A Familiar Frontier: The Kennedy Administration in the Congo ...

than other Congolese. By the time of independence, a black ruling class emerged, deeplyinvested in the status quo and sharing financial interests with Union Minière and theBelgian state. 1 The European interests found their perfect representative in MoiseTshombe: Christian, anti-communist, educated in an American missionary school whosometimes engaged in business pursuits himself. Belgium certainly celebrated whenTshombe declared Katanga independent on July 11, 1960, while the Congo was dealingwith the mutiny of the Force Publique. 2 Katanga had been independent before Leopold’sland grab, with its store of precious metals serving as a major point of conflict betweenLunda and Baluba tribes. 3 The Europeans living in Katanga had openly discussedsecession even before independence, and there had been some consideration of an offer tojoin the province to neighboring Rhodesia, another state dominated by minority whites.The Congo was the leading supplier of cobalt and industrial diamonds (used formining or construction rather than jewelry) to the West, and also contributed meaningfulamounts of copper and tin. The industrial diamond production was primarily located inKasai, but the remaining mining interests lay in Katanga and across the border innorthern Rhodesia. Furthermore, Katanga produced a great deal of cobalt and tantalum,minerals that had defense implications and were not present in significant quantities inthe U.S., meaning that the access to Katangese sources was critical. 4 Significantly, theUnited States had loaned $60 million to nearby Rhodesia during the 1950s, with some ofthat investment going directly to the Rhodesian-Congo Power Corporation. The loanswere expected to be repaid through the delivery of cobalt and copper to the U.S. Thus,1 Mahoney, JFK: Ordeal in Africa, 912 Kalb, The Congo Cables, 73 Mahoney, JFK: Ordeal in Africa, 894 Weissman, American Foreign Policy in the Congo, 2968