 Hello? Is it recording? Okay, perfect. Good evening and welcome to this book launch organized by the Center for Grants Strategy of the World Studies Department, I think called it London. My name is Eleonora Natale. I am a lecturer in International History, the Department of World Studies and a member of the Center for Grants Strategy. I'm very happy today to have here Dr. Slavia Gasparis, who is presenting her book, US Foreign Policy and the End of the Cold War in Africa, A Bridge Between Global Conflicts and the New World Order. Dr. Gasparis is a lecturer in World Studies Education, co-chair of the Africa Research Group and member of the Center for Grants Strategy at the Department of World Studies. She completed her PhD here at his College in San Francisco. For her research, she received a scholarship from our graduate school and three grants from the Royal Historical Society, the European Association for American Studies and the School of Institutes of International Affairs. She was also a visiting fellow at the Woodrow Wilson Center for Scholars in Washington DC. Besides being an estimated member of our department, Dr. Gasparis has been a teaching fellow and academic tutor at the Defense Studies Department at the Joint Services Command and Staff College and at the Royal College of Defense Studies. Dr. Gasparis's research focuses on the study of the Cold War in the Third World, the development of both Cold War US foreign policy and US-Africa relations. She has also worked on US policy in the Rwandan Genocide and in the Great Lakes region. And today we also have the great pleasure of having here Dr. Makovic from Lancaster University. Thank you for being our discussant today. Dr. Bas is the director of the Center for War and Diplomacy and reader in the National History of the Cold War at Lancaster. His research focuses especially on the international history of the Cold War, particularly in southern Africa. But he also resorts to sleeping in Africa and the transformation of European Army forces since the end of the Cold War. I'm very excited about this book launch. We had a great turn off of this event. And so I'll let, in a minute, Flavia presents her work. Just a reminder, if you have any questions, please post them in the chat function at the bottom of your screen. We will pick them up at the end of the presentation. And also I would like to remind you that we are recording this event via Zoom and then we will upload it to our YouTube channel in case you want to rewatch it or share it. So Flavia, I'll leave it to you. Thank you. Okay, thank you very much for this kind introduction and for being our chair tonight. Good evening everybody. And thank you for being virtually here tonight to hear about my book. And of course a special thanks to Marco, I'm particularly glad to have you here as a discussant of my book and really looking forward to hearing your comments. So basically in the next few minutes, I want to just briefly present my book, of course, the genesis of the book, the origin and its main point. So let me first of all share with you a brief PowerPoint that I prefer for you. So maybe you can follow. Okay, so hope you can all see my PowerPoint. Okay, so basically, as you may see from from the title of the book, my book is a study of US foreign policy in Africa between 1988 and 1994 so at the juncture of the end of the Cold War. And I think in order to basically explain what the starting point of the book was, I think start with by showing you this this quote. The future competition with the United States will take place not in Europe and not in the Atlantic Ocean directly. It will take place in Africa and Latin America. We will compete for every piece of land for every country. This quote comes from Yuri Andropov in 1965. Andropov will later become the general secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. And he said in 1965 the competition will take place in Africa and Latin America. At the end of the day, the competition between the United States and the Soviet Union took place on many fronts from nuclear war to a propaganda war. But Andropov was right. I said it was true that it is true that Africa and Latin America together with other areas of what became known as the third world played an important and very complex role in the in the superpower rivalry in the Cold War. And when Andropov in 1965 said we won't compete in Europe, actually he was right. If you think about the battle for Europe was already settled quite early in the Cold War was over to some extent quite early in the Cold War. Already in the 50s with the with the vision after the division of Germany, after the creation of NATO after the creation of the Warsaw Pact, the two blocks in Europe, the rule of the games of the Cold War in Europe was already very clear was already frozen, if you want. The Cold War at that point became instead a global competition. From Berlin from Europe to the Cold War radiated outwards, progressively invested new areas and regions of the planet, particularly during and after the process of the colonization with the creation of the so called third world. So over the last over the past 10, 15 years, the third world has progressively acquired the centrality in the study of the Cold War. I put here in the PowerPoint, a couple of quotes from this type of literature, which summarized very well the idea that at the end of the day, the real deal, the real stake of the Cold War was indeed the battle for winning hearts and minds of the third world. The Cold War to some extent was called for in the name of the third world precisely because the battle for Europe was already settled early in the Cold War. So there is this increasing attention to the development of the Cold War in the third world, how Cold War has invaded some point these new areas of the world coming out from the colonization. However, what I noticed is that when we look at the end of the Cold War, the last part of the Cold War, the way in which the Cold War ended, this attention to the third world vanished once again. When we mentioned the end of the Cold War, these are indeed the images that immediately come out to our mind. So, of course, the fall of the Berlin Wall, the revolution in Eastern Europe, the end of the Soviet Union. These are the images, the moment that even symbolically will link the end of the Cold War. However, these images document just one of what I call the many ends of the Cold War. The Cold War, as I said, was a global conflict. The Cold War played an important role in the third world. The Cold War had many battlegrounds in the third world and consequently I would say that there are many different ends of the Cold War. It's not true that the narrative of end of the Cold War centered on Europe necessarily applies or has the same meaning for all the battlegrounds, all the battleships of the global Cold War. There are indeed many ends of the Cold War and each of these ends, each end of the Cold War opened a different series of challenges and opportunities for the post-Cold War international system led, of course, by the soul remaining American superpower during the so-called unipolar moment. And this aspect is quite important in consideration of the fact that some of the most important crisis of the US-led New World Order during the 90s, some of the most important crisis of this New World Order happened precisely in those regions of the world that once were part of the third world battlegrounds of the Cold War. For example, the Gulf War or the Somalist War in the early 90s just to mention a couple of examples. So in my book, I wanted to investigate one of those different ends of the Cold War and its impact on post-Cold War US foreign policy. And I looked at one specific case, the one specific case studies, which is the African continent and more specifically Sub-Saharan Africa. Why Africa? The African continent is a very interesting case in the complex context of the end of the Cold War in the third world and the shrinking of US foreign policy in the early 90s. Africa was indeed an important battlefield of the Cold War, not a neglected battlefield of the Cold War. Africa joined the Cold War a bit later compared to other areas of the third world alike for Eastern Fantasia, mostly because the continent decolonized a bit later. And Africa acquired importance for the Cold War, particularly during the 70s. There are incidents with the beginning of two conflicts in two specific areas of the continent, which are also the focus, the main focus of my book, Southern Africa and the Horn of Africa. So we see these two important conflicts. There was a major regional war in Southern Africa, which also stood in the moment of many regional actors, Angolan and Nibia, South Africa, Iran and so on. And a minor border dispute in the Horn of Africa between Somalia and Ethiopia, the so-called Ogden War. The two superpowers and the two blocks, together with other important international actors of the Cold War, like China or Cuba, all these international actors and the two superpowers massively intervened in these conflicts. Tried to use these conflicts as proxies, supported the local actors in these conflicts to stop each other. And by doing so, of course, through these interventions, they interfered, they stopped the local roots, the development of these conflicts, and sometimes the outcomes of these conflicts. At the same time, on the other hand, the local actors, the regional actors also exploited the intervention of the external actors, also exploited them. The superpower competitions played one superpower off against the other in order to reach their own goals in these wars, in these conflicts. So all this process basically created an overlap between the regional dynamics and the interests of the local actors and the global dynamics of the Cold War. The Cold War, which in those years, during the 70s, was going through the process on the town. And this overlap was particularly evident in Africa. I put here a famous quote from the US National Security Advisor during the Carter administration, Dibinu Brzezinski. Dibinu Brzezinski famously stated that the salt, the salt agreement lies buried in the sands of Oregon. The salt agreement was possibly the greatest accomplishment of the US-Soviet dialogue on arms control during the 70s. This agreement, together with the whole town process, eventually collapsed in 1979 after the two superpowers clashed in the Ogden War, in these conflicts in the Horn of Africa. And the Ogden War, in this regard, really was an important resource for the undermined the town process, together with many other factors of course. I think this quote encapsulates very well, sorry, encapsulates very well how basically encapsulates very well the corporate interactions, how the superpowers disagreement over their respective policies during the Ethiopian Somali border dispute, which was indeed a minor and a marginal conflict for them, but their disagreement on this conflict ended up insignificantly affecting the global dynamic of the Cold War and of the town. So we really see here a mutual influence between the global and the local, and this overlap, this corporate interconnection, this overlap between the global and the local, really was one of the main ways in which the Cold War developed and materialized in Africa. Furthermore, when we look instead at the post-Cold War period, at the unipolar moment, we see how the involvement of the United States in the African continent, particularly in those regions which were mostly affected, which were more affected by the Cold War, again, in Africa and the Horn of Africa, the involvement of the United States in these regions during the 90s is marked by a very heterogeneous action, marked by some sort of influence. We see an important intervention in mediation and conflict resolutions, like in the case of the Civil War in Angola and even more in the Civil War in Ethiopia and even more in the Civil War in Angola. We see massive military intervention, like in the case of the Somali Civil War in 1991. We see also very low-profile involvement and total disengagement as it happened during the Rwandan Genocide in 1994. So these are just a few examples to show the sort of inconsistencies, these heterogeneous actions of US foreign policy in these areas in the early 90s. And of course, this heterogeneous picture and the mixed results of these actions raised questions about the rationale of US foreign policy in the continent in the immediate post-Cold War period. A rationale which I believe has the rules in the specific way in which the Cold War ended in Africa. So my study of US foreign policy in Africa at the end of the Cold War started precisely from this very point, starting from the identification of the end of the Cold War in Africa, what was the end of the Cold War in Africa. I tried to identify the unique temporal framework, the crucial process, the crucial turning points which were meaningful for ending the Cold War in this particular scenario. And I identified 1988 as a major turning point for the end of the Cold War in Africa. 1988 as the moment when the reset button of the Cold War was pushed in Africa. Because both the Cold War related conflicts in the continent, the war in South Africa and the conflicts in the Horn of Africa, both of these conflicts found a solution in 1988 with the signature of two very important agreements. The New York agreements in South Africa and the Ethiopian Somali agreement in the Horn of Africa. So in my study I saw how the signature of these two agreements put in motion a significant transformation in the political and military dynamics in these regions. A transformation which basically split that overlap between the global and the local that was created in the 70s. A transformation that ended up in removing the Cold War paradigm from Africa. So for this reason, I like to say that 1988 to some extent is the Africa's barely war. As I said before, the Cold War materialized, developed in Africa through this progressive global, local overlap through this corporate interconnection. So as a consequence, the end of the Cold War in Africa was the reversal of this process of these connections, the split of this linkage. The split of this linkage culminated in 1988. And that's why I say 1988 is the Africa's barely war. And this is interesting because 1988 one year before the actual war fell in Berlin. So with this picture in mind, I then analyzed US foreign policy in Africa after 1988 after this end of the Cold War in Africa. And what I noticed was that in the early 90s, US foreign policy in Africa was characterized by a complex interaction between two different and coexisting things, two different and coexisting directions. On the one hand, the United States had to manage the legacy of the Cold War, the legacy and the consequences of the 1988 turning point. On the other hand, the United States also had to face the new challenges and new imperatives that came out from that turning point. And Washington had to find new approaches for its foreign policy and for its involvement in the country. So we have on the one hand managing the legacy of the Cold War, on the other hand, finding something new, finding a new approach for foreign policy in Africa. And I also noted that the US strategy, US foreign policy in Africa was more consistent and more committed for as long as the first thing managing the legacy of the Cold War still offered a guideline. In other words, for as long as the Soviet Union was still there. This was evident in particular in the way which after 1988 Washington tried for instance to implement a policy of conflict resolution and mediation in several conflicts in Africa in cooperation with the Soviet Union. This was true as I said before in the case of the Civil War in Ethiopia and even more in the Civil War in Angola where at some point in 1990, 1991, Moscow, Washington established a formal joint action as mediator in this conflict. And why did the United States do so? Why did the United States cooperate in this way in conflict resolutions in Africa with the Soviet Union? Because cooperating with Moscow, cooperating with the Soviet Union in one of the peripheral former battlefields of the Cold War helped the broader relations between the two superpower and it helped the dialogue on the core issues of arms control that was still going on in the early 90s, particularly with the signature of the start agreement in 1991. So basically this was the opposite process that happened during the 70s when instead the salt agreement was buried in the sense of the war. In the 70s we have seen how the disagreements between the two superpowers over the regional conflicts in Africa undermined their relationship at the broader level, undermined the town process. At the end of the early 90s, cooperation in these regional conflicts in these regional battlefields instead helped the broader relations. So we see this opposite direction, this opposite process, and this also helped the US foreign policy in Africa because at that point in the early 90s, up to 1991, Washington could still link its policy in Africa, its strategy in Africa to a broader strategic imperative, which was the Soviet Union, cooperating with the Soviet Union, accomplished in concluding the dialogue on arms control with the Soviet Union. After the disappearance of the Soviet Union, after the disappearance of these other global actors and as a new international system based on one superpower was enriching discrepancy in the US action in Africa became more evident. The US foreign policy became a bit more incoherent and consistent and this was the symptom of the difficulties in finding new general rules of conduct in an area where the end of the Cold War had, where the 1988 turning point had removed an important overall strategic imperative. And an example here is, for instance, the intervention of the United States in the Somali in the Civil War in 1991. The United States deployed 28,000 soldiers in Somalia in 1991, mostly for humanitarian reasons. And as you probably know that intervention ended up in a disaster with the famous Black Hawk Down incident. And this showed basically the, this showed how the humanitarian argument that was so common, so fashionable in the New World Order in the early days of the New World Order turned out to be incredibly incredibly and ultimately efficient to guide US policy in the continent. It was not basically as strong as the Soviet imperative had been firstly in terms of confrontation before 1988 particular during the 70s and then in terms of cooperation after 1988. And in this regard, I really want to show you this quote from Chester Crocker. Chester Crocker was the Assistant Secretary for African Affairs during the Reagan administration. He was in office for eight years. He was one of the most influential Assistant Secretary for African Affairs. And during my research I interviewed him and during our interview during our talk, he told me precisely these words. He said, the Soviets had become what you may call our superpower partners in conflict resolution. We negotiated a bunch of agreements with them. By December 1991, there was no more Soviet Union. Back in the 90s, they forgot about Africa and we lost our partners because they had been our partners in conflict resolution. And all of a sudden they are gone and we had no counterparts to bring leaders to be in these situations and it made it very difficult. So I believe this quote really gives the sense of how the existence of the enemy that after 1988 became a counterpart, even a partner if you want. The existence of this other global counterpart was helping the resetting of US foreign policy in Africa. After the disappearance of the Soviet Union, after the disappearance of this partner, as Crocker said, things became much more difficult. And so, to conclude, let me bring everything back to the two main points, the two main questions I asked in my book. When did the Cold War end in Africa and what was post-Cold War US foreign policy in Africa in this unipolar moment in the 90s? As for the first point, when did the Cold War ended in Africa, I said 1988. But the main point here is really to stress how broadly speaking, in order to fully grasp the turning point of the end of the Cold War, we really first have to understand the ends of the Cold War, as I mentioned at the beginning. And by investigating these many different ways in which the Cold War ended in the Third World, in particular in its global battlegrounds, I believe we can develop also a new perspective for the understanding of this momentous event at the end of the Cold War. And also for the understanding of what came right after, for the understanding of the legacy of the Cold War, for the understanding of that unipolar moment dominated by the United States that followed the end of the Cold War. I did this for Africa. I tried to investigate the end of the Cold War for Africa. I'm sure maybe this can be done for all the other battlegrounds of the Cold War in order to basically have a broader picture of the ends of the Cold War. And secondly, as for the second point, the Post Cold War is foreign policy, broadly speaking, when it comes to US foreign policy in the unipolar moment, from the study of Africa, of the case studies of Africa, I noticed how, to some extent, and I hope this has emerged in my presentation today as well, to some extent the United States almost needed a global counterpart, almost needed another global player. And I think this open interesting reflection particularly in the current historical moment when there is this big debate about the rise of China, for instance, the return of Russia, the return of the great power politics and certainly the end of the American unipolarity. Thank you very much for your attention. Thank you. Thank you so much, Slavia, for this brilliant presentation. Thanks a lot. Marko. Okay. Okay. Well, thank you very much for inviting me to discuss this great book. It's an absolute pleasure to be here, although of course I would prefer somehow to do it in person with a drink in hand. But that's of course currently not possible. Now, this book is obviously not a book on current US foreign policy towards Africa, but a Washington's role in the Cold War endgame on the African continent. However, I think it's nevertheless very timely and topical this book. International historians they normally try to blow their own trumpet to say how relevant their work is for current international affairs. I'm not saying that Flavia has done so, but definitely this book that it is actually relevant for today's affairs. Actually, the case is almost self evident. Flavia has referred to that to some extent what has been turned already a while ago the new scramble for Africa, the rise of African terrorist groups linked, you know, to of course ISIS and before Al Qaeda, the persistent instability in the population and luckily on a more positive note, the substantial growth of a number of African economies. The United States has actually like other powers, somehow, or somewhat regained an interest in Africa. In the background, the book allows us to learn how Washington engaged with Africa in the past, when actually at the time it already deemed Africa relevant to some extent and it also allows us to learn actually, eventually why the United States withdrew from the African continent. Consequently Flavia's book can offer valuable lessons for a period when the United States is again interested in the African continent. And during the Cold War, the United States only again interested because it sees competition for the destiny of the African continent and also of course security threats such as reflected in its support to the French forces in Mali. Now, while the book's topicality is of course very much to be welcomed and makes it interesting. There are other potentially less ephemeral reasons why it should be celebrated as a remarkable achievement. Firstly, it feels not just one, but various historiographical gaps. Secondly, it addresses numerous pertinent research questions and related issues. And thirdly, it is not only intellectually but also scientifically and scholarly very rigorous. I would just now like to elaborate on each of these overarching reasons why I think this book is great and not just topical and timely. I mean, it's great as a historical piece of work. Now, it is relevant, of course, because of this scholarly value. It is very relevant for a number of scholars working on Africa, US foreign policy, the Cold War, as well as international relations and security more generally. Now, a few words on the historiographical cases in plural. So the most significant historiographical case for the book stems in my view from a very simple fact. It's actually that it is on the Cold War in Africa, right? So, and of course the immediate post-Cold War period. Admittedly, research on the impact of the East-West conflict on the African continent has increased significantly over recent and especially the last decade as illustrated by such works as Nancy Mitchell's book on Jimmy Carter in Africa. But overall, research on Africa's Cold War pales in comparison to research on the Cold War in Europe, but also research on the Third World, other Third World regions, more prominent ones such as the Middle East and Asia. Moreover, Africa has also frequently been neglected in general and even in global accounts of the Cold War. This is notably the case very recently, or has been the case very recently with Paul-Thom's jambolins to Cold War's killing fields and Laurence Lutey's Cold Wars. These are of course excellent works and I don't mean any criticism in any way. And privileging the Third World, other Third World regions over Africa can be justified, as does jambolin, who argues that the Cold War was more significant at a bigger impact, was more intense and more violent, especially in the Middle East and Asia. And also, it did not lead in Africa to as many deaths and it can also be argued, of course, that's the case and in Africa the Cold War also arrived relatively late, at least compared to these other two regions. However, on the other hand, it should be considered that the East-West conflict in Africa was contemporaneous to the largest decolonization wave ever and as a corollary therefore it had far reaching and lasting consequences. In addition, and as Flavia emphasizes in her book, the Cold War in Africa then further escalated in the Horn of Africa and Southern Africa as a result of stubborn Portuguese colonialism and white supremacy, radicalized local regimes and also importantly increasingly militarized superpower involvement. And this brings me to the second historiographical gap addressed by this book, namely US foreign policy towards Africa in the late Cold War and the immediate post-Cold War period. The United States had traditionally neglected Africa. Only during the Second World War it gained a temporary interest and a secondary strategic interest in the African continent as soon as the Second World War was over that interest evaporated. Then only with the independence of Ghana and in the wake of course of the Congo crisis starting in 1960, the United States became truly interested in the African continent. But let's face it, even then Africa was never of prime strategic importance to the United States, even during John F. Kennedy's charm offensive in the early 1960s. But nevertheless, that's certainly a reason why it has less been studied the US role in Africa, especially in the late Cold War. But it is very important because as Flavia has shown in a presentation and she especially shows in a book, the United States had a very strong influence during the Cold War for the Cold War in the Cold War ending and its immediate aftermath. Finally, the book addresses the different ends and endings and that was highlighted in the presentation of the Cold War in the Third World. By zooming in on the historiographically most neglected region, which is Africa, because others have started to address a bit more the other Cold War endings in the Third World, but not sufficiently of course Africa. Now moving on to the intellectual relevance of why actually the research questions and related issues are very pertinent. Firstly, and that's related to the third historiographical case it shows actually that the Cold War in Africa or the end of the Cold War in Africa preceded the end of the Cold War in Europe and the Cold War had different endings in different regions. Already in 1988, the United States and the Soviet Union shifted from a competition to a cooperation mode, albeit of course with Moscow increasingly in the junior partner role. Nevertheless, the book also shows that until its demise in 1991, the Soviet Union, however friendly it had become, remained a reference point for US African policy. Secondly, Flavia has assessed the connection and interaction between the core and the periphery. And so doing and reminding, as she did in the presentation to the reader of how the Ogden War adversely affected superpower Deton in the 1970s, she convincingly then goes on to show how the rapprochement between the Soviet Union and the United States of the late 1980s came to remove the Cold War from the equation in Africa. I found that very interesting. Thirdly, in studying the end of the Cold War in Africa, the book also sheds light on how the East-West conflict and its ending affected the region beyond the disintegration of the Soviet Union and of course there was a reference to Black Hawk down and these tragic events. Fourthly and relatedly, Flavia has questioned not only how US foreign policy affected Africa and vice versa during the Cold War, but also how Washington's engagement with Africa influenced and reflected the position in the world more broadly of the United States during what has been called the unipolar moment. This allows the reader to learn that as soon as the United States had lost its reference point in Africa, namely the Soviet Union, it became somewhat disoriented. As a result, comparatively minor setbacks led the Americans to abandon Africa in the early 1990s after extensive and decades long Cold War motivated interference and resulting devastation. Last but not least, the book analyzes how the Cold War ended in the two hotspots of late Cold War Africa, Southern Africa and of course the Horn. And if we look at the Horn in the 90s and even now, of course, the security situation continued to be very precarious and is still very precarious, very problematic. And these countries continue, the countries in these regions continue to suffer from the legacy of the Cold War, which had superimposed itself on local and regional conflicts. Finally, purely academically allow me to say a few words about the scholarly rigor of this book. So the research on which this book is based is truly impressive. Flavia has notably carried out really extensive and groundbreaking archival research in the United States. Moreover, the vast corpus of primary sources, and we saw that with a quote towards the end, has been complemented by interviews in both the United States and Africa. Finally, and despite the book's US focus, she has also tried to reduce the US centric source base by carrying out archival research in South Africa and relying on published Soviet and Cuban sources. This has ultimately allowed her not to lose sight of other also local actors in the ending of Africa's Cold War. Now, to conclude, in some, in addition to just being a fascinating read, this book is topical, original, significant and rigorous to use to paraphrase Ref Speak somehow. I can just only recommend that you read the book if you haven't already done so. So thank you again for having me here. And I would have a couple of questions, but I think we'd rather open the floor if that's okay for the chair. Yeah, absolutely. Thank you. Thank you, Marco, for your presentation. Thank you very much. Yeah, definitely. We have plenty of time now to open the floor to any questions that the audience might have. I invite you again to tap down any questions you might have in the chat function or in the Q&A function. So we do have a question actually. Are you ready, Flavia? Yes, yes, please. I would like to ask if China has started playing the role the Soviet Union had played during the Cold War in Africa and if the US needs this geoconomical activity of China in Africa, as China is becoming the new counterpart of the US. Okay, thank you very much for this question. This is actually a very common question whether the US-Chinese rivalry at the global level, broadly speaking, and then in this situation, in this case, in Africa is basically the can play the role of the substitution of the US-Soviet rivalry or if it is similar to that rivalry. I think to answer your question to some extent, yes, in the sense that of course the geoconomical activity of China in Africa can create a sort of threat for the United States which in some way can redirect US foreign policy in Africa or create at least a common overarching aim in the US foreign policy in Africa. I don't think however that whatever competition, whatever relationship between China and the United States will happen in Africa. This is going to be similar or even less identical to the type of relations that the type of bipolar dynamic that the United States and the Soviet Union had in Africa during the Cold War. I believe there is a lack of an ideological, a strong ideological aspect, a strong ideological opposition as it was during the Cold War. And also economically speaking, during the Cold War in Africa we saw two, like in the rest of the world, but in Africa in particular we saw the clash, the opposition, the rivalry between two completely different economic system, why this is not going to happen with China and the United States. An aspect that probably I would be interested in seeing in the future is to what extent the arrival of China, the expansion of China, the geoconomical activity of China in Africa will affect or not the relations between the Western countries in Africa. That's another interesting aspect, particularly the relationship between the United States and the former colonial powers, France and the UK in particular, because as Marco stressed, this combination between Cold War and decolonization created a series of interesting dynamics during the Cold War. So during the Cold War we see how the relations between the former colonial empires, France and Britain in particular, and the United States were in some way in the possible competition among these three powers were in some way silenced or overshadowed by the common enemy, and by the need to basically be united against the common enemy, the Soviet Union. So I'm wondering if the geoconomical activity in China in Africa is going to affect again the relations between these Western countries in Africa. Thank you. Brilliant. Thank you, Flavia. We have another question from the audience. What was the US policy towards Rwanda from 1991 to 1994 specifically in the run up to the genocide? Oh well, I would need like three hours to answer this question. What was the US policy towards Rwanda from 1991 to 1994? Of course, this episode Rwanda is remembered as one of the blackest pages in the history of the United Nations and also in the history of the US foreign policy, the United States has often been blamed for being the major responsible for the lack of intervention of the United States, of the United Nations in Rwanda. A common view is that the United States did not intervene in Rwanda because of the disastrous intervention in Somalia, the previous disastrous intervention in Somalia, the Black Hawk Down incident that I mentioned during my presentation. That incident was a real shock for the United States. The death of 18 Marines, basically the so-called CNN Effect, this event broadcasted all over the world, so this was a real shock. A common view is that when another crisis broke out in Africa, in another very small countries with absolutely no significance or interest for the United States, the United States decided not to get involved once again. This is true to some extent. It's true that basically what happened in Somalia affected the US attitude, the US policy towards Rwanda and genocide. On the other hand, what happened in Rwanda was also in the lack of involvement, the disengagement of the United States in Rwanda was also the result of an unclear relationship with the United Nations. Of course, after the end of the Cold War, with the disappearance of the Soviet Union, the United Nations emerged once again as an important actor in the global arena. During the Cold War, the United Nations was almost insignificant because of these veto gains between the two superpowers was inefficient for various reasons. So once the veto game disappears, the bipolar logics disappear, there was this hope that the United Nations could play an important role in the international system. It could finally become what the founding fathers wanted the United Nations to be, namely an efficient mechanism to settle the international crisis. And the obvious problem at that point was how the United States, the superpower, the unipolar superpower, the unchallenged superpower would basically interact with the United Nations. The United States never ever ever wanted to act internationally through the United Nations and this was clear far before the Black Hawk Down Incident and the genocide in Rwanda. So the United States, as always, considered the United Nations, even in the most successful intervention of the United Nations, which was the Gulf War in 1991, as always considered the United Nations just one of the possible tools at disposal of the unipolar superpower. And this basically unclear and solved and difficult relations between the United States and the United Nations was also another important factors that led to the lack of intervention and lack of engagement of the United States in Rwanda. This is just very nutshell because we could talk about this forever, but I'm afraid it's going to be boring. Not at all. Thank you, Claudia. We have more questions. So the first is about, can you share some experiences of working with archives in Africa? I hear archives in South Africa have got more difficult to access recently, not just to the public. Did you find this was the same? Okay. Yeah, I mean, in Africa, I consulted only the, precisely the archives in South Africa, which is among the countries that I studied in my book basically is the only accessible archives in Africa. I couldn't go, of course, in the archives in Somalia, of course. I really had a very nice experience there. The South African archives are, I think they are the most unexplored and underutilized archives in the history of the Cold War. So there's really a lot, a lot in those archives. The access was easy in terms of physically access to the archives. The organizations of the materials, a bit less easy to follow. Much was dependent on the personal relationship you established with the main archivist there who now I think that is retirement. So it's not there anymore. But again, I think it was a very interesting experience. The access in terms of organization of the material is a bit difficult. But I think the South African archives are really something that is worth exploring because I believe there are still a lot of underutilized sources there. Thank you, Claudia. Someone else is asking here, I think your main argument, the end of the Cold War in Africa preceded the end of the Cold War elsewhere, is fascinating. Can you maybe give us a hint on how the local actors, for example, the African governments and political movements reacted to this early disengagement? Sorry. Can I go with an intro, how the local actors reacted to this early disengagement? Well, I mean, again, my book is mostly on US foreign policies. So, also when I mentioned 1988, I refer mostly to the end of the superpower, rivalry and the superpower competitions in the Cold War. The local actors, the African governments and political movements, how they reacted to this early disengagement. Of course, I studied this aspect for an interesting finding is was the case of Ethiopia. Ethiopia that was traditionally US, sorry, a Soviet ally through how the Cold War. At the end of the Cold War, basically, with the collapse of the regime of Mingistra in Ethiopia, the new government basically said, okay, let's establish a strong relationship with the United States after all, a superpower is a superpower. You don't mind if it's a Soviet Union or the United States. So, to some extent, there was this attempt from some of the local actors, the African governments to establish good relationship with the United States. In other case, was certainly South Africa, when the ANC took power in one day elections in 1994 in South Africa, the Netsom Mandela, the relationship between Netsom Mandela and the Clinton administration, for instance, was very strong. And that's even more interesting because throughout the Cold War, the ANC was considered a sort of terrorist communist organization and Netsom Mandela like a terrorist, a communist terrorist. It's interesting how instead the relationship immediately changed after the end of the Cold War and South Africa also had much interested in established good relationship with the United States, particularly the United States was interested in developing a free market economy in South Africa, considering the relationship that the ANC had with the Communist Party in South Africa throughout the Cold War. There was a lot of interest in instead keeping a free market economy in South Africa. So, basically, what I've noticed in my studies that several local actors and African governments had interest in developing a strong relationship with the United States after the disappearance of the Soviet Union after the end of the Cold War. I didn't see, but again, that was not the focus on my book specifically, but from what I see, I didn't notice a sort of reaction against the general disengagement from the continent. So the idea was to establish good bilateral relationship with the United States. But I didn't notice, I didn't find in my research any particular reaction concerning the general disengagement from the continent. Thank you. Marco, would you like to ask those questions to Flavia perhaps and get back in the conversation. If there's no other remaining question, yes, I'd be happy to. So, two rather provocative questions. The first, because you know, to be credible, I also have to be a bit critical or provocative. So, as you discussed African sources that kind of stuff recovered. Now, and I remember it from having some discussions with you, whether you could think of using other European, you know, from the metropolis sources such as France, for instance, I mean Britain to some France, especially with its continued involvement that the safari club at the end. So, whether you could say something on that and then another generally provocative question I fear. So, the Cold War has been blamed for much of Africa's woes in the 1990s and certainly rightly so. Now with the departure of the superpowers. The lid was also taken off. I mean, if we look for instance that's our year Congo. But then of course you can say it was the cold one first place that contributed to the mess there, right. So I'm not trying to make here any positive. You know, what do you think is the relationship there so it was really like a bit, a bit like, you know, Tito, gone in Yugoslavia that kind of issue. Thank you very much, Marco, in terms of the sources. Yes, you're right. Other accessible sources concerning this era and this period. History are certainly the British and the French archives I consulted some British documents particularly concerning the relationship between the United States and Britain concerning South Africa. Particularly during the 80s. As I mentioned before, when I was talking about Nelson Mandela and the ANC, despite the fact that Britain there was probably the biggest and the strongest anti-apartheid movement global anti-apartheid movement, the government of Margaret Thatcher, Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher was particularly hostile to the ANC and to Nelson Mandela. She mentioned very often how basically they were considered just a communist organization and of course this to some extent affected the way in which the United States acted towards South Africa. Having this conversation with Chancellor Crocker, I mentioned, when I interviewed him, he told me, well, of course, when you have the British Prime Minister calling the ANC and Nelson Mandela a terrorist, a communist terrorist, you have to take into consideration, you know, it's a kind of something you have to consider in developing your policy towards the ANC or to establish a dialogue as the United States did after 1988 with the ANC. Yeah, of course this, I consulted a bit the British sources in this regard. Yeah, probably the French sources would have added something, some more insights to my book, I agree with you. I didn't want to shift too much the attention from US foreign policy by including too many Western actors in Africa, but certainly for future studies I will certainly take your advice and probably include more other sources from the former colonial power. Thank you, Marco. And in terms of the second question, sorry, could you please repeat the second question? Nobody you think because you studied extensively the end of the Cold War and we see somehow the humanitarian situation further unravel or continuing to unravel once the superpowers I mean, especially if you think, I mean of course there is the horn, which is a quite obvious case with you know Somalia, but then there is also of course West Africa, if we think about you know the civil wars that happened there. So how can we perhaps relate that to the Cold War and what's the influence of actually the superpowers leaving first the Soviet Union then the United States. And that's also the period in the 90s when you have the most African led peacekeeping efforts notably through Echo was so what was the kind of, you know, triggering the departure kind of effect of the superpowers in relation to the legacy of the Cold War. I think I'm not focused very much on that area that you mentioned particularly on Echo was the head of West Africa, you are the expert here on West Africa, but I think that it is connected broadly speaking to what I said before, the idea that after the end of the Cold War after the disappearance of the Soviet Union there was this idea that the United Nations could finally become what they were supposed to be so an efficient mechanism to intervene these conflicts to avoid the violation of human rights and peacekeeping at the time looked a very, very easy tool for for doing this job so in a moment in which the Security Council was not paralyzed frozen any longer by the superpowers competition by the veto game between the two superpowers probably the expansion that was the reason why we can see this expansion of the peacekeeping operations also in West Africa. The connection is this one, the disappearance of the Soviet Union, the disappearance of the veto game in the Security Council and the paralysis of the Security Council after the disappearance of the Soviet Union. Thank you. Thank you, Claudia. I think we still have some time for some some other questions. This was outside the range that you covered in your book in terms of years but there's a question about how do you see the period of the 60s when there was vigorous action by the United States to cover operations such as the conflict in the Congo, or possibly support for the colonial world. Any thoughts on that? I mean, how do I see this period in which sense. Of course, yeah, the United States basically intervene in Congo actually the Congo crisis in the 60s was the first Cold War related conflict in the continent and the intervention, the cover operation of the United States in Congo was the first official intervention of the United States in Africa as a Cold War. So the United States intervening Congo in order to avoid that the crisis that happened after the departure of the Belgium and the first elections with Patrice Lumumba, taking power, becoming Prime Minister. The United States intervene in order to avoid this crisis could open the doors to the intervention of the Soviet Union, and in particular in order to avoid that the mineral rich Congo could ended up in the hand of the Soviet. Let's not forget that the uranium of the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki came from Congo. So, of course, there was a strategic interest for this intervention, the same with Portugal. So, basically, a general comment here is that through how the Cold War, the United States always saw Africa, at least mostly saw Africa through the emergence of the Cold War. So the intervention in Congo, the intervention in also supporting Portugal was, because all these interventions were seen through the lens of the Cold War was to avoid the intervention of the expansion of the Soviet Union mostly and, of course, simplified some nuances, but overall this was the lens through which the United States looked at Africa and this created two outcomes. On the one hand, the United States ended up in supporting horrible regimes and colonial powers. Congo is one of the cases. I mean, through the CIA cover to operation, Mobutu was brought to power for 30 years in Congo and we're still seeing the consequence of that regime. On the other hand, the Cold War lens also helped to link what was otherwise an overall marginal area, the African continent to the central directive of US foreign policy which was the Cold War. Yeah, thank you. Just briefly to come in. Yeah, it's fascinating. I just, you know, I'm quite interested in the 1960s and that is more a comment rather than a question, if I may. It's interesting. Somehow, somewhat, the Congo crisis tends sometimes to overshadow the Cold War, the early Cold War in Africa, which predominantly played out in West Africa. So Guinea, Ghana, Mali, these kind of places. And I think what is interesting is if, I mean, Flavio is far more than me on the 70s, but if I opposed the 70s to the 60s, the Cold War, you have very much in the 60s, it's more of an economic model competition. It's between the Soviet model of development and the US led modernization theory. So if you look at US documents on the 1960s, it's all about trying to avoid an arms race. And for instance, arms exports to Africa always focused on Ethiopia, of course, before certain events, the revolution, so I mean, after the revolution, of course, to some extent, by the Americans to Africa, but otherwise Africa in the 60s received hardly anything in weapons from the United States. For instance, there was a ceiling of 25 million when it came to annual ceiling $25 million for exports to Africa. So it's very much an economic model competition. It was much more, you know, it was a softer approach and then it became increasingly militarized because both superpowers realized in the early 1960s that you couldn't just buy them and then they would definitely align with you. It was more fluctuating the whole situation, as the Soviets had to learn in Guinea, for instance, and then of course, I mean, even there were bits of planted by the Chinese in Kwaman Krumas Ghana. And in general, so the situation was difficult, even though, for instance, John of Kennedy's charm offensive in the early 1960s, you know, dispersing huge sums in development aid in Africa did not bring the expected dividends. So I would largely oppose 60s called war despite the Congo and I'm not, you know, minimizing any of that or minimizing other violence that was taking place and covert operations, some of them more debatable than others in terms of proof. But nevertheless, it was more peaceful, so to speak, than actually the 1970s when it really became more radicalized and militarized and you can really easily look at this even if you just, you know, look at arms transfers, for instance, on CPRE databases, for instance. Sorry, I just, that's interesting. Thank you very much, by the way. Thank you, Mark. We have another interesting question. To what extent was the US foreign policy shaped and guided by Cuban adventurism in Southern Africa, as opposed to a trade superpower competition with the Soviet Union. It was certainly guided by the Cuban intervention in Africa, particularly in Angola. I, of course, I've been talking a lot about US, the United States and the Soviet Union, but I briefly, of course, we can stay here three hours. It's a little bit overly oversimplified in some way. I mentioned in my presentation, I have the important role of other global actors, China, first of all, and Cuba, Cuba played a massive role in, in Southern Africa with the intervention in support of the MPLA regime in Angola. So, why, and the US foreign policy was shaped by the Cuban adventurism in Southern Africa, intervention in Southern Africa, but from the US perspective, this was not opposed to the superpower competition with the Soviet Union. The United States saw the Cubans as, I use a strong word here, as Soviet proxies, or at least as a tool of the Soviet Union, as just a monolithic bloc. This was not absolutely the case. Cuba, Fidel Castro had a very independent policy in Africa, very independent from the Soviet Union, sometimes in contradiction with the Soviet Union. In many cases, the Castro regimes took decisions in Angola, in Southern Africa, without even consulting the Soviet Union first. But this nuance, this difference was not completely grasped by the United States. The United States still saw the Cubans as a monolithic bloc, together with the Soviet Union overall, of course. Okay, great. I think we covered pretty much all questions, unless some last one pops up. There are actually a lot of comments as well in the chat, you may want to take a look afterwards. Yes, of course. Otherwise, Marco, do you want to add some concluding remarks or Flavia? If you mind, I also put my email address on the chat, if someone wants to contact me. Just in case, thank you. For some final feedback. Hi. So, well, thank you very much, Flavia, for this interesting presentation, and thank you, Marco, for being our discussant today. Also thanks to the Center for Brand Strategy for organizing this book launch and, obviously, thanks to our audience, our participants for listening and for your questions. Thanks a lot, and have a good evening. Thank you very much everybody. Bye.