The United States and North Africa: An Historiographical Wasteland

Extract

It is ironic that the United States, a nation purportedly born, out of revolution, should he so naive in its understanding and reticent in its recognition of other indigenous uprisings and nationalist aspirations. In the post-World War II era, no area has experienced more political upheaval than the continent of Africa. The rejection of colonialism within a wave of nationalist insurgency has produced no less than forty independent states. North Africa, in particular, provides a faithful reflection of the road to independence for the whole of Africa. The four Muslim states have attained sovereignty through United Nations supervision, French concessionary reluctance, and bloody civil war. Yet, in all cases, the United States belatedly withheld sympathetic diplomatic action.

American political insensitivity toward the Maghrib is evidenced by the scarcity of published materials on United States-North African relations. Perhaps if American interests in the area were only the product of the post-1945 period, this historiographical inadequacy could be excused within the argument of unfamiliarity and other foreign priorities. Yet the argument would be a shallow one. The United States has enjoyed deep-rooted, though irregular, historical connections with North Africa both before and during the colonial period. Although material on United States relations with North Africa, 1776-1945, centers on only a handful of topics, those sources of contact alone would partially invalidate the specious excuse of unfamiliarity and irrelevance which ethnocentric scholars raise.