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During the first week of December, the U.S. President hosted the leaders of Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo for a peace agreement. He promised an end to decades of conflict in the volatile eastern DRC, presenting it as an opportunity for businesses in all three nations to generate significant profit.

Weeks later, however, a starkly different strategy for instability emerged. It was declared that U.S. forces had conducted Christmas Day airstrikes in northwestern Nigeria, striking sites associated with the Islamic State (IS). On a online platform, the President stated, I had cautioned these Terrorists that if they did not stop the slaughtering of Christians, there would be hell to pay, and tonight, there was.”

A Defining Change of Direction

These divergent actions exemplifies the defining feature of the U.S. engagement with sub-Saharan Africa in this term: a moving away from promoting democracy and human rights in favor of a avowed focus on commerce and conflict resolution—even as this aligns with the nascent air campaign in Nigeria remains to be seen.

“We no longer see Africa as a continent in need of handouts, but as a capable commercial partner. ‘Trade, not aid,’ a slogan commonly used for years, is now truly our policy for Africa,” declared a top U.S. diplomat in a visit to Côte d’Ivoire in March.

A White House spokesperson reinforced this, noting the President “views Africa not as a charity case, but as a powerhouse partner. Under his leadership, American capital, technology, and diplomacy are helping African nations achieve stability, build real energy independence, and turn their natural wealth into jobs and opportunity.”

Consequences and Contradictions

This change is major, but experts note it is early to gauge its impact. The approach is influenced by the President’s personal style, which has included conflicts with long-standing U.S. partners and negative rhetoric towards Africans.

“The core tenet is, if it’s in the immediate or future interest of the United States, as I see it, then I’m going to do it,” commented a senior fellow for Africa studies at a prominent foreign policy council.

Major actions have included:

• Dismantling the primary U.S. international development agency, USAID. An analysis predicts this could lead to millions of excess fatalities globally by 2030, with a significant portion in Africa.
• Imposing visa restrictions on citizens from over twenty African countries and halting most refugee admissions.
• Unleashing a global tariff campaign that has harmed African businesses dependent on U.S. markets, such as textile manufacturers in Lesotho.
• Letting a longstanding U.S.-Africa trade preference act, the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), to lapse without renewal.

International Apathy and Friction

Differing from his recent predecessors, the President never visited sub-Saharan Africa during his first term. His most notable comment on African affairs was dubbing nations on the continent with a crude epithet, which he later confirmed using.

“Africa sits at dead bottom in his list of priorities, not just for him, but for the administration in general,” remarked the Africa program director for an international conflict resolution organization. He pointed to the recent U.S. National Security Strategy, which gave only three paragraphs to Africa in a 29-page document.

A significant dispute has broken out with South Africa, seemingly spurred by claims of persecution against the white minority. This led to a U.S. boycott of the G20 summit in Johannesburg and threats to block South African delegates from the next meeting.

“The idea of a ‘white genocide’ happening in South Africa resonates strongly now in U.S. political culture and the idea that diversity is not welcome, it’s a threat,” commented a veteran South African journalist based in Washington.

Business-Like Relations and Targeted Involvement

A similar confrontation appeared with Nigeria in November, when the President threatened to cut aid and send in the military “guns-a-blazing” over the killing of Christians. This ran up against Nigeria’s complex reality as a nation evenly divided between Christians and Muslims and suffering from security crises affecting both groups.

Some Nigerian analysts said that the harsh rhetoric may have prompted the government into more responsiveness on security. After the Christmas airstrikes, Nigerian officials said they had consented to the U.S. intervention and might collaborate on further actions.

The President has been open his desire for a Nobel Peace Prize. His administration has brokered in the Congo conflict and dispatched a diplomat to try to negotiate a resolution in Sudan’s civil war, to date without success. While the Congo deal was reportedly broken quickly, it “at least serves to introduce a degree of diplomacy and a channel outside the battlefield,” said one conflict expert.

An Echo of Other Powers

Observers describe the new U.S. approach as reminiscent of that of global rivals like Russia and China, who have deepened their involvement in Africa in recent decades based on commercial interests.

“It’s a long overdue recognition of African agency, and to that extent, it represents, at least at the level of symbols, taking Africa very seriously,” said one foreign policy analyst.

Realistically, the revised strategy likely means that “a nation that doesn’t have anything to put on the table … is not on his radar.”

“The diplomacy that we are talking about isn't about spreading the milk of human kindness, as it were, it is about a transactional posture towards Africa,” the observer stated.