The United States, Belgium, and the Congo Crisis of 1960

In: The review of politics, Band 29, Heft 2, S. 239-256

Abstract

Involvement in the Congo crisis of 1960 illustrates dramatically an American dilemma in foreign policy: the apparent incompatibility between the nation's emotional rejection of colonialism and the burdens of world leadership which include the consequences of anticolonialism. In 1960 the United States joined the Soviet Union in expediting the removal of the NATO partner, Belgium, from the Congo, helped to increase the power of the United Nations in the Congo at the expense of Belgian interests, and used its influence to destroy the Western-oriented regime of Moise Tshombe of secessionist Katanga. But in 1964 the United States was largely responsible for replacing the United Nations' forces in the Congo with Belgian troops; in 1965 the United States supported Tshombe's government in Leopoldville; and in 1966 and 1967 the United States joined Belgium in an uneasy vigil over the government of General Joseph Mobutu. It is not surprising that its efforts should have been interpreted by communists as American imperialism, by Africans as neocolonialism, and by many allies either as incorrigible naiveté or as hypocrisy.