Caribbean proxies of Communist China have a decision to make

“China is the most benevolent country on the planet.”

“Our bilateral relationship is one of the closest in the world between a big and small country.”

“China’s contribution to global peace and prosperity … is unmatched.”

These are the servile words of Gaston Browne, prime minister of Antigua and Barbuda, one of our smallest and closest neighbors in the Caribbean.

The microstate, 300 miles southeast of Puerto Rico, has the population of Martha’s Vineyard in summer. It was so quiet that the U.S. closed its embassy in 1994.

Where Washington saw nothing, Beijing saw opportunity. China opened a five-acre embassy in 2022. China built a major maritime cargo facility. It expanded Antigua’s airport runway to 10,000 feet, large enough for almost any aircraft. China is developing a massive Special Economic Zone that occupies nearly three percent of Antigua’s territory, with CCP sovereignty guarantees on land and offshore.

China is financing a 200-unit residential complex overseen by Browne’s wife, who happens to be housing minister.

“President Xi Jinping is the most impactful global leader,” Browne gushed to Chinese TV last year.

Caribbean islands have a friendly vibe, but their politics can be cutthroat. Browne is a British-educated banker who doubles as finance minister. He is bogged down in cronyism and corruption scandals and calls for his resignation. He has criminalized politics, branding critics “bitter, embattled, miserable, disloyal traitors” out to “sell the soul” of the country, and threatening them with legal action.

Browne’s relationship with the CCP and with terrorist regimes like Venezuela and Cuba, make the Antigua leader more than a mere annoyance.

He isn’t unique. “The most jarring and overlooked illustration of the CCP’s pervasive influence and investment is mere miles off the southeast coast of the U.S. in the Caribbean islands,” House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rick Crawford wrote in Newsweek after a recent visit to the region.

“As of 2022, 10 Caribbean countries have joined the CCP’s Belt and Road Initiative,” Crawford said.

“This resource-dense part of the Western Hemisphere provides several strategic benefits for Beijing and its ultimate pursuit of global dominance,” he added.

“By proposing the Belt and Road Initiative, the Global Development Initiative, the Global Security Initiative, and the Global Civilization Initiative, China has taken concrete actions to promote common development and prosperity of the world and benefit the people, showing unparalleled leadership and charisma in the world, and will surely lead more countries in the Global South to strengthen unity and cooperation,” Browne said during a January, 2024 visit to Beijing.

Browne shares similar affections with Havana and Caracas.

“We are fully aware of the geopolitical challenges that Venezuela faces,” Browne said aboard the Simón Bolivar, a Venezuelan naval training barque, just four weeks ago. “However, the government and people of Venezuela must be assured that Antigua and Barbuda continues to be a very liable partner and will continue to stand in solidarity with our brothers and sisters in Venezuela.”

The solidarity, of course, is with dictator Nicolás Maduro and his comrades. Aboard ship, Browne swiped at Maduro’s critics. “We will not be persuaded by the rhetoric or the misinformation and dis-information that are being used to demonize the duly elected Venezuelan government,” he said, according to the Caribbean Media Corporation’s coverage in the Gleaner of Jamaica.

He added, “We will continue to work with Venezuela, Cuba and other like-minded countries to ensure that our hemisphere remains a ‘Zone of Peace.’”

Browne didn’t post those comments on his busy Facebook pages.

This week, Browne struck a different tone hours before he and other Caribbean leaders visited Washington to meet Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

“There are lots of misconceptions about our relationship with Cuba, our relationship with China, our relationship with Venezuela,” Browne’s office posted on Facebook. “We want the Secretary to understand that Antigua’s foreign policy position is based on being a friend of all; and that we are too small to have enemies.”

President Trump is the first to take the China threat seriously. One of his prime major foreign policy actions this year was to compel a Hong Kong Chinese company to sell its ports on either end of the Panama Canal. Beijing is blocking that sale. Secretary Rubio, who knows the area well, has made the Caribbean region one of his top diplomatic priorities.

Pushing the CCP out of the Caribbean will happen, either easily or painfully. Co-opted regional leaders like Browne are likely to cause their countries considerable pain.