The African Union was founded in 1956 with the free African nations banning together to help each other with economic issues and for common defense. This has helped the nations of the AU not only gain a better economy but in 1995 the member nations of the AU joined together in a common military and the member nation's militaries were all unified under the AU, this has proved very effective during the Central African Warlord Crisis of 2010 where they were able to effectivley coordinate their movements against their enemies.