Well that certainly seems like shitty counter insurgency. It doesn't effect the material reasons that led to insurgents and creates more martyrs which increases recruitment and helps align the civilian population with the insurgency. The vietnamese knew this 50 years ago which is one of the reasons the US got its ass handed to it, has the US not learned it still?
Outside of the tactic not being effective though, why is the US interested in doing counterinsurgency in the region?
I would imagine western intelligence is very useful in fighting Isis. It certainly has been a huge boon for Ukraine in their war. As for why the west is interested in stopping the spread of Islamic extremism in Africa, foreign safe harbors for extremists often end up being training grounds for terrorists that attack the west.
So when all the extremists that now can't be monitored and controlled start commiting attacks in other parts of Africa, or sneak over the med to Europe to attack there, that's a good thing because.........?
Because the US is the worst extremist in the world, killing and torturing more people, more systematically, more continuously, and with munitions that poison the land enough to kill the children and the grandchildren who will be born there for decades later.
The article doesn’t mention that Niger is also the prime supplier of Uranium for the French nuclear powerplants (and probably for more EU countries). Like it or not, that’s an important aspect of Western presence as well.