A Cost-Benefit Analysis Of The Proposed Congolese-US Minerals-Security Deal

The US might be able to replace Chinese companies’ dominant role in the DRC’s gigantic minerals industry if it plays its cards right but must avoid being dragged into a quagmire through mission creep.

Reuters reported last week that Erik Prince had already reached a deal with the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) sometime before its latest crisis to improve tax collection, reduce cross-border smuggling of minerals, and secure mines in its mineral-rich historical Katanga region. This news follows the DRC’s pursuit of a related deal with the US that would see it provide American companies with privileged access to its critical mineral deposits in exchange for military equipment and training.

The regional context concerns the reportedly Rwandan-backed M23 rebels’ invasion of the mineral-rich eastern DRC on the pretext of coercing Kinshasa into implementing prior military-political agreements and to root out Hutu rebel groups that they allege are partially comprised of fugitive genocidaires. Reuters claimed that Prince’s PMCs wouldn’t be deployed to areas of active conflict even though they were originally supposed to work in the North Kivutian capital of Goma that’s now occupied by M23.

Scant details have emerged about the security terms of the Congolese-US deal that’s being discussed but it’s unlikely that quagmire-averse Trump would commit American troops to the conflict. Rather, he’s more likely to deploy them to the mineral-rich historical Katanga region for training purposes or possibly even outsource these responsibilities to Prince’s PMCs, many of whom are veterans. In any case, Trump is probably very serious about clinching a deal due to the global context, which will now be described.

His global trade war/“economic revolution” is mostly aimed against China as explained in the preceding hyperlinked analyses. It’s not just about competing for markets abroad or rebalancing their bilateral trade deficit, but containing China, which could take the form in this case of the US getting the DRC to curtail China’s access to its critical minerals. Chinese companies already control most of the DRC’s mineral deposits so it would be a strategic coup if the DRC replaces them with American ones.

Therein lies the primary challenge since US support, both from Prince’s PMC and the Pentagon, has to meet enough of the DRC’s interests in order for it to take the economic and legal risks that replacing Chinese companies with American ones would entail but without also risking another quagmire. The DRC under its present leadership wants to restore the state’s writ over its M23-occupied resource-rich eastern periphery instead of granting broad Bosnian-like autonomy to that region or ceding it to Rwanda.

It's here where masterful diplomacy must come into play otherwise Rwanda might carry out another regime change in the DRC like it did in erstwhile Zaire by installing a leader, perhaps former President Joseph Kabila despite his father turning against his Rwandan allies, who’ll grant these concessions. In that scenario, the US might not only lose out on this critical mineral opportunity, but China could also possibly further entrench its influence and thus partially counteract some of Trump’s pressure upon it.

Massad Boulos, the father-in-law of Trump’s daughter Tiffany, has been tasked by him with laying the groundwork for this complicated mineral-security-diplomatic arrangement but it’s premature to predict whether he’ll succeed. All that’s known for sure is that the stakes are significant in the context of the newly intensifying Sino-US dimension of the New Cold War since America could deal a powerful strategic blow to the People’s Republic if it replaces its rival’s role in the DRC’s critical minerals industry.