The Pentagon is seeking to enhance ties with allies like Morocco and Tunisia, gain long-term access to bases in Mali and Algeria and build on aircraft refueling agreements with Senegal and Uganda, the report said.

President George W. Bush leaves Monday on a whirlwind Africa trip with stops in Senegal, South Africa, Botswana, Uganda and Nigeria.

The military's plans for Africa pre-date Bush's trip and reflect a wider Pentagon review of where to position US forces throughout the world, the Times said.

Some of the initiatives are still at the proposal stage while others are already underway, it said.

Top authorities in the United States European Command, which oversees military operations in 93 countries including most of Africa, view the continent as an area of emerging threats.

"Africa, as can be seen by recent events, is certainly a growing problem," Marine Corps General James Jones, the head of the US European Command, told the Times in an interview.

"As we pursue the global war on terrorism, we're going to have to go where the terrorists are. And we're seeing some evidence, at least preliminary, that more and more of these large, uncontrolled, ungoverned areas are going to be potential havens for that kind of activity," he was quoted as saying.

The Pentagon is not seeking permanent US bases in Africa but wants to rotate troops in Europe to Africa more frequently, the report said.

It would like access to bases in Africa for training and for periodic strikes on terror groups including al-Qaeda and smaller African groups.

"These are groups that are similar to al-Qaeda, but not as sophisticated or with the same reach, but the same objectives," Air Force General Charles Wald, the European Command's second-in-command, told the Times. "They're bad people, and we need to keep an eye on that."

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