ScholarWorks@숙명여자대학교

초록

The United States security strategy towards Africa is transforming. Whereas the Obama administration prioritized containing China in the Asia-Pacific by scaling back military involvement in Africa and emphasizing economic and diplomatic overtures, the Biden administration, acknowledging Africa’s resurgent geopolitical and strategic significance, is expanding its Indo-Pacific strategy to incorporate the African continent, unequivocally signaling a renewed commitment to re-engagement. This policy shift is shaped by the activist African agendas of China and Russia – China is undertaking sundry security cooperation initiatives encompassing peacekeeping support, constructing naval bases to consolidate maritime footholds, arms transfers, and military training to countervail the U.S. and amplify political leverage, while Russia is augmenting its military and diplomatic sway by furnishing security capabilities through paramilitary organizations to African nations embroiled in civil wars and insurgencies. The impetus for according priority to Africa is that African countries receiving security assistance from authoritarian regimes engender a predicament regarding multilateral security cooperation – as exemplified by South Africa and 16 other African nations abstaining from the March 2022 UN resolution criticizing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, confounding the U.S. and Western allies. The U.S. is tasked with making amends for neglecting African countries, accordingly evolving its Indo-Pacific strategy inherited from the Asia-Pacific framework. This article elucidates the evolving African security cooperation milieu becoming an arena of great power rivalries. It examines how the U.S. Indo-Pacific strategy shapes African security, furnishing implications for Korea-Africa military cooperation.

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