China is reportedly looking to build a military base on the western coast of Africa, which would be its first permanent military presence on the Atlantic Ocean.
The Chinese are hoping to establish a base in Equatorial Guinea, an effort that is setting off alarm bells in the Biden administration and at the Defense Department, the Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday, citing unnamed U.S. officials.
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“As part of our diplomacy to address maritime-security issues, we have made clear to Equatorial Guinea that certain potential steps involving [Chinese] activity there would raise national-security concerns,” a senior Biden administration official told the outlet.
Pentagon spokesman John Kirby, when asked about the report during Monday’s briefing, told reporters that the administration “has made clear” to Equatorial Guinea’s leaders that “certain potential steps involving the [People’s Republic of China] and the PRC’s activities there would raise national security concerns for us, and we’ve been — the administration has been clear about that.”
Principal deputy U.S. national security adviser Jon Finer visited the country in October in an attempt to persuade President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo and his son and heir apparent, the current vice president, to reject China’s proposed advancements.
Gen. Stephen Townsend, the commander of U.S. Africa Command, testified in front of the Senate in April that “the most significant threat” from China would be “a militarily useful naval facility on the Atlantic coast of Africa.”
“By militarily useful, I mean something more than a place that they can make port calls and get gas and groceries,” he added. “I’m talking about a port where they can rearm with munitions and repair naval vessels.”
In an effort to convince Equatorial Guinean leaders not to provide China with a military base, the United States offered aid to the country last March following an apparently accidental ammunition exposition that killed at least 100 people and leveled an army base.
The same month, members of the Equatorial Guinean military participated in naval exercises with the U.S. in the Gulf of Guinea.
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U.S. intelligence agencies have been aware of China’s efforts to obtain a base in the African nation since 2019. A Trump official visited the country in the final days of the administration.
China has “likely considered” a number of African nations for overseas bases, including Kenya, Seychelles, Tanzania, and Angola, according to the Defense Department’s “Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China” report, which was released last month.
