Chloe brief

In 1960, June 30, the congo was freed from Belgium. They soon after elected Patrice
Lumumba as their prime minister, and action which stemmed many problems, causing the U.S.
to interfere. America sending the CIA into the congo was the wise thing to do because we would
have lost access to all the natural resources if Lumumba got his way. He was only in office for a
short while, but already things were falling apart. The army revolted, and to parts of the congo
seceeded. Lastly, they were becoming allies with the soviets, and they probably would have
become communist.
It was out of control. The army revolting was something that would go on to claim around
100,000 lives. The army wanted higher pay, and for all the white officers to be removed from
their ranks. This violence went on for 5 years. At one point, Belgium brought in troops in an
attempt to restore the peace. This shows how weak the government was. And this was only
after a short period of time, a mere preview of what would have happened. Who knows what
else could have gone wrong, just this turmoil went on for five years and costed many lives! It
was only after a few days that this chaos broke out! The white population was being tormented.
Maybe some part of Patrice was pleased or at least passive about this, because he was black.
Maybe he considered it justice. The mineral-rich land of Katanga and Southern Kasia split off
from the government while Lumumba was in office. Katanga was a very wealthy province, and
by splitting, the congo was losing major opportunities. Also, for obvious reasons, such as
military, and just general support, it is always better for a country or any place to be as unified
as possible. The people, if the only ones, who should have supported Lumumba should have
been his own people. But even they didnt have faith in their own prime minister, the first
democratically elected one I may add. He was planning to cut off the U.S. from all the
resources, which means that we would have presumably cut them off in return, so they wouldnt
have had our support and since Katanga and South Kasai split away, they didnt have any other
sources.

They would just essentially have had to support themselves with no trade, (unless it was from
the USSR which is a whole other can of worms). Also, what if someone had declared war on the
congo? The whole congo was divided, and they have no help. Even if belgium had helped, they
still could never save the failing system.
Since they were close to the Soviets, they would have almost certainly become
communist. He was so desperate for help, he asked the USSR to help him using military forces
against his own provinces, his own people, when they were seceding.
He was killed before anything else could develop, but he had already become the Soviets
allaby. He was weak. His leadership was being questioned. The congo had no army. It was all
divided and the only people who could help was the russians. He would have turned communist
if they had recommended it. They got him in the perfect moment. He was in no position to
refuse to change, anything to try to help the congo he had plunged into madness. It just blows
my mind that he was asking the soviets to use force against his own country. The provinces
receded because they didn't support him, and if he has thought he was worthy of being Prime
minister, he could have just proved it to them. But he wasnt confident in himself. He knew that
he didnt have what it took. He knew that he was leading the conga down a bad road, so he
couldnt even try to persuade them, because some part of him knew they were right.

We, America, would have lost all accesses to the natural resources the land had to offer. If
patrice had gotten what he wanted we couldn't have gotten these things: Coltan, Diamonds,
copper/cobalt, gold, uranium, tin, rubber, ivory. For the U.S., and for everyone, these things are
very crucial. If we had not been able to get these things from them, it would be very bad for us.
Life as we know it, would not be the same. In 2013 the congo was the United States 13 largest
goods export market. The congo was also our 74th largest supplier of good imports. In addition,
since there was no control the people (mostly the congolese) were being, sometimes brutally,

forced to harvest rubber and other goods. This is insane! Things were so out of control that
slavery was reappearing!

In conclusion, although we were not involved in the actually killing of Patrice Lumumba,
what we did is justified. We recognized a cry for help. We saw that without us, the congo could
have gone a terrible way, and we knew what needed to be done. The amount of time between
when he was elected, and when all the things I have just shared with you happened is
alarmingly fast. There is a direct line leading to him. We saved the citizens of the congos lives
as well as our own for all we know. Thank you for your time.