Blue Warrior

“You just can’t trust a damn African,” a voice in the dark muttered. It was the vice president of one of the civil engineering firms building new highways in the rapidly expanding northern corridor. Murmurs rumbled around the table as graying heads nodded in agreement. “The Kenyans canceled one of our contracts for the new highway expansion project between Mombasa and Nairobi last week. They claimed there were environmental concerns, but all they really were concerned about was more money.” The middle-aged executive slowly rubbed his open palm for emphasis.

Zhao knew what the engineer said was true, but it was only a small piece of the picture. China’s decades-old policy of “noninterference” in the domestic affairs of other nations meant his government would gladly do business with the tyrants and despots that the West shunned on humanitarian grounds. Chinese government and business officials also freely issued “soft” development funds and loans — financial transactions unencumbered by human rights provisions or even basic accounting principles. These aid packages were giant pots of money from which greedy, cruel African elites could dip freely for their personal use so long as Chinese interests were also served in the process.

Chinese firms were also quick to provide arms, ammunition, and other contraband items denied to dictatorial regimes by the moralizing Western powers. Security treaties and Chinese military bases soon followed. By such means, China swifly gained lucrative footholds across the continent.

But the other reality, Zhao knew, was that Chinese firms wreaked terrible environmental damage all over Africa in recent years — just as they had in their own country for decades. Over eight million acres of arable Chinese land were now so polluted they could never be used for food production. Arable land had decreased in China even as industrialization exploded. Africa, on the other hand, possessed the world’s largest supply of arable land and could amply serve as China’s new food basket if exploited properly.

Chinese companies also imported their own labor, even low-skilled positions, and dominated local economies. They were as rapacious and colonizing as the Great Powers had been in the nineteenth century, lacking only the missionary zeal of “the white man’s burden” to justify their efforts. The Chinese government no longer had any vested interest in spreading the gospel of communism, as it once had in the sixties — such quaint sentiments were bad for business. Freshly minted Third World communist revolutionaries tended to nationalize key industries, and Chinese businessmen held no interest in that. Neither did Zhao. He fully appreciated the Africans’ concerns, but he didn’t care about them. Like his own government, Zhao was a supreme pragmatist. Economic development always came at a high price, and every great nation had to pay it at one time or another. If Africa wanted to develop with China’s help, Zhao reasoned, it should have to do so on China’s terms.

The bottom line for African governments, even the despotic ones, was that they were beginning to count the true costs of doing business with a predatory partner like China and found the transactions wanting. They were changing up the rules of the Chinese game with the help of the opportunistic West. It was a worrying proposition for the Politburo. The general secretary himself had visited the African continent on his first official overseas tour abroad to underscore China’s interest in the region, and its concerns.

“Thank you for the excellent presentation, Mr. Li,” the chairman said as the lights went up. The MSS analyst bowed gratefully and took his seat. The chairman continued. “The Standing Committee has decided to draw a line in the sand in Mali. We want to create a new model of secure cooperation and development for our other African partners. The future of China depends upon it. That is why I am calling upon the resolute Mr. Zhao Yi to represent us in the Malian venture.” The chairman waved a hand at his nephew, who stood, beaming with confidence. All eyes turned to him.

“Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I won’t let China down.” He bowed respectfully to his uncle, then the room.

The chairman himself led the others in a round of applause.

5

The village of Anou

Kidal Region, Northeastern Mali

1 May

The village slept this time of day. No one would come to the shop until later. The relentless heat blanketed everything. But Ibrahim couldn’t sleep. The curse of advancing age, he supposed.

The shopkeeper felt the gentle breeze of the old GE oscillating fan on his back. The aluminum blades were bent, rattling the little wire cage enclosing them. Ibrahim didn’t care. The rattling sound comforted him. So did the heat and the sun. He liked familiar things these days, even the unpleasant ones.