The story of Western involvement in Africa begins, as most imperial tales do, with breathtaking violence followed by sanctimonious justification. When King Leopold II of Belgium established his personal fiefdom in the Congo Free State, he did so under the transparently fraudulent banner of bringing civilization and Christianity to what Joseph Conrad would later call “the heart of darkness.” The result was the death of approximately ten million Congolese through forced labor, systematic mutilation, starvation, and disease. This was not some aberration but rather the logical conclusion of a system that viewed African lives as inherently expendable in the quest for rubber, ivory, and other extractable wealth. To read the diplomatic correspondence of the period is to encounter a form of doublethink so profound that it makes Orwell seem like a literalist — men who ordered hands chopped off for quota failures while simultaneously congratulating themselves on their humanitarian mission.
The British in Kenya, the French in Algeria, the Portuguese in Angola and Mozambique, and yes, the Americans in Liberia all participated in this grand theft of both resources and human potential. The particular American genius was to simultaneously maintain a posture of anti-colonialism while benefiting from the imperial arrangements of others. American corporations like Firestone established vast rubber plantations in Liberia using what amounted to slave labor, all while the United States preened itself on never having formal colonies in Africa (conveniently forgetting that Liberia itself was founded as an American quasi-colony). This hypocrisy — this extraordinary ability to condemn European imperialism while practicing a variant of it — would become the leitmotif of American engagement with Africa throughout the following century.
What cannot be overstated is the sheer sadism that characterized much of colonial rule. The French practice of publicly displaying severed heads of resistance fighters in Algeria, the German genocide of the Herero and Namaqua peoples in present-day Namibia, the British concentration camps during the Boer War and later during the Mau Mau uprising in Kenya — these were not accidents or excesses but essential features of the colonial project. They were the necessary means by which a tiny minority of Europeans could control vast populations and territories that did not wish to be controlled. During the Belgian Congo’s rubber terror, failure to meet collection quotas was often punished by the amputation of hands — including those of children — which were then smoked and presented to officials as proof of punishment. Such calculated barbarism requires a level of moral derangement that simply calling it “racism” fails to capture; it represents a fundamental rupture in human solidarity, a willingness to inflict suffering that would be unthinkable against those considered fully human.
The formal end of colonialism after World War II was less a moral awakening than a pragmatic recalibration. Direct rule had become too expensive and too embarrassing in an age of emerging human rights discourse. What followed was perhaps even more insidious: neocolonialism, a system in which nominal independence masked continued economic subordination. The United States, having emerged from the war as the dominant global power, became the principal architect and beneficiary of this new arrangement, particularly after the Bretton Woods agreement established the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank as instruments of Western financial control. It was, to borrow a phrase from the inimitable Gore Vidal, empire by financial strangulation rather than by military occupation — and all the more effective for its air of technocratic inevitability.
Consider Tanzania under Julius Nyerere, a man of genuine idealism who sought to chart an independent course for his country. When he implemented socialist policies aimed at self-sufficiency, the IMF responded with crushing loan conditions that required the dismantling of public services and the opening of markets to foreign capital. The result was economic devastation that undermined the very independence Tanzania had fought so hard to achieve. This pattern would repeat itself across the continent: Ghana under Kwame Nkrumah, Zambia under Kenneth Kaunda, and later, virtually the entire continent under the notorious Structural Adjustment Programs of the 1980s and 1990s. The consistency of this response to African attempts at genuine economic independence should put paid to any notion that these were neutral technocratic decisions rather than deliberate policies to maintain Western dominance.
What is most striking about these economic policies — forced upon desperate nations with the imperious certainty of an Old Testament prophet pronouncing judgment — is their rank hypocrisy. Not a single Western nation developed through the free-market fundamentalism they prescribed for Africa. The United States industrialized behind protectionist tariffs. Britain, France, Germany, Japan — all relied on state intervention, industrial policy, and strategic trade protections during their development phases. Yet when African nations attempted to follow this well-trodden path to prosperity, they were told that only unfettered capitalism would save them. That this advice came from nations that continued to massively subsidize their own agricultural sectors, thereby undermining African farmers, only adds an extra layer of cynicism to an already fetid arrangement.
The debt trap was elegantly simple in its conception and devastating in its effects. African countries, desperate for development funds, would accept loans from Western-dominated institutions. These loans came with conditions that invariably included cutting public spending, privatizing state assets (often sold at fire-sale prices to Western corporations), eliminating protections for nascent domestic industries, and removing capital controls. When these policies inevitably led to economic distress, more loans would be offered, with even more stringent conditions. The result was a form of debt peonage that rendered nominal sovereignty almost meaningless. By the 1990s, many African nations were spending more on debt servicing than on health and education combined — a moral obscenity that was defended with the bloodless language of fiscal responsibility and market discipline.
Take the case of Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of Congo) under Mobutu Sese Seko. Mobutu was a kleptocrat of historic proportions who looted his country with abandon. Yet he remained in power for 32 years, receiving consistent support from the United States and international financial institutions because he reliably served Western interests by opposing Soviet influence and maintaining a favorable environment for foreign corporations. Meanwhile, the Congolese people saw their national wealth disappear into Swiss bank accounts and luxury real estate in France and Belgium, all while being forced to repay the debts incurred by their oppressor. When Mobutu appeared at the White House in 1983 — having already stolen billions — President Reagan praised him as “a voice of good sense and goodwill.” One searches in vain for a more perfect crystallization of the moral bankruptcy of American Africa policy during this period.
The case of Zaire illustrates a broader pattern: the systematic preference for pliable authoritarians over democratic nationalists. Throughout the Cold War and beyond, the United States consistently backed rulers who protected American corporate interests while looting their own countries. Houphouët-Boigny in Ivory Coast, Bongo in Gabon, Moi in Kenya, Eyadéma in Togo — the list is long and dispiriting. These men were feted in Western capitals, provided with military aid, and protected from international criticism, even as they tortured dissidents, embezzled foreign aid, and reduced their populations to penury. Their only qualification for such support was a willingness to keep the extractive machine running smoothly and to vote the right way at the United Nations. As for their domestic depredations, well — to quote Franklin Roosevelt’s alleged comment about Nicaragua’s Anastasio Somoza — “He may be a son of a bitch, but he’s our son of a bitch.”
Or consider the tragic case of Thomas Sankara in Burkina Faso, a visionary leader who implemented policies aimed at genuine independence and development: land reform, mass vaccination campaigns, promotion of domestic food production, and a refusal to be bound by exploitative debt. Sankara famously declared, “Debt is a cleverly managed reconquest of Africa.” His reward for this insight was assassination in 1987, in a coup widely believed to have had French and American backing. His successor immediately reversed his policies and realigned the country with Western financial interests. Sankara’s death illustrates the limits of African sovereignty in a world where challenging the economic order could be tantamount to signing one’s own death warrant. His elimination was not an anomaly but rather part of a pattern of Western intervention against leaders who took too seriously the idea of genuine independence.
What makes Sankara’s case particularly instructive is that he was no fire-breathing Marxist radical but rather a pragmatic reformer who achieved remarkable results in his short time in power. Under his leadership, Burkina Faso vaccinated 2.5 million children against meningitis, yellow fever, and measles in just two weeks. Wheat production doubled. School attendance increased dramatically. Women’s rights were expanded. The country was on a path to genuine development that did not rely on extractive foreign investment or crushing debt. These achievements — not any threat to Western security — made him dangerous. He represented an alternative model that, if successful, might have inspired emulation across the continent, threatening the economic arrangements that kept Africa subordinate and Western corporations profitable.
When debt and economic manipulation proved insufficient, the United States and its allies did not hesitate to resort to more direct means of control. The CIA’s involvement in the overthrow and subsequent assassination of Patrice Lumumba in Congo in 1961 is now well-documented. Lumumba’s crime was to take seriously the idea that Congo’s immense mineral wealth should benefit the Congolese people rather than Western mining companies. His elimination paved the way for Mobutu’s reign of corruption and external exploitation. The details of this sordid affair — including CIA plans to poison Lumumba’s toothpaste — would be comical if the consequences weren’t so catastrophic for millions of Congolese who have lived and died in poverty while sitting atop some of the world’s richest mineral deposits.
The brazenness of American intervention reached an apotheosis in Angola, where the CIA, working with apartheid South Africa, supported Jonas Savimbi’s UNITA rebels in a brutal civil war aimed at preventing a left-leaning MPLA government from controlling the country’s oil wealth. This unholy alliance — American intelligence services coordinating with a white supremacist regime to destabilize a black African government — reveals the utter cynicism of U.S. policy during this period. Savimbi, a chameleon-like figure who had previously espoused Maoism before rebranding himself as a freedom fighter for the Reagan administration, received hundreds of millions in U.S. aid while his forces laid landmines that continue to maim Angolans to this day. His utility was not in his ideology — which was essentially nonexistent beyond personal ambition — but in his willingness to serve as a weapon against a government that might use Angola’s resources for Angolan development rather than Western profit.
The list of similar interventions is depressingly long: U.S. support for UNITA in Angola, backing for Somalia’s Siad Barre until he became inconvenient, complicity in the Ethiopian civil war, and consistent support for Egypt’s military dictatorship in exchange for peace with Israel. The common thread in all these cases was not concern for African well-being but rather the maintenance of a favorable environment for American strategic and economic interests during the Cold War and beyond. When President Carter’s UN Ambassador Andrew Young attempted to pursue a more enlightened policy toward Africa in the late 1970s, he was quickly undermined by the foreign policy establishment and eventually forced to resign. His sin was to suggest that Cuban troops in Angola might be playing a stabilizing role — a factual assessment that contradicted the required demonization of any left-leaning influence on the continent.
Perhaps nothing illustrates the fundamental amorality of American Africa policy better than the U.S. relationship with apartheid South Africa. Until the mid-1980s, successive administrations maintained cordial relations with the apartheid regime, viewing it as a bulwark against communism and a reliable source of strategic minerals. The Reagan administration’s policy of “constructive engagement” — a term that rivals “enhanced interrogation techniques” for Orwellian euphemism — provided diplomatic cover for a regime engaged in some of the most systematic racism since Nazi Germany. When the Anti-Apartheid Act was finally passed in 1986, it was over Reagan’s veto. This pattern — resistance to African liberation followed by belated embrace once it becomes inevitable — has been a consistent feature of American policy, from the civil rights movement domestically to decolonization abroad.
The post-Cold War era initially promised a “peace dividend” and perhaps a more enlightened approach to Africa. What it delivered instead was a diminution of interest. Without the Soviet threat, Africa’s strategic importance receded in American calculations. Foreign aid declined, diplomatic engagement waned, and a policy of selective indifference took hold. The United States would engage only when specific interests — counter-terrorism, access to oil, containing China — were at stake. Otherwise, the continent could languish in obscurity. This retreat reflected a fundamental truth about Western engagement with Africa: it has always been instrumental rather than principled, focused on what Africa could provide rather than on African well-being. Without the Cold War imperative, the pretense of concern became harder to maintain.
This strategic neglect was most glaringly evident during the Rwandan genocide in 1994, when the Clinton administration not only refused to intervene but actively worked to prevent effective UN action. The extermination of nearly a million people in the space of a hundred days did not constitute a sufficient American interest to warrant meaningful response. Susan Rice, then on the National Security Council and later U.S. Ambassador to the UN, reportedly asked during the crisis, “If we use the word ‘genocide’ and are seen as doing nothing, what will be the effect on the November [congressional] election?” This grotesque calculus — weighing the lives of Africans against American domestic politics — perfectly encapsulates the fundamental amorality of U.S. policy toward the continent. That Rice later went on to even higher positions in government, without apparent moral reflection on her role in this catastrophic failure, speaks volumes about the lack of accountability in American foreign policy.
The Rwandan case merits closer examination because it so clearly reveals the emptiness of Western commitments to human rights when they conflict with political convenience. The genocide was not some spontaneous outburst of tribal hatred, as it was often portrayed in the Western press, but rather a carefully planned campaign of extermination with clear warning signs. UN peacekeeping commander Roméo Dallaire had explicitly warned his superiors about the impending slaughter and requested reinforcements to prevent it. Instead, after ten Belgian peacekeepers were killed, the UN force was actually reduced from 2,500 to 270 troops. U.S. officials, meanwhile, engaged in linguistic contortions to avoid using the word “genocide,” which would have triggered obligations under the Genocide Convention. The deliberate abandonment of Rwanda’s Tutsi population — left to be hacked to death by machete-wielding militias while the world’s most powerful nation quibbled over terminology — stands as one of the great moral failures of the post-World War II era.
In the aftermath of this shameful episode, President Clinton would offer a qualified apology during a brief airport stopover in Kigali in 1998: “We did not act quickly enough after the killing began,” he admitted, before adding the exculpatory caveat, “we did not fully appreciate the depth and the speed with which you were being engulfed by this unimaginable terror.” This was, to put it bluntly, bullshit of the highest order. U.S. intelligence services knew exactly what was happening; they simply calculated that no vital American interests were at stake. The episode laid bare the reality that, in the hierarchy of American foreign policy concerns, African lives ranked somewhere below domestic political considerations and far below any tangible strategic or economic interest.
The early 21st century brought renewed attention to Africa, but largely through a security lens. The establishment of AFRICOM in 2007, the military involvement in Libya in 2011, the deployment of special forces across the Sahel — these initiatives signaled that the United States primarily viewed Africa as a potential source of terrorism rather than as a partner in development. The billions spent on military assistance and counter-terrorism dwarf the pittance allocated to genuine economic development or democratic strengthening. This militarization of American Africa policy — often conducted with minimal congressional oversight or public debate — has created a parallel system of engagement that operates largely in the shadows, with U.S. forces now present in some capacity in over 30 African countries.
The consequences of this securitization have been predictably counterproductive. In Somalia, American drone strikes and support for the Ethiopian invasion in 2006 helped transform Al-Shabaab from a marginal group into a major terrorist organization. In Libya, NATO intervention (with the United States “leading from behind,” in Obama’s unfortunate phrase) removed Gaddafi but left behind a failed state that has destabilized the entire region. In the Sahel, years of U.S. counter-terrorism training did nothing to prevent military coups in Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger — indeed, some of the coup leaders were American-trained officers. The persistent focus on military solutions to complex political and economic problems has not made Africa safer or more stable; it has simply created new enemies and deeper resentments.
What’s particularly striking about this military-first approach is how it contradicts America’s own stated goals of promoting democracy and development. When AFRICOM was established, its first commander, General William “Kip” Ward, emphasized that its mission would include promoting “democratic values” and “strengthening partner nations.” In practice, however, the command has primarily focused on counter-terrorism and training African militaries — many of which have abysmal human rights records. The underlying assumption seems to be that security must precede development and democracy, but this gets the causality backward. It is precisely the lack of accountable governance and economic opportunity that creates fertile ground for extremism and instability.
Even supposedly humanitarian initiatives have often served as vehicles for American self-interest. PEPFAR, the Bush administration’s program to combat HIV/AIDS in Africa, undoubtedly saved lives. But it also came with ideological strings attached, including promotion of abstinence-only education and restrictions on working with organizations that provided abortion services. More importantly, it directed billions to American pharmaceutical companies rather than supporting generic production that could have treated many more people at lower cost. The program’s initial refusal to fund antiretroviral drugs from non-patented sources revealed its dual nature: humanitarian on the surface but designed to protect corporate interests at its core. This tension between genuine assistance and commercial advantage has been a consistent feature of American engagement with Africa.
What is particularly galling about PEPFAR’s original restrictions on generic drugs is that they came at a time when African governments were fighting desperately for the right to access cheaper medications. South Africa, in particular, faced an aggressive legal challenge from pharmaceutical companies when it attempted to import generic antiretrovirals — a lawsuit tacitly supported by the Clinton administration before public outrage forced a retreat. The message was clear: African lives mattered, but not as much as pharmaceutical patents. This prioritization of corporate interests over human need is not some regrettable side effect of American policy; it is its essence. When forced to choose between maximizing profits for American companies and maximizing health outcomes for Africans, successive administrations have consistently chosen the former.
The Obama administration’s “Power Africa” initiative similarly promised to increase electricity access across the continent but primarily served as a subsidy for American power companies. The Trump administration dispensed even with the pretense of developmental concern, famously dismissing African nations as “shithole countries” and proposing massive cuts to already meager aid budgets. The Biden administration has attempted to reset relations, but without addressing the fundamental contradictions in American policy. Fine words about partnership and development continue to be undercut by a primary focus on security concerns and commercial advantage. One is reminded of Oscar Wilde’s observation that hypocrisy is “the tribute vice pays to virtue” — in this case, the rhetorical commitment to African development that masks a continued prioritization of American interests.
If American engagement with Africa has been characterized by hypocrisy and exploitation, it has at least been cloaked in the language of democracy and human rights — however hollow these commitments have proven in practice. The new players on the continent make no such pretense. China’s approach to Africa is refreshingly honest in its transactionalism: infrastructure investment in exchange for resources and political support, with no awkward questions about democracy or human rights. This straightforwardness — this absence of moral lecturing from a nation with its own significant human rights issues — has proven attractive to many African leaders tired of Western condescension. When President Xi Jinping declares that China will never interfere in African countries’ internal affairs or impose its will on others, the contrast with Western practice is stark and deliberate.
Into this vacuum of genuine engagement have stepped new players with fewer historical and rhetorical constraints. China, most prominently, has pursued a strategy of massive infrastructure investment through its Belt and Road Initiative, offering loans for roads, railways, ports, and power plants without the political conditions attached to Western assistance. While this approach brings its own problems — debt dependency, environmental damage, limited local employment — it has been enthusiastically embraced by African governments tired of Western lectures and conditionality. The sheer scale of Chinese investment dwarfs anything the West has contemplated: the Mombasa-Nairobi Standard Gauge Railway in Kenya, the Addis Ababa-Djibouti Railway, the Benguela Railway in Angola, massive hydroelectric projects in Ethiopia and the Democratic Republic of Congo — these are transformative infrastructure projects of a kind that Western aid has rarely funded.
China’s courtship of Africa has been methodical and comprehensive. The Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, established in 2000, has become a major platform for economic and diplomatic engagement, with generous financial commitments regularly announced at its triennial summits. Chinese leaders make frequent visits to the continent — far more than their American counterparts — and have established Confucius Institutes at universities across Africa to promote Chinese language and culture. Major infrastructure projects are often inaugurated with great ceremony, with Chinese ambassadors presenting them as gifts from one developing nation to another. This narrative of South-South cooperation, of China as a fellow victim of Western imperialism rather than as a new imperial power, has proven remarkably effective in building goodwill, regardless of its historical accuracy.
The Belt and Road Initiative, China’s massive infrastructure development program, exemplifies this approach. By 2021, China had signed BRI cooperation agreements with 46 African countries, committing hundreds of billions of dollars to infrastructure development. The initiative includes landmark projects like the $4 billion Mombasa-Nairobi railway in Kenya, the $3.5 billion Addis Ababa-Djibouti railway, and the $12 billion Coastal Railway in Nigeria. These projects address a critical infrastructure gap that Western aid has largely ignored, focusing instead on governance reforms and social services. When African leaders can point to tangible, visible infrastructure development — even if financed by potentially problematic loans — the political benefits are immediate and significant. The long-term economic sustainability of these projects is a separate question, but their short-term political appeal is undeniable.
Russia, meanwhile, has pursued a different but equally effective strategy, offering security assistance through both official channels and mercenary groups like Wagner. In the Central African Republic, Mali, and elsewhere, Wagner forces have helped prop up embattled regimes in exchange for access to mineral wealth and strategic positioning. These deployments have often followed the failure or withdrawal of Western security missions, offering a brutal but effective alternative to governments facing insurgencies. What makes the Russian approach particularly attractive to certain African regimes is its lack of pretense: Wagner does not lecture about human rights or democratic governance; it simply eliminates threats to its clients’ rule and takes its payment in mining concessions or other economic advantages.
The Wagner Group’s methods are notoriously harsh, with credible allegations of civilian massacres, torture, and other human rights abuses. But from the perspective of besieged African regimes, they offer what the West increasingly does not: unconditional support for state survival, uncomplicated by human rights concerns or democratic expectations. When the choice is between maintaining power with Russian help or potentially losing it while waiting for conditional Western assistance, many leaders have made the pragmatic choice. In Mali, for instance, the military junta turned to Wagner after growing frustrated with the ineffectiveness of European counter-terrorism efforts and their accompanying political demands. The result has been a significant deterioration in the human rights situation but greater regime security — a trade-off that the junta clearly considers worthwhile.
The Russian approach has been particularly effective in countries with a history of close ties to the Soviet Union during the Cold War. In Angola, Mozambique, and Ethiopia, Soviet military and educational assistance created generations of elites with Russian connections and sympathies. Russia has leveraged this legacy through debt forgiveness, new military cooperation agreements, and educational exchanges. At the Russia-Africa Summit in 2019, Vladimir Putin explicitly invoked this shared history, reminding African leaders that “our country has played a significant role in the liberation of the continent, supporting the struggle of its peoples against colonialism, racism, and apartheid.” This historical framing — Russia as an ally in anti-colonial struggles rather than as a colonial power itself — resonates with many Africans and stands in stark contrast to the complicated imperial legacies of Western powers.
What makes the Russian engagement particularly significant is its focus on regime security rather than economic development. While China builds roads and railways, Russia provides the means for embattled regimes to maintain power — often against their own populations. In Sudan, Wagner allegedly helped former President Omar al-Bashir’s security forces suppress protests before his overthrow. In Mozambique, Wagner operatives fought alongside government forces against Islamist insurgents in Cabo Delgado province (though with limited success). In the Central African Republic, Wagner personnel not only provide security for President Faustin-Archange Touadéra but also control valuable diamond and gold mining operations. This combination of security assistance and resource extraction represents a form of neocolonialism stripped of developmental pretense — exploitation in its rawest form.
China’s approach is more sophisticated and potentially more transformative. While Western development models have required African countries to focus on primary commodity exports and to open their markets to manufactured imports, China has invested in industrialization and value-added production. Chinese companies have established factories in Ethiopia, Tanzania, and elsewhere, transferring technology and building industrial capacity in a way that Western investors have largely avoided. The quality and terms of these investments vary widely, but they offer something the West has never consistently provided: a pathway to industrial development rather than perpetual resource dependency. In Ethiopia’s Eastern Industrial Zone, for instance, Chinese companies produce shoes, garments, steel, cement, and other manufactured goods, creating thousands of jobs and beginning the process of industrialization that has lifted millions out of poverty in Asia.
What is particularly striking about Chinese economic engagement is its pragmatic focus on industrial development rather than ideological prescriptions. Unlike Western donors who have insisted on comprehensive economic liberalization before providing assistance, China has supported a variety of economic models, including state-led development strategies that more closely resemble its own experience. This flexibility — this willingness to meet African countries where they are rather than where Western economic orthodoxy thinks they should be — has given China significant advantages in building relationships across the continent. When Chinese officials speak of “win-win cooperation,” the phrase may be diplomatically anodyne, but it reflects a genuine focus on mutual economic benefit rather than political transformation.
Ethiopia provides perhaps the clearest example of this approach. Under the leadership of Meles Zenawi and his successors, Ethiopia pursued a developmental state model explicitly modeled on the experiences of South Korea and Taiwan — countries that combined state direction with market mechanisms to achieve rapid industrialization. Western donors and institutions consistently criticized this approach and attempted to push Ethiopia toward greater liberalization. China, by contrast, embraced Ethiopia’s strategy, providing billions in infrastructure financing and encouraging Chinese companies to establish factories in Ethiopian industrial parks. The result was a period of double-digit economic growth that, while subsequently undermined by political instability and civil conflict, demonstrated the potential of alternative development models when given adequate support.
The irony is that China is essentially following the development playbook that made America and Europe rich: protected industrialization, massive state investment in infrastructure, and strategic trade policy. These are precisely the tools that Western-dominated institutions like the IMF and World Bank have denied to African countries in the name of “free market” orthodoxy. The hypocrisy is stark and has not gone unnoticed by African leaders and intellectuals. As Dambisa Moyo, the Zambian economist, has observed, “China’s approach to Africa, warts and all, is simply following the path that the West forged over hundreds of years.” The difference is that China makes no pretense about its self-interest, while Western engagement has always been cloaked in the language of altruism and moral superiority.
The contrast between Western and Chinese approaches was vividly illustrated during the COVID-19 pandemic. As Western countries hoarded vaccines and implemented travel bans targeting African nations (most notoriously after the identification of the Omicron variant in South Africa), China engaged in “vaccine diplomacy,” providing millions of doses to African countries with minimal conditions. While the efficacy of Chinese vaccines has been questioned, the political impact of this assistance — arriving when Western countries were focused almost exclusively on their own populations — was significant. It reinforced a narrative of China as a reliable partner in times of crisis, in contrast to Western powers that abandoned Africa when their own interests were threatened.
For France, the consequences of waning American influence are particularly acute. The French nuclear industry depends heavily on uranium from Niger and elsewhere in the Sahel, regions where Russian influence is rapidly expanding. Recent coups in Niger, Mali, and Burkina Faso have all featured strong anti-French sentiment and moves toward closer ties with Russia. France now faces the prospect of being cut off from critical resources without the backing of American power that has historically supported its post-colonial arrangements in Africa. This anxiety was palpable in President Macron’s response to the 2023 coup in Niger, where France maintained significant military forces and uranium interests. His initial threats of intervention quickly gave way to a humiliating withdrawal when it became clear that the new military government enjoyed popular support and that intervention would face fierce resistance.
The French predicament in the Sahel has been decades in the making. The country’s relationship with its former colonies has been characterized by a form of neocolonialism that French officials euphemistically term “Françafrique” — a system of economic, political, and military ties that has kept French companies dominant in sectors ranging from telecommunications to resource extraction. This arrangement has been maintained through a combination of corruption (with French companies regularly bribing African officials), military presence (with French bases across the region), and monetary control (through the CFA franc, a currency effectively controlled by the French treasury). As younger generations of Africans have become increasingly nationalist and aware of these exploitative arrangements, anti-French sentiment has grown exponentially, creating fertile ground for Russian influence operations that portray France as a continuing colonial power.
Niger is a particularly instructive case. The country supplies approximately one-third of the uranium used in French nuclear power plants, which in turn generate about 70% of France’s electricity. This dependency has led France to support a succession of governments in Niger, regardless of their democratic credentials or treatment of their own populations, as long as they maintained favorable terms for French mining companies like Orano (formerly Areva). When military officers overthrew the pro-French president in July 2023, they tapped into deep wells of popular resentment against both the previous government and its French backers. The coup leaders’ pivot toward Russia — including inviting Wagner forces to replace departing French troops — represented an existential threat to French interests in the region. Without American backing for potential intervention, France was forced to accept a new reality in which its energy security was potentially compromised by forces hostile to its presence.
Similar dynamics have played out in Mali, where French forces engaged in a costly and ultimately unsuccessful counter-terrorism operation from 2013 to 2022. Despite billions in military aid and the deployment of thousands of troops, the security situation steadily deteriorated. When a military junta took power in 2020, it quickly moved to distance itself from France and seek Russian assistance instead. By 2022, Wagner forces had replaced departing French troops, and Russian propaganda outlets were actively stoking anti-French sentiment. The failure of French (and by extension, Western) counter-terrorism efforts in the Sahel represents one of the most significant strategic setbacks for Western influence in Africa in the post-Cold War era. It has opened the door not only to Russian military presence but also to Chinese economic dominance in a region rich in strategic minerals essential for the green energy transition.
The economic implications for the broader West are equally significant. Africa has the world’s youngest population, with a median age of just 19.7 years. It also contains critical reserves of minerals essential to the green energy transition: cobalt, lithium, rare earth elements, and more. As Chinese and Russian influence grows, Western access to these resources and markets may become increasingly constrained, with profound implications for everything from smartphones to electric vehicles to military hardware. The Democratic Republic of Congo, for instance, contains approximately 70% of the world’s cobalt reserves — a mineral essential for electric vehicle batteries and other green technologies. Chinese companies already control a significant portion of Congolese cobalt production, giving China considerable leverage over the global supply chain for these critical materials.
This competition for African resources is often portrayed in Western media as a new “scramble for Africa,” echoing the 19th-century partition of the continent by European powers. But this framing obscures a crucial difference: African governments now have agency and options that they lacked during the colonial era. They can and do play competing powers against each other to extract better terms. Rwanda under Paul Kagame, for instance, has maintained close security ties with the United States while simultaneously accepting significant Chinese investment. Ethiopia has leveraged competition between Western donors, China, and Turkey to finance its ambitious infrastructure projects. This is not to suggest that these relationships are equal — significant power asymmetries remain — but African governments are no longer passive recipients of whatever terms foreign powers dictate.
The mineral question is particularly acute for green technology. The energy transition required to address climate change depends heavily on minerals found predominantly in Africa: cobalt and copper from the DRC, lithium from Zimbabwe, manganese from South Africa, graphite from Mozambique. Western countries have belatedly recognized the strategic importance of these resources and have begun to develop policies aimed at securing supply chains. The U.S. Inflation Reduction Act, for instance, includes provisions designed to reduce dependency on Chinese-processed minerals. But these efforts may be too little, too late. Chinese companies have spent decades establishing dominant positions in African mining and processing, while Western firms — often discouraged by political instability, corruption, or inadequate infrastructure — have been more hesitant. The result is a growing Chinese advantage in controlling the raw materials essential for the industries of the future.
Beyond the material concerns lies a deeper challenge to the Western self-conception. Since the end of the Cold War, the United States and its allies have justified their global position in part through claims of moral superiority and commitment to universal values. The rejection of this narrative by increasing numbers of African states represents not just a strategic setback but an ideological one. When Africans look at the historical record and contemporary behavior of Western powers, many no longer see benevolent partners but rather hypocritical exploiters whose promises of democracy and development have repeatedly been subordinated to narrower interests. This perception is reinforced by the West’s selective application of principles like sovereignty and human rights — vigorously defended when convenient, ignored when not. The result is a profound credibility gap that newer players like China and Russia have skillfully exploited.
This credibility gap was starkly illustrated during the early stages of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, when many African nations refused to join Western sanctions or condemn Russian aggression. In the UN General Assembly vote on a resolution demanding Russia’s withdrawal, 17 African countries abstained and another eight didn’t vote at all. This was not, as some Western commentators suggested, due to ignorance or indifference to aggression. Rather, it reflected a widespread perception that Western powers invoke principles like territorial integrity and sovereignty selectively — vociferously defending them in Ukraine while ignoring or actively undermining them elsewhere, most notably in Iraq, Libya, and other countries where Western interests were at stake. When U.S. Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield lectured African nations about their “unwise” relationships with Russia, many African intellectuals and leaders responded with understandable incredulity. The hypocrisy was too glaring to ignore. Here was a representative of a country that had invaded Iraq on false pretenses, bombed Libya into failed-state status, and supported countless coups against democratically elected governments, presuming to deliver moral instruction on international relations. The patronizing tone — the implicit assumption that Africans were somehow dupes of Russian manipulation rather than actors making rational calculations based on their own interests — only reinforced perceptions of Western arrogance and double standards.
What Western policymakers have failed to grasp — or perhaps have chosen to ignore — is that the “rules-based international order” they so frequently invoke appears to many Africans as a system designed to maintain Western advantage rather than to promote genuine fairness or development. The World Bank and IMF remain dominated by Western powers despite modest governance reforms. The UN Security Council still reflects the power dynamics of 1945 rather than the contemporary world. Trade agreements systematically advantage developed economies while limiting the policy tools available to developing ones. International courts seem to disproportionately target African leaders for prosecution. Against this backdrop, Western lectures about playing by the rules ring hollow. As one Kenyan commentator acidly observed during the Ukraine crisis, “It’s amazing how the West finds its moral compass when Russia is the transgressor.”
This perception of hypocrisy extends to democracy promotion, long a rhetorical centerpiece of U.S. engagement with Africa. The historical record is one of consistent support for autocrats who served American interests, punctuated by occasional, usually belated embrace of democratic movements once they appear likely to succeed. From Mobutu to Mubarak, the United States has backed dictators who tortured and killed their own citizens, all while lecturing other countries about human rights. Even in the post-Cold War era, when democracy promotion supposedly became a more central foreign policy goal, the United States has maintained close ties with authoritarian regimes in Uganda, Rwanda, Egypt, and elsewhere when it suited strategic purposes. The resulting credibility gap has made it increasingly difficult for the United States to present itself as a champion of democratic values on the continent.
Consider the case of Rwanda under Paul Kagame. Despite credible allegations of political assassinations, cross-border kidnappings, and support for brutal rebel groups in neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo, Kagame has remained a darling of Western donors, receiving billions in aid and regular invitations to prestigious venues like the World Economic Forum. His utility in maintaining regional stability — however brutally enforced — has consistently trumped concerns about his authoritarian governance or human rights record. This pattern of prioritizing stability and cooperation over democracy promotion has been consistent across administrations, regardless of their rhetorical commitments to human rights. The message to Africans has been clear: Western concern for democracy is contingent and secondary to other interests.
The credibility gap extends beyond politics to economics. Western powers continue to subsidize their agricultural sectors heavily, making it virtually impossible for African farmers to compete in global markets. They maintain patent regimes that keep essential medications unaffordable for millions of Africans. They demand environmental standards that they themselves did not observe during their own industrialization. They preach free trade while maintaining tariff and non-tariff barriers against African manufactured goods. They promise climate financing that routinely fails to materialize in the promised amounts. The cumulative effect of these policies is to create a profound skepticism about Western intentions that no amount of rhetorical commitment to partnership can overcome.
Perhaps most damning has been the West’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The combination of vaccine nationalism (with rich countries hoarding doses far beyond their needs), resistance to patent waivers that would allow broader production, and travel bans targeting African countries after the identification of new variants revealed the hollowness of rhetoric about global solidarity. As South African President Cyril Ramaphosa bitterly observed after travel bans were imposed following the identification of the Omicron variant in his country: “The prohibition of travel is not informed by science, nor will it be effective in preventing the spread of this variant. The only thing the prohibition on travel will do is to further damage the economies of the affected countries and undermine their ability to respond to, and recover from, the pandemic.” The episode epitomized the West’s approach to Africa: quick to punish, slow to assist, and fundamentally self-interested despite claims to the contrary.
Against this backdrop of Western hypocrisy and diminishing influence, China has positioned itself as a more reliable partner. Beijing’s massive infrastructure investments address a critical need that Western aid has largely ignored. The African Development Bank estimates the continent’s infrastructure financing gap at $68–108 billion annually — a figure far beyond what traditional Western donors have been willing to provide. China’s willingness to fund projects that Western donors consider too risky or unprofitable — from railways in Ethiopia to hydroelectric dams in Zambia — has earned it significant goodwill among governments desperate for development. The lack of political conditions attached to this financing — the absence of lectures about governance or human rights — is seen by many African leaders not as a bug but as a feature.
Chinese engagement has not been without problems. There are legitimate concerns about debt sustainability, environmental standards, labor practices, and the quality of some Chinese infrastructure projects. The port of Mombasa in Kenya, for instance, was reportedly used as collateral for Chinese loans to build the Standard Gauge Railway — creating the risk of a strategic asset falling under Chinese control in case of default (though both Kenyan and Chinese officials have denied this). Similar concerns have been raised about Zambia’s national electricity company and other strategic assets across the continent. These arrangements have prompted accusations of “debt-trap diplomacy” — a deliberate Chinese strategy to gain control of African assets through unsustainable lending.
Yet such criticisms often overlook both African agency and Western complicity in creating the conditions that make Chinese financing so attractive. African governments are not passive victims but active participants in negotiations with Chinese entities. They request and shape projects based on their own development priorities, even if their bargaining position is often weak. Furthermore, decades of austerity imposed by Western-dominated financial institutions created massive infrastructure deficits that Chinese financing has helped to address. If the terms of these arrangements sometimes disadvantage African countries, this reflects not just Chinese opportunism but also the desperate need created by years of Western neglect and extractive policies.
What is particularly striking about Chinese engagement is its comprehensive nature. Unlike Western powers that have focused primarily on extractive industries and, more recently, security concerns, China has invested across the economic spectrum: infrastructure, manufacturing, agriculture, telecommunications, and services. This approach recognizes something that Western policy has often ignored: Africa’s potential as a market and production base, not just as a source of raw materials. With a rapidly growing population projected to reach 2.5 billion by 2050, Africa represents one of the few regions with significant demographic growth and expanding consumer demand. Chinese companies have been quicker than their Western counterparts to recognize and capitalize on this potential, establishing themselves across sectors from mobile phones to construction.
The telecommunications sector offers a particularly illuminating example of this approach. Companies like Huawei and ZTE have established dominant positions in African markets by offering products tailored to local conditions and price points, backed by substantial financing from Chinese state banks. These companies have built much of Africa’s digital infrastructure, from undersea cables to mobile networks to data centers. In doing so, they have not only created commercial advantages for themselves but also established a level of technological dependency that will be difficult to reverse. When Western countries, led by the United States, began pressuring African nations to exclude Huawei from their 5G networks on security grounds, many African governments balked — not just because of cost considerations but because their existing telecommunications infrastructure was already heavily dependent on Chinese technology.
Russia’s approach, as previously noted, has been more focused on security and extractive industries, but no less effective in establishing influence. The Wagner Group’s operations in countries like the Central African Republic, Mali, and Sudan have given Russia significant leverage over governments facing security challenges. By providing regime security — protecting ruling elites from both external and internal threats — Russia has gained access to valuable resources and strategic positioning. In the Central African Republic, Wagner forces not only provide personal security for President Faustin-Archange Touadéra but also control gold and diamond mining operations in exchange for their services. Similar arrangements have been established or sought in other resource-rich countries facing security challenges.
What makes the Russian approach particularly effective is its explicit rejection of Western norms and conditions. Wagner does not pretend to be promoting democracy or human rights; it offers straightforward transactional relationships focused on regime survival and resource extraction. For embattled leaders facing Western pressure over human rights abuses or democratic backsliding, this approach offers both political and literal life insurance. The price — typically paid in mining concessions or other economic advantages — may be high, but for rulers more concerned with staying in power than long-term development, it represents a rational calculation. As one analyst put it, “Wagner offers African leaders something the West cannot or will not: unconditional support for regime survival.”
The Russian approach also capitalizes on historical connections and anti-Western sentiment. Moscow has deliberately framed its current engagement as a continuation of Soviet support for African liberation movements during the Cold War — positioning itself as a historical ally against colonialism rather than as a colonial power itself. This narrative, combined with active disinformation campaigns highlighting Western hypocrisy and failures, has proven remarkably effective in building popular support for Russian presence, particularly in former French colonies where anti-colonial sentiment remains strong. In Mali, for instance, Russian flags were prominently displayed during anti-French protests following the military coup, reflecting a popular perception of Russia as an alternative to what many Malians view as continuing French imperialism.
The combination of Chinese economic engagement and Russian security presence has created a new dynamic in Africa that the United States has struggled to counter effectively. American initiatives like Prosper Africa (launched under Trump) and the Build Back Better World partnership (launched under Biden) have been hampered by inadequate funding, bureaucratic complexity, and a lack of sustained high-level attention. While Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin have made multiple visits to Africa and hosted major Africa-focused summits, American presidential visits to the continent have been relatively rare and often brief. This disparity in attention and engagement has not gone unnoticed by African leaders and publics.
What makes this shift in influence particularly significant is its timing. Africa is on the cusp of potentially transformative economic integration through the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), which aims to create a single market of 1.3 billion people with a combined GDP of $3.4 trillion. If successfully implemented, this agreement could fundamentally alter Africa’s position in the global economy, moving it from the periphery toward the center. The power that most effectively engages with this emerging market will gain significant advantages in the coming decades. China, with its comprehensive approach and willingness to invest for the long term, appears better positioned than the United States to capitalize on this opportunity.
For France, the consequences of this shifting landscape are especially acute. The country’s energy security has long depended on uranium from Niger and other former colonies in the Sahel. French companies like Orano (formerly Areva) have maintained effective monopolies over uranium extraction in these countries, securing supplies at favorable prices through a combination of political influence, military presence, and economic leverage. This arrangement — a textbook example of neocolonialism at its most transparent — is now under direct threat from anti-French sentiment and growing Russian influence. The military junta that seized power in Niger in July 2023 explicitly cited France’s exploitative resource policies as justification for its turn toward Russia. Similar sentiments have driven anti-French movements and coups in Mali and Burkina Faso.
The potential loss of access to African uranium represents an existential threat to France’s energy model, which relies on nuclear power for approximately 70% of its electricity generation. Without secure access to reasonably priced uranium, the economic viability of this model comes into question. Alternative suppliers exist — Kazakhstan, Canada, Australia — but the loss of preferential access to African sources would significantly increase costs and strategic vulnerability. This explains the particularly vehement French response to recent coups in the Sahel, including initial threats of military intervention in Niger that were ultimately abandoned when it became clear that neither public opinion nor other Western powers would support such action.
France’s predicament illustrates a broader reality: the post-colonial arrangements that have allowed Western powers to maintain economic advantage without formal imperial control are increasingly unsustainable. New generations of Africans, more nationalist and less willing to accept subordinate status in the global economy, are demanding fundamental changes in these relationships. When Western powers resist these demands — when they continue to insist on terms that primarily benefit their corporations and strategic interests — they create openings for competitors like China and Russia that are willing to offer alternative arrangements. These alternatives may not be more equitable in absolute terms, but they often provide more immediate benefits and greater respect for sovereignty as it is understood by ruling elites.
The broader economic implications for Western countries extend beyond specific sectors like energy or mining. Africa represents one of the few regions with significant projected population growth in the coming decades, while Europe, North America, and East Asia face demographic decline or stagnation. This makes Africa potentially crucial for future global economic growth and market expansion. Companies and countries that establish strong positions in African markets now will have significant advantages as these markets grow and develop. Chinese firms have recognized this reality and have moved aggressively to establish themselves across sectors, from telecommunications to consumer goods to financial services. Western companies, with some exceptions, have been more hesitant, often deterred by perceptions of political risk or inadequate returns.
This hesitancy reflects a fundamental failure of strategic thinking. By focusing on short-term profit maximization and risk minimization, Western businesses and policymakers have ceded competitive advantage to more patient rivals willing to accept lower returns and higher risks for long-term positioning. The consequences of this myopia will be felt for decades to come, as Chinese companies solidify their dominance in what may well become the world’s most dynamic regional market. The loss is not just economic but also geopolitical, as commercial relationships inevitably shape political alignments and cultural influences. A generation of Africans growing up using Chinese smartphones, studying at Chinese universities, and working for Chinese companies is likely to develop very different perspectives on global affairs than previous generations more oriented toward Europe and North America.
Beyond these material concerns lies a deeper challenge to the Western self-conception and the liberal international order it has promoted since 1945. Western powers, led by the United States, have justified their global leadership in part through claims of moral authority and commitment to universal values like democracy, human rights, and rule of law. The rejection of this narrative by increasing numbers of African states — their explicit embrace of alternative partners offering no such pretensions — represents a profound ideological challenge. It suggests that the appeal of the Western model has diminished, not just in Africa but globally, as its contradictions and hypocrisies have become more apparent and as alternative models of development and governance have demonstrated their viability.
This ideological challenge has been sharpened by the combination of declining Western power and persistent Western arrogance. As Zambian economist Dambisa Moyo has observed, “There is something unsettling about the West’s superior attitude, particularly given its own declining economic fortunes.” The presumption that Africans should naturally align with Western interests and values — that they should accept Western leadership simply because it claims moral superiority — appears increasingly disconnected from the realities of a multipolar world in which multiple powers offer competing visions and practical benefits. When Western countries urge African nations to reject Chinese or Russian engagement on normative grounds, while offering no comparable economic alternatives, they reveal a fundamental misunderstanding of both African priorities and their own diminished leverage.
What, then, is to be done? A genuine reset of Western relations with Africa would require more than rhetorical adjustments or modest increases in aid. It would necessitate a fundamental rethinking of economic relationships, including debt forgiveness, removal of agricultural subsidies that harm African farmers, support for African industrialization, and a willingness to allow African countries the same policy space and developmental tools that Western nations themselves used to become wealthy. It would require accepting that liberal democracy cannot be imposed from outside but must develop organically in response to local conditions and needs. It would demand an honest accounting of past exploitation and current hypocrisy — an acknowledgment that Western engagement with Africa has been primarily self-interested rather than benevolent, and that claims to moral superiority have often masked material extraction.
Most fundamentally, it would require treating African nations as genuine equals rather than as sites for resource extraction or geopolitical competition. This would mean accepting African priorities and perspectives even when they conflict with Western preferences or interests. It would mean supporting genuinely African solutions to African challenges rather than imposing external models or conditions. It would require shifting from a paradigm of aid and advice to one of mutually beneficial economic partnership and respectful political engagement. It would demand taking seriously African contributions to global discussions on everything from climate change to international security to economic development, rather than treating the continent as a perpetual recipient of Western wisdom.
The historical record suggests that such a transformation is unlikely. The West in general, and the United States in particular, has shown little capacity for the kind of moral introspection and policy evolution that would be necessary. More probable is a continued decline in influence, punctuated by periodic interventions when specific interests are threatened, while China and Russia consolidate their positions across the continent. This process will not be uniform — some African countries will maintain closer ties to Western powers for historical, economic, or strategic reasons. But the overall trajectory seems clear: a steadily diminishing Western role in a region that was once dominated by European powers and their American successor.
The tragedy in this situation belongs primarily to ordinary Africans, who deserve better than to be pawns in yet another great power competition. The continent has already suffered incalculable harm from five centuries of external exploitation, from the transatlantic slave trade through colonialism to contemporary forms of economic subordination. The emergence of new external players does not necessarily promise a better future, particularly when these players are no less self-interested than their predecessors. What Africa needs is not a new imperial master — Chinese, Russian, or otherwise — but the space and support to chart its own developmental course, building on its rich cultural traditions, abundant natural resources, and the creativity and resilience of its people.
There is a cost for the West as well, both material and moral. In abandoning Africa to new imperial competitors, Western powers sacrifice not only strategic position and economic opportunity but also any legitimate claim to global leadership based on universal values rather than mere power. The hollowness of Western claims to moral superiority is nowhere more evident than in its treatment of Africa — in the yawning gap between rhetorical commitment to partnership and development and the reality of exploitation and neglect. The waning of American influence in Africa thus represents not just a strategic setback but a damning indictment of a hypocritical foreign policy that has never truly valued African lives or aspirations.
In the final analysis, the African proverb that “when elephants fight, it is the grass that suffers” applies with particular force to the continent’s position in great power competition. Whether dominated by Western powers, China, Russia, or some combination thereof, Africa’s fundamental challenge remains the same: to transform its wealth of natural and human resources into sustainable development and genuine independence. External powers may enable or constrain this process, but they cannot substitute for African agency and leadership. The most hopeful path forward lies not in a new scramble for Africa — American, Chinese, Russian, or otherwise — but in a genuine commitment to African self-determination and a more equitable global order in which the continent’s people finally receive their long-overdue share of prosperity and respect.
If this seems utopian, that is perhaps the most damning indictment of all — a reflection of how thoroughly we have normalized the exploitation of a continent and its people, how completely we have accepted the subordination of African interests to external powers as the natural order of things. That this exploitation now wears Chinese or Russian faces rather than exclusively Western ones offers no comfort to those who continue to suffer its effects. The waning of American hegemony in Africa may alter the cast of characters, but until the fundamental dynamics of exploitation are transformed, the tragic script remains essentially unchanged. That transformation — that genuine liberation — remains the unfinished business of African independence, sixty years after the formal end of colonialism and centuries after the continent’s riches and peoples began to be extracted for the benefit of others.
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