US position towards Congolese Crisis in 1960

Abstract

The article is dedicated to the analysis of the United States attitude towards the appearance of the Republic of the Congo on the world map on the eve of the declaration of independence and at the first stage of the unfolding of events known as the «Congolese Crisis of 1960-1965». The research is based on declassified materials from the State Department of the USA and the Central Intelligence Agency. There were investigated attitudes of American ruling circles towards the emergence and intensification of the communist threat in Sub-Saharan Africa, as well as concrete steps to eliminate it and promote the interests of the United States and their allies. Particular attention was paid to the fight against the political line of the first Prime Minister of the Republic of the Congo, Patrice Lumumba, who was seen in Washington as a leader in the spread of USSR influence in the region. The period from the declaration of independence of the Republic of the Congo to the resignation of the Government of P. Lumumba was singled out as the first stage of the Congolese crisis. It was discovered that in addition to the official foreign policy line, it was realized a number of informal measures and methods of political influence of the US on internal processes in the Republic of the Congo, engulfed by separatist movements and military confrontation of the central government and unrecognized territorial formations, in particular the Katanga State and the Southern Kasai Mining State. In the article there are analyzed plans and programs, developed on behalf of the CIA’s top executives in Washington, aiming to prevent another state from entering the orbit of the outside influence of the Soviet-led Communist bloc with the prospect of further loss of not only a single country in Sub-Saharan Africa.