Michael M. Phillips
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 Jinping that 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.
Gabon President Ali Bongo with Chinese leader Xi Jinping in Beijing last year. Bongo told a U.S. official that he had promised Beijing a naval position on Gabon’s Atlantic coast. PHOTO: KEN ISHII/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE/GETTY IMAGES
Jon Finer, U.S. principal deputy national security adviser, urged Bongo to retract the offer in the weeks before he was overthrown. PHOTO: IVAN VALENCIA/ASSOCIATED PRESSThe Chinese government didn’t reply to a written request for comment. The Foreign Ministry said it was unaware of the government’s military plans in Gabon or elsewhere on Africa’s Atlantic coast.
Within weeks of his meeting with Finer, Bongo was overthrown by his own presidential guard, and the U.S. was forced to start again, trying to persuade the new Gabonese junta leader to shun Chinese overtures.
It’s a battle American officials say they are winning. So far, no African country with an Atlantic coastline has signed a deal with China, U.S. officials say.
“We’re confident that Gabon is not going to permit a permanent P.L.A. presence or establish a Chinese military facility,” the U.S. national-security official said.
Next door, in Equatorial Guinea, where U.S. officials have previously flagged Chinese efforts to open a base, Washington has seen no signs of military construction at a Chinese-built, deep-water commercial port in the city of Bata, which would be the most likely spot for such a presence, the national security official said.
Authorities in Equatorial Guinea, a repressive, family-run oil state, have “consistently assured us that they will not have the P.R.C. construct a base,” the official said.
Chinese navy ships freely transit international waters. And Chinese companies have built some 100 commercial ports in Africa since 2000, from Mauritania in the far west to Kenya on the Indian Ocean, according to the Chinese government.
A Chinese navy ship in Cape Town, South Africa, in 2019. U.S. officials say no African country with an Atlantic coastline has signed a deal with China so far. PHOTO: CHEN CHENG/XINHUA/ALAMY
Djibouti, the tiny nation overlooking the strategic Red Sea, has a permanent base for Chinese ships and trips. PHOTO: ELIAS MESSERET/ASSOCIATED PRESSOnly one African port, however, serves as a permanent base for Chinese ships and troops: The P.L.A.’s seven-year-old facility in Djibouti, which overlooks the strategic Red Sea where the U.S. and its allies are currently defending shipping routes against attacks from Iran-backed Houthi rebels from Yemen. The Chinese base, capable of docking an aircraft carrier or nuclear submarines, sits a short drive from the largest American base in Africa, Camp Lemonnier, a hub for the U.S. campaign against al-Shabaab, the virulent al Qaeda affiliate operating in Somalia.
The August military coup in Gabon has triggered U.S. laws that restrict security assistance to military regimes, limiting American diplomats’ ability to supplement sticks with carrots.
The palace uprising took place just hours after election authorities announced that Bongo, whose family had run Gabon since 1967, had won a third term in office. Gen. Brice Oligui Nguema, head of the powerful Republican Guard, was named transitional president by rebellious officers who declared the election void. Bongo was put under house arrest.
American diplomats had to regroup to persuade the new Gabonese authorities to rebuff Chinese approaches. Finer met with Oligui on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in September. The National Security Council’s top Africa hand, Judd Devermont, and Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Melanie Higgins visited Gabon the following month.
At that meeting, Oligui said he understood U.S. concerns about a Chinese military presence on the Atlantic. He said that Bongo had a handshake agreement with President Xi, but that there was no written deal.
“They talked about a package of stuff we could do to keep Gabon from engaging with China,” said a senior State Department official.
The president’s office in Libreville referred questions to Noël Nelson Messone, Gabon’s ambassador in Washington, who said he wasn’t privy to any discussions about a possible Chinese base. He said Oligui had yet to have high-level talks with Beijing.
In Libreville, Devermont encouraged Oligui to set a timetable for a swift return to elected government.
“There’s this tension here between how we uniquely uphold our democratic values and how we pragmatically continue our bilateral relationship, which has a security component,” a senior U.S. defense official said.
American diplomats say Oligui has reached several milestones—such as restoring press freedoms, promising a national political dialogue and scheduling a two-year transition to civilian government—that the U.S. identified as necessary to allow resumption of some security assistance.
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Gabon’s new rulers “are well aware of the pessimism that surrounds most transitions, particularly in Africa,” said Messone, the Gabonese ambassador. “That is why they are committed to a timely transition road map.”
U.S. and Gabonese officials are currently negotiating a defense-cooperation agreement and have discussed American training to help Gabon secure its borders. In November the White House decided to have Gabon host this year’s U.S.-led West and Central African maritime exercises, which bring together naval forces from dozens of countries. The exercises are designed to help coastal countries battle piracy and illegal fishing.
The U.S. could also boost support for Gabon’s efforts to preserve its rainforests, which cover almost 90% of the country.
Mvemba Dizolele, director of the Africa program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, an independent think tank in Washington, D.C., predicted the Biden administration would find a way to legally provide whatever inducements are needed to frustrate China’s military aspirations.
“This is a matter of tremendous national-security urgency,” said Dizolele. “We need to continue working with the Gabonese.”
The U.S. has also made a diplomatic pitch to Equatorial Guinean President Teodoro Obiang Nguema, who has ruled the former Spanish colony since 1979. Finer visited Malabo, the country’s capital city, in 2021 and met with Obiang’s son, Vice President Teodoro “Teodorin” Nguema Obiang Mangue, at the U.N. last year. The U.S. invited Equatorial Guinean military officials to observe American-led naval exercises and floated the idea of helping the country combat piracy.
Relations, however, have been overshadowed by U.S. concerns about extrajudicial killings and torture of regime opponents. In civil cases, U.S. government lawyers accused Obiang Mangue of amassing more than $300 million “through corruption and money laundering.” Obiang Mangue told the U.S. ambassador in Malabo in 2011 that he earned his wealth through legitimate government contracts, according to a State Department cable from the time.
Equatorial Guinea’s ambassador in Washington, Crisantos Obama Ondo, said China supplies the African nation with military hardware and training, as well as roads, ports, airports and other infrastructure. But, he added, “we’re surprised by the insistence of the U.S. government because we haven’t received a formal or informal request from the Chinese government to set up a naval base in Equatorial Guinea.”
The ambassador said that human-rights groups have unfairly criticized the Obiang government and that new laws are addressing torture, prison abuses, corruption, nepotism and other issues. Obiang Mangue, the president’s son, is leading the reform effort, the ambassador said.
U.S. officials, however, find the regime opaque, and, despite assurances, worry that Obiang might yet allow the Chinese to establish a permanent presence in the country, the senior U.S. official said.
Meanwhile, U.S. officials watch to see where the Chinese will turn next. “When one door closes, they’re looking for another opportunity,” the U.S. national-security official said.
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