The Foreign Service Journal, September 2022

THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | SEPTEMBER 2022 47 debate, when he echoed the language of his Algeria speech: “Africa is now the emerging area of the world. It contains 25 percent of all the members of the [United Nations] General Assembly. We didn’t even have a Bureau of African Affairs until 1957 [ sic , 1958]. In the Africa south of the Sahara, which is the major new section, we have less students from all of Africa in that area studying under government auspices today than from the country of Thailand. If there’s one thing Africa needs, it’s technical assistance.” Yet in 1959, Kennedy went on to note, less than 5 percent of all U.S. technical assistance went to Africa. Six African countries are members of the United Nations, he said, but there wasn’t a single American diplomatic representative in any of them. And when Guinea became independent, he added, the Soviet ambassador showed up that same day, but it took nearly eight months for the U.S. ambassador to appear. Such was the impact of Kennedy’s words that three days later, Assistant Secretary Satterthwaite convoked a lengthy brief- ing to defend the administration’s Africa policy. Mr. Africa: A Mixed Record Kennedy won the unofficial title of Mr. Africa, which helped to fuel his narrow electoral victory. Africa thus served success- fully as an indirect and noncontroversial means to reach Black voters while skirting the explosive language of civil rights. It was just enough to win key industrial states without losing the Deep South, a masterful political juggling act. Nixon read the election returns, too, and would later switch gears to implement a South- ern Strategy that would capture the White House in 1968. Kennedy’s victory raised hopes for a new day in U.S.-African relations. He staffed the Africa Bureau early on with strong, politically attuned leadership, starting with Michigan Governor G. Mennen Williams as assistant secretary. He chose highly vis- ible ambassadors to Africa, including his prep school classmate, magazine editor and fluent French speaker WilliamAttwood to Guinea. He launched the Peace Corps and put brother-in-law Shriver in charge. He reached out to independence movements, notably Mozambique’s Eduardo Mondlane, a product of Ameri- can education who was married to an American and who had a base of support in the liberal churches and foundations. Yet Kennedy’s presidential record in Africa would prove mixed, at best. Days after his inauguration, he faced a crisis in the former Belgian Congo and charges of CIA involvement in the assassination of the country’s first prime minister, Patrice Lumumba. His support for Mondlane prompted threats by Portuguese dictator and NATO ally Antonio Salazar to termi- nate the Azores base agreement. Kennedy then backed off from Mondlane, a message that pushed Africans to look elsewhere for support. Finally, Kennedy’s assassination in 1963 abruptly ended what remained of his Africa outreach. Successor Lyndon B. Johnson practiced a hands-off approach in Africa whose primary criteria for U.S. support was opposition to communist influence, a hardline attitude that isolated Guinea’s Sékou Touré and contributed to his increasingly harsh rule. To be sure, Kennedy’s vision resonated among those Ameri- cans most interested in the continent of Africa, but it would take another generation to build sufficient grassroots political force to influence policy. The anti-apartheid movement eventually enjoyed success in pressuring Congress and a reluctant Ronald Reagan White House to impose sanctions in 1985 on white-ruled South Africa and support negotiations to bring independence to Namibia and end civil wars in Mozambique and Angola. n JFKPRESIDENTIALLIBRARYANDMUSEUM On Oct. 10, 1962, President John F. Kennedy received President of Guinea Ahmed Sékou Touré at Washington National Airport for a state visit. African independence leaders saw Kennedy as a unique U.S. politician who grasped their interests. From left: Naval Aide to President Kennedy, Captain Tazewell T. Shepard Jr.; President Touré; U.S. Assistant Chief of Protocol for Visits and Public Events Samuel L. King (in back); President Kennedy; and U.S. State Department interpreter José de Seabra.