(Credit: youtubeCGTN)     The People’s Republic of China’s Liaoning aircraft carrier.

By Gary Raynaldo   –   DIPLOMATIC  TIMES

WASHINGTON  –  PENTAGON –   Reports that China is seeking to establish a naval base in Equatorial Guinea on the Atlantic Coast of Africa  is causing alarm in the Biden administration.  The Wall Street Journal reported earlier this week that China is making attempts to set up its first permanent military base in the Atlantic Ocean.   According to the  WSJ,  “the reports raise the prospect that Chinese warships would be able to rearm and refit opposite the East Coast of the US.” The White House and the  Pentagon  said such a move by China would raise national security concerns.  

” What I would just tell you as — as part of normal diplomacy to address maritime security issues there in that region, we have made clear, the administration has made clear, I don’t know about the Department of Defense necessarily, to the leaders of the Equatorial Guinea that certain potential steps involving the PRC and the PRC’s activity there would raise national security concerns for us. And the administration has been clear about that. But what we have seen China try to do there and elsewhere around the world is establish a foothold that they could use. That could advance their own military goals and I think that’s the real crux of the issue.”

-Pentagon  Press Secretary John Kirby told reporters during briefing. 

(Photo by Gary Raynaldo /  ©Diplomatic Times)  Pentagon Press Secretary John Kirby briefs reporters at the Pentagon in Washington D.C.

U.S. Not Trying To Pressure Equatorial Guinea in its relations With China:  Kirby

The Pentagon press secretary stressed that Equatorial Guinea is a sovereign nation,  “and we respect their right to have bilateral relations in manners that they see fit, but we wouldn’t be doing right by our relationship, our bilateral relationship with them if we weren’t honest about what our concerns were. But it’s not about enforcing some sort of leverage on them.”

CHINA Already Has Naval Base Near Entrance to the Red Sea in Horn of  Africa  Large Enough To Support Aircraft  Carriers:   AFRICOM 

Last April 2021,    the top commander of  U.S. Africa Command told lawmakers on Capital Hill that China’s  existing naval base near the entrance to the Red Sea in Horn of  Africa  nation Djibouti was a cause of concern because  it is large enough to support  aircraft carriers.  U.S. Africa Commander Army Gen. Stephen Townsend told the House Armed Services Committee then  that the People’s Liberation Army was expanding its existing naval installation adjacent to a Chinese-owned commercial deep-water port and also seeking other military basing options elsewhere on the continent.    The base, formally opened in 2017, was developed to support the Chinese anti-piracy mission off the coast of Somalia in the Gulf of Aden. 

Credit: africom.mil)   Army Gen. Stephen J. Townsend, Commander of U.S. African Command testifies  before the House Armed Services Committee regarding national security challenges and U.S. force posture in the Centcom and Africom areas of operation and related policy issues, on  Apr. 20, 2021 in Washington D.C. 

“Their first overseas military base, their only one, is in Africa, and they have just expanded that by adding a significant pier that can even support their aircraft carriers in the future. Around the continent they are looking for other basing opportunities,”

-Gen .Townsend told the HASC.