In August, Ali Bongo, then-president of the Central African nation of Gabon, made a startling revelation to a top White House aide: During a meeting at his presidential palace, Bongo admitted he had secretly promised Chinese leader Xi Jinpingthat Beijing could station military forces on Gabon’s Atlantic Ocean coast.
Alarmed, U.S. principal deputy national security adviser Jon Finer urged Bongo to retract the offer, according to an American national security official. The U.S. considers the Atlantic its strategic front yard and sees a permanent Chinese military presence there —particularly a naval base, where Beijing could rearm and repair warships—as a serious threat to American security.
“Any time the Chinese start nosing around a coastal African country, we get anxious,” a senior U.S. official said.
The charged exchange between Bongo and Finer in Libreville, Gabon’s capital, was just one skirmish in
the great-power maneuvering
between the U.S. and China in Africa. China is conducting a backroom campaign to secure a naval base on the continent’s western shores, American officials say. And, for more than two years, the U.S. has been running a parallel effort to persuade African leaders to deny the People’s Liberation Army Navy a port in Atlantic waters.
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@C1vilRightsTonyDemocrat2yrs2Y
What irks me the most about this is the revelation that, from a US Govt perspective, a horrible leader like Ali Bongo can wreak havoc on an entire country and we turn a blind eye. But a Chinese vessel? No, that's going way too far. Ironically, it is this transactional approach to African affairs that makes the likes of China even more attractive. Why? Nobody beats China at the morality-free game. Get your act together, America.
Decades and decades of US aid - direct and also indirect via IMF and World Bank - to both Gabon and Equatorial Guinea.
With Africa and many other places, it’s always about the next dollar.
Indonesia gets a free trade agreement from Biden and weeks later turns around and signs a Putin-like “forever friendship” pact with China - indirectly offshoring American purchasing power and sub-supply-chain-vulnerability to Chinese subcontractors. Just like Vietnam.
@MackerelBuckLibertarian2yrs2Y
Another example of the US deciding how the rest of the world should operate. Newsflash for our State Department: we're no longer king of the world, other countries are increasingly thinking for themselves, and much of the world doesn't feel as threatened by China (and many of our other enemies) as much as we do. Maybe it's time to accept this.
@OpulentC1v1cRepublican2yrs2Y
China's belt and road program, along with the Russian Wagner group, is akin to having Tony Soprana coming in and helping you with rowdy customers. Before you know it you are going broke because he is eating all of your profits. This is the foreign policy of China and Russia. Imbed Russian and China in the country and rape it of all its resources and expand the empire as well. Nobody willing to stop them in fear of starting WW3. It is inevitable that these nations will go to war, it's just a question of when. Not trying to be bleak but the cards are on the table.
“The U.S. considers the Atlantic its strategic front yard”. So we need to understand that by a fraction of that logic, Putin views Ukraine as something very similar, not to speak the Chinese regarding the South China Sea. In an era of increasingly available WMD, world leaders should come to agreements that ensure mutual security and reduce mutual distrust.
So, unnamed "U.S. officials" think they've done a decent job so far in keeping China out of the Atlantic side of Africa?? Think again. These are the same Biden officials who royally botched the Afghanistan withdrawal, which showed Putin he could invade Ukraine with impunity, whose fecklessness emboldened China to expand its China Sea footprint, who support Palestinian terrorists in their war against Israel, who did nothing to retaliate against repeated attacks on U.S. forces until our troops were maimed and killed, and then gave the enemy advance notice of our plans.
@ISIDEWITH2yrs2Y
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