The United States and Morocco Continue to Strengthen Military Cooperation

According to a report by Reference News on August 14, the website of the Spanish newspaper reported on August 11 that the diplomatic and defense relations between the United States and Morocco continue to draw closer. Washington views Morocco as an important ally in Africa, and as part of cooperative measures, the U.S. has begun conducting long-range weapon tests in Morocco.

The U.S. and Morocco announced in a joint statement that U.S. military personnel and members of the Royal Moroccan Armed Forces jointly completed the "first live-fire demonstration of the African Multi-Domain Training and Experimentation Center (AMTEC)."

This military facility is located in Tantan, just over 200 kilometers from Lanzarote in the Canary Islands, and is situated 50 kilometers north of the Western Sahara border.

This latest cooperation is based on a bilateral memorandum of understanding signed in July this year and represents another step in the long-standing close military alliance between the U.S. and Morocco. During Trump's two terms in office, military cooperation between the two sides significantly accelerated.

U.S. Africa Command stated that this is an important milestone in U.S.-Morocco defense cooperation. A series of practical exercises deeply assess equipment performance and accelerate the delivery of new equipment technologies to the AMTEC joint forces.

Colonel Zouhair Hamdani, a coordinator for the Royal Moroccan Armed Forces, stated: "Our goal is to make AMTEC a hub for regional innovation, strategic collaboration, and industrial development, while also establishing an excellence center focused on advanced technology testing, validation, evaluation, and research and development." Hamdani also mentioned that this test is "an important milestone in realizing the aforementioned vision."

The core equipment of this test is a low-cost long-range cruise missile system designed to provide economically viable and scalable precision strike options.

Another goal set by AMTEC is to provide specialized testing grounds for the military and defense industry entities to test new equipment, thereby strengthening the U.S.-Morocco strategic alliance.

General Dagvin Anderson, commander of U.S. Africa Command, stated: "Collaboration with Morocco provides a critical testing ground for our and African partner forces' readiness building. AMTEC not only strengthens security cooperation and promotes technological innovation but also proves that a trusted alliance is key to jointly addressing common security challenges." (Translated by Han Chao)