outsourced. It cannot be subcontracted to external powers whose strategic priorities may shift with every electoral cycle in Washington. What Nigeria requires is not the establishment of foreign bases on its soil but the strengthening of its own institutions, the professionalization of its armed forces, and the development of a coherent regional security architecture led by Africans themselves. To invite a foreign military base into Nigeria under the pretext of counterterrorism would be to repeat a familiar historical error: mistaking dependency for partnership and presence for protection.

The experience of the Gulf states should serve as a cautionary tale. Hosting foreign military infrastructure may appear to enhance security, but it also transforms national territory into a potential battlefield for conflicts that originate elsewhere.

Nigeria must therefore ask a fundamental question before taking any such step: whose war would it ultimately be hosting?

For a nation already grappling with profound internal challenges, the last thing it needs is to become another forward outpost in the geopolitical chessboard of great powers – a pawn in struggles whose consequences will be borne not in Washington, but on Nigerian soil.

Toungo writes from Kaduna.