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Abby Martin speaks to Eugene Puryear to discuss the big picture of US imperialism in Africa: From the Berlin Conference to the subversion of liberation movements to neocolonial puppets and the current sprawl of AFRICOM "counterterrorism."

Abby Martin

Here at the Empire Files, we're going to be covering a lot of stories about the U.S. empire in Africa over the next few months, but before we get into these focused episodes on specific countries, I wanted to get the big picture that explains the legacy and current U.S. policy on the continent. To do that, I'm pleased to be speaking with Eugene Puryear, and author and journalist who covers the politics of Africa frequently on his daily podcast called The Punch Out, which I encourage everyone to check out, as well as video reporting on a great new network called Breakthrough News. He joins me now from New York. Thank you so much for joining me, Eugene.

Eugene Puryear

Thank you so much for having me. Have you.

Abby Martin

So, Eugene, today we have AFRICOM and a growing number of U.S. bases and troops across the African continent, but if you look at where those bases are, it's pretty much a stripe from coast to coast across Central Africa. Why is that?

Eugene Puryear

I think that's such an important question and it's a very relevant point to the geography of Africa. So across the middle, most people have heard of the Sahara Desert. So just below the Sahara Desert, there's something called the Sahelian region, and that pretty much is exactly that length of base as you were talking about, cutting across the north-central, the northern middle part of the continent, and the Sahelian region is just between the Sahara and then further down closer to the coast, large forest regions and so on and so forth.

To put it a little bit more in context, there are a few things people should understand about this region and why the U.S. bases are there. Now, the first reason that those bases are there is that this is the front line of the defense, if you will.

These neocolonial countries, primarily in West Africa, but also in other parts of the continent, that are enforcing the writ and the rule of Western multinationals that are partnered up with them to remove a number of critical resources, many of them are in the Sahelian region entirely. Countries like Niger. Some of them to a lesser extent. Countries like Nigeria, where it's just the northern part of the country, but since most of these borders are colonial borders and they're totally fake, most of the problems are cross-border issues that affect all the different countries to lesser and greater degrees. So the conflicts in the Sahel have the opportunity to do two main things that the United States is very concerned about and hence why they have such a military presence.

Now, the first thing is an attempt to strengthen the security strategy of West African states, but what you have is a situation where the governments that are in place in these countries, what they want to do is extract as many resources they can from the country. The elites are in this government and those who are backing them keep as much of that wealth for themselves, the wealth that they don't send off to Europe and to the United States and other countries around the world and not let any of that trickle down. So almost all of them have states that have strong Western-backed, Western-armed, Western-trained militaries that enforce the writ of these elites in places like northern Nigeria, the whole country of Niger, the northern part of Mali, and they want to do whatever they can to make sure that the move...

Abby Martin speaks to Eugene Puryear to discuss the big picture of US imperialism in Africa: From the Berlin Conference to the subversion of liberation movements to neocolonial puppets and the current sprawl of AFRICOM "counterterrorism."

The corporate sector mostly supports the stimulus package as fears of inflation have subsided and it wants the economy to expand. Many of Biden's policies are very progressive and open a path for the left to fight to make them permanent. But have no illusions about the class character of the Biden administration or its foreign policy. Paul Heideman (Jacobin) and Paul Jay discuss what the left should do, on theAnalysis.news

The corporate sector mostly supports the stimulus package as fears of inflation have subsided and it wants the economy to expand. Many of Biden's policies are very progressive and open a path for the left to fight to make them permanent. But have no illusions about the class character of the Biden administration or its foreign policy. Paul Heideman (Jacobin) and Paul Jay discuss what the left should do, on theAnalysis.news

The corporate sector mostly supports the stimulus package as fears of inflation have subsided and it wants the economy to expand. Many of Biden's policies are very progressive and open a path for the left to fight to make them permanent. But have no illusions about the class character of the Biden administration or its foreign policy. Paul Heideman (Jacobin) and Paul Jay discuss what the left should do, on theAnalysis.news

Nicole Fabricant says Bolivia's new president Luis Arce faces a neo-fascistic right while negotiating a new relationship with the country's social movements that fragmented under his mentor, Evo Morales. Fabricant is a Bolivia researcher and associate professor of anthropology at the University of Maryland Towson.

Greg Wilpert

Welcome to theAnalysis, I'm Greg Wilpert. It's been a little over 100 days now since the new president of Bolivia, Luis Arce, has assumed office. As he took over following a harrowing year during which the far-right president, Jeanine Anez years had managed to oust longtime leftist President Evo Morales from office. In November 2019 with the help of Bolivia's military, its police, and the Organization of American States. Luis Arce, who was finance minister under Evo Morales, managed to win last October's presidential election with 55 percent of the vote.

Since then, he has had to deal with a complicated situation, fending off Bolivia's far-right, as well as coping with the Covid pandemic and a severe economic crisis. Just how well has Arce managed to do this and what has brought Bolivia to where it is now? Joining me to discuss these issues is Nicole Fabricant. Nicole is an associate professor of anthropology at the University of Maryland in Towson and a frequent contributor on Bolivia to NACLA, Jacobin, and other publications.

Also, she's the author of the book Mobilizing Bolivia's Displaced: Indigenous Politics and the Struggle over Land. Thanks for being here today. Nicole.

Nicole Fabricant

Thanks, Gregory. It's great to be in conversation with you.

Greg Wilpert

So let's start with what's perhaps the more urgent concern in Bolivia at the moment – the pandemic. Bolivia was hit very hard, just as most of Latin America. Give us a brief idea as to what Arce has had to deal with when he took office and what he's done since then in regard to managing the pandemic.

Nicole Fabricant

Sure. So the pandemic, as you said, had hit Bolivia pretty hard in the months of March, April, May, June, straight through the summer, and Jeanine Anez's  government really in so many ways failed to deal with this public health crisis, but also the twinning economic crisis. So we had these interlocking crises mounting at the same time. So Arce came in with and really his election, an incredible landslide was a real shock to a lot of us from the global north, expecting that it would be a much closer, given the polarization of the country, outcome.

So I think there was a lot of just shock and excitement and celebration that there was this new iteration of MAS, and he came in right away trying to figure out what the best solutions to the Covid-19 crisis would be, while at the same time not locking down economic means of everyday production and life because that had come to a stall during the crisis. So right away, they were solidifying the first major Covid-19 vaccine deal.

I think 20 percent of the population was the goal initially for Arce, and so there were a lot of these first Sputnik-V doses that arrived in late January. We're still seeing spikes, though, all over Santa Cruz right now, which is the agro-industrial capital in the region, where I've worked pretty closely. So that seems to be the hotbed and the epicenter right now of the Covid-19 crisis.

Greg Wilpert

And recently health care workers actually started a strike. What's that all about?

Nicole Fabricant

Yeah, so I'm trying to get a better sense too not being on the ground in ...

Nicole Fabricant says Bolivia's new president Luis Arce faces a neo-fascistic right, while negotiating a new relationship with the country's social movements that fragmented under his mentor, Evo Morales. Fabricant is Bolivia researcher and associate professor of anthropology at the University of Maryland Towson.

Nicole Fabricant says Bolivia's new president Luis Arce faces a neo-fascistic right, while negotiating a new relationship with the country's social movements that fragmented under his mentor, Evo Morales. Fabricant is Bolivia researcher and associate professor of anthropology at the University of Maryland Towson.

Retired Ambassador Chas Freeman, Nixon's translator during his 1972 trip to China, says U.S. policy to China remains a desire to hold on to primacy globally and regionally. Biden's approach so far is not much different than the aggressive posture of Trump.

https://youtu.be/ZjmvxeShO2Q

Retired Ambassador Chas Freeman, Nixon's translator during his 1972 trip to China, says U.S. policy to China remains a desire to hold on to primacy globally and regionally. Biden's approach so far is not much different than the aggressive posture of Trump.

Paul Jay

Hi, welcome to theAnalysis.news. I'm Paul Jay. Please don't forget there's a donate button at the top of the web page.

No issue is more central to U.S. foreign policy than the rise of China as a major global economic power. The rhetoric from the Trump administration, from the new foreign policy team around Biden, and from the majority of foreign policy pundits in D.C. depicts China as a threat and adversary and aggressive power. The language is much the same as during the Cold War with the Soviet Union. It's mostly China that is used to justify a massive growth in the U.S. military budget. Yet it's clear that without cooperation with China on climate policy, there's little chance we humans will survive the crisis.

So what drives U.S. policy towards China? And why is it considered more threatening than simply a large economic competitor? Now joining us is Ambassador Chas Freeman. He's a visiting scholar at Brown University's Watson Institute for International Studies. He was Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs from 1993 to 1994, earning the highest public service awards of the Department of Defense for designing a NATO-centered post-Cold War European security system and reestablishing defense and military relations with China. He served as U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia during Operation Desert Shield and Desert Storm 89 to 92.

He was Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for African affairs from 86 to 89 during the historic U.S. mediation of the Namibian independence from South Africa and Cuban troop withdrawal from Angola. Charles was deputy chief of mission and charge d'affaires in the American embassies in both Bangkok 84 to 86 and Beijing from 81 to 84. He was director for current Chinese affairs at the U.S. Department of State from 79 to 81. He was the principal American interpreter during President Nixon's path-breaking visit to China in 72. In addition to his Middle Eastern, African and East Asian, and European diplomatic experience he served in India from 66 to 68. In 2009, he was asked to return to government to chair the U.S. National Intelligence Council. Following a month-long campaign of public vilification by right-wing elements of the American Israel lobby, he announced it would be impossible for him to succeed at that job and withdrew his acceptance of it. Thanks very much for joining us Chas.

Chas Freeman

Pleasure to be with you.

Paul Jay

So you are one of the most experienced American diplomats when it comes to China and one of the, I guess, foremost experts on U.S.-China relations. Why is China considered an existential threat? Now, when I try to research this topic. I mostly find a lot of language and rhetoric about China's denial of human rights and so on, and I'm sure most people who follow foreign policy don't take all that very seriously.

The United States complains about human rights when they're countries that are considered adversaries and when they're allies, the United States, doesn't care that much about human rights. So what's really driving this U.S. approach to China?

Chas Freeman

In a word, I think a desire to hold on to primacy globally and regionally. In World War two, Japan expelled the European imperialist powers from East Asia and the United States by the way, from the Philippines. We defeated Japan.