U.S. foreign policy and the Belgian Congo in the 1950s.

The turmoil that engulfed the Belgian Congo when it gained independence in 1960 and the tortuous role subsequently assumed by the United Nations have received considerable coverage. Less attention has been given to the preceding years, particularly U.S.-Belgian relations, the critical connections between the superpower that led the UN and the small European state that ruled the Congo. In the 1950s, Washington's policy toward Central Africa was caught between maintaining good relations with allies in Brussels, London, and Paris, and the ambition, sharpened by the Soviet challenge, to win friends in emerging nations. Few members of the State Department questioned the prevailing attitude toward Africa espoused by the dominant West European advocates. Then, too, U.S. information about and experience in the Congo remained so poor as to render U.S. leaders as ill-prepared as the rest of the world for the terrible civil war in the Congo during the 1960s.

The presidential administration of Harry S. Truman adopted a "modest, middle ground position" on colonial issues that continued in the 1950s. However, the personalities and rhetoric of President Dwight D. Eisenhower and his secretary of state, John Foster Dulles, made U.S. policy "seem more conservative, more hostile to African aspirations and more supportive of white rule than it actually was." In both the Truman and Eisenhower administrations, the United States followed a "Europe first" policy that required public support of North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) countries. The United States showed more willingness to diverge from the positions of the European colonial powers only after the showdown with Britain and France over the Suez Crisis of 1956, the acceleration of African nationalist demands for independence, the growth of civil rights as a political issue following the Little Rock school crisis of 1957, and the emergence of Vice President Richard M. Nixon's presidential ambitions. Yet, Central Africa consistently mattered less to the United States than Western Europe.(1)

Washington's strategic military planning relied on nuclear defense, which made the Congo vital to the United States and to NATO. The Shinkolobwe mine in Katanga, a source of the uranium that fueled the U.S. nuclear arsenal, was a major preoccupation. In 1950 the State Department noted that its "most important specific objective [regarding Belgium was] to insure an uninterrupted flow of Congo uranium to the United States." U.S. funds and material helped to strengthen the Congolese Force Publique - a militia composed of Congolese troops and Belgian officers - and to expand the airport at Kamina. By the end of the 1950s, when the United States possessed new sources of uranium and refused to buy ores from the Congo - even at bargain prices - the Congo's importance to the United States plummeted. This sudden U.S. indifference toward the Congo took the Belgians by surprise.(2)

In the early 1950s, the few U.S. officials in the Belgian Congo duly reported on colonial policies, modernization of the economy and educational system, press opinions, and occasional political incidents. However, direct U.S. contact with the views of local populations was circumscribed by Belgian officials, who preferred to be the conduit of information to the Americans and the chief interpreters of events. The U.S. representatives, aware of the importance of maintaining Belgian goodwill, took care not to be too active. Because of "chronic Belgian suspicion of our motives in the Congo, as well as official ill-feeling," the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) waited until 1951 to place its first operative in the Congo after World War II. The United States Information Service (USIS) programs in the early 1950s sought the support of the white colonists, not the indigenous population. Only in 1954 did the Belgians allow the USIS to direct activities toward the tribal people, but they recommended that work be done through the Belgian government information service.(3)

In 1951, the State Department asked for a more detailed report from U.S. consuls in the Belgian Congo. The director of the Office of African Affairs officially identified Africa economically and politically with the democracies of the free world. Because colonialism in Africa posed a problem, the U.S. approach should be neither pro-Belgian nor pro-African but favor the "encouragement in the sense of convincing both colonial and native that the road to survival is one of well-balanced economic and political development with emphasis on the rights and privileges due the dignity of man." The free world must do whatever was necessary to assure African loyalty to the cause of freedom as the West perceived it. Such an approach might well contribute to belief in the need for modification of some policies of colonial powers. Indeed, one U.S. consul in the Belgian Congo noted that it was "by no means certain that the Department would give unqualified approval to all the colonial policies pursued by the Belgian Government."(4)

The U.S. ambassador to Brussels warned that "politically we are aware that Belgium is sensitive to intervention in its governance of the Congo. Our aid and advice must be offered with care." The United States was wary, about how much aid it wanted to offer in any case. U.S. chiefs of staff had hesitated to make any direct commitment to the defense of the Congo during the drafting of the North Atlantic Treaty. Similarly, the United States had resisted Belgian efforts to link the price of uranium to the colony's welfare.(5)

According to the U.S. consul in Leopoldville, Robert G. McGregor, there was "widespread misunderstanding regarding the U.S. position on colonial matters, it often being confused with the activities of the UN which is openly accused of active interference in colonial affairs." Belgian uncertainty persisted despite a …