China has quietly cemented its hold on Latin America while the Biden administration attempts to fend off Beijing’s expansion in other corners of the globe, experts and lawmakers warned.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi met with his counterparts in Argentina and Bolivia last week to reaffirm their shared interests in bolstering relations and opposing “hegemony and bullying,” underscoring Beijing’s commitment to what it refers to as “South-South cooperation,” according to The Council on Foreign Relations. The Biden administration has failed to properly foster relations with Latin American nations or give them a reason not to embrace Beijing, creating a threat of a bolstered Chinese presence in the region, experts and lawmakers told the Daily Caller News Foundation. (RELATED: Chinese Communist-Linked Battery Maker Breaks The Bank On Lobbying Amid Congressional Scrutiny)
“The Biden administration must be clear-eyed about the dangers posed by this encroachment into the Western Hemisphere,” House Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Michael McCaul told the DCNF. “The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is playing offense in our backyard, and the U.S. must respond by increasing engagement with our South American neighbors as we sound the alarm about the CCP’s malign intentions throughout the globe.”
The Biden administration is seeking to counter China’s influence across other regions of the globe, including by attempting to deter the country from aiding Russia’s war effort against Ukraine, and urging Beijing to play a constructive role in the ongoing Middle East conflict, rather than an incendiary one. It has also sought to shore up key partnerships in southeast Asia and bolster Taiwan’s defense — including through the recent passage of foreign military aid — against an increasingly hostile China.
China’s trade relationship with Latin America in previous decades was negligible at best; the region’s exports to China in 2002 only made up less than 2% of China’s markets, CFR reported. By 2023, China ranked as Latin America’s second-largest trading partner in the world, with trade values exceeding $489 billion in 2023 and expected to pass $700 billion by 2035, according to the Andres Bello Foundation.
China is also Latin America’s largest sovereign credit lender, which has created concerns that the region is becoming locked in a “debt trap,” increasing countries’ economic dependence on Beijing, according to CFR and Foreign Affairs.
“Building influence in Latin America offers Beijing several strategic advantages to both strengthen China and undermine the United States,” Andres Martinez-Fernandez, senior policy analyst for Latin America at The Heritage Foundation, told the DCNF. “The Biden administration has taken Washington’s historical inattention to Latin America to unthinkable levels, even as Beijing sharpens its engagement.”
Latin America is also a benefactor of China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), President Xi Jinping’s signature multi-trillion-dollar investment project. The BRI aims to expand China’s influence by building infrastructure, transportation communication and trade networks in countries and continents across the globe. The BRI is a key method that allows Beijing to pin debt on host nations, as they borrow funds for large infrastructure projects. (RELATED: Chinese Spy Ship Stalks US Warships During Military Drills)
“The CCP’s tentacles reach nearly every corner of the globe as it continues to engage in debt trap diplomacy — masquerading as a friend to developing countries before saddling them with unsustainable debt,” McCaul told the DCNF.
China’s President Xi Jinping and Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro take part in a welcoming ceremony at the Great Hall of the People, in Beijing, China September 13, 2023. Miraflores Palace/Handout via REUTERS THIS IMAGE HAS BEEN SUPPLIED BY A THIRD PARTY.
BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) is another influence-boosting project China is seeking in Latin America; the group seeks to provide a global economic coalition meant to act as a workaround the Western-led finance system. China is the largest player in BRICS, and though Brazil is a member already, Beijing hopes to bring other Latin American countries into the fold, including Argentina — although Buenos Aires has thus far rejected the invitation.
China has expanded its military-to-military cooperation within the Latin American and Caribbean regions, bolstering arms sales to different nations, providing training on behalf of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), and enhancing communication and strategy assistance, CFR and the Atlantic Council reported. Venezuela in particular has embraced this relationship with China, buying up some $626 million worth of arms between 2006 and 2022, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.
China has installations scattered throughout the global south region; it maintains an intelligence base in Cuba located roughly 100 miles from the shores of Florida, allowing Beijing to tap into electronic communications across the southeast seaboard of the U.S., according to the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. China also has a network of space program-related installations across Latin America, including satellite locations in Argentina, Brazil, Venezuela, Peru and Bolivia, according to The Washington Post.
Though China has bolstered its regional influence efforts in Latin America long before President Joe Biden took office, it advanced further under the “neglect” of the Biden administration, which has failed to take the needed steps to prevent Beijing from gaining an economic and military foothold with countries that already have a negative toward from the U.S., such as Brazil, according to Gordon Chang, author and foreign affairs expert. (RELATED: China’s Most Powerful Spy Agency Vows To ‘Resolutely Fight’ Taiwan Independence)
▶️FM Wang Yi: The Global South is no longer the “silent majority,” but a key force for reforming the international order and a source of hope as the world undergoes profound changes unseen in a century. pic.twitter.com/ypOrMAj0Lj
— Spokesperson发言人办公室 (@MFA_China) March 7, 2024
“The Biden administration is certainly not paying enough attention to Latin America and the Caribbean, but that has been true of Washington for a century. China wants to control the region, for trade, for war against the United States and for bringing down the American republic.” Chang told the DCNF. “Biden is guilty of more than neglect, however. He undermined Jair Bolsonaro’s reelection bid in Brazil in 2022 because he was a conservative. Lula da Silva won and turned Brazil leftward — and toward China.”
Aside from its BRICS membership, Brazil has angered U.S. officials with Lula’s open criticism of the dollar as the global reserve currency, according to the Carnegie Endowment For International Peace. China makes up roughly 33% of Brazil’s exports and remains a strong political partner, even on a local level.
One way to counter China’s presence in Latin America is through the revival of the Monroe Doctrine, Republican Florida Rep. Michael Waltz told the DCNF. The Monroe Doctrine, created in 1823, issued a warning to any foreign actors that any political intervention in Latin America, or any nation in the Americas as a whole, could be viewed as an act of hostility against the U.S.’ interests.
“We absolutely need a new Monroe Doctrine that looks to block China’s economic and military tentacles in the region,” Waltz told the DCNF. “It would be a massive strategic loss if China is able to continue to increase its military presence in places like Cuba and monopolize Latin America’s export market.”
Separate from China, the Biden administration should also take steps to foster a better economic and political relationship with these nations, and give them reasons to come to the negotiating table, Chang told the DCNF.
“Let’s start by helping our friends instead of China’s. We can also increase intra-regional commerce by liberalizing our free-trade agreements,” Chang told the DCNF. “By giving preference to goods made in the Western Hemisphere, we can get factories to move back from Asia to this region. This will strengthen our commercial ties, lessen our reliance on a hostile Chinese state, and help reduce the flow of migrants to our southern border. And for those who are worried about the climate, goods made in our region will require far less carbon emissions to transport here than goods made a half-world away. What’s not to like?”
The State Department told the DCNF that the U.S. “continuously works at home and throughout the [Latin American] region to strengthen governance, promote transparency, and ensure respect for human rights.”
“We don’t oppose (the People’s Republican of China’s) engagement and investment throughout the region. But we echo long-standing calls from Latin American capitals that the PRC’s actions respect local laws and interests,” the State Department told the DCNF.
The White House did not respond to a request for comment.
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