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The new Big Brother? The lead page of the Caribbean News section of The Freeport News on Saturday, carried an in-depth story with a St. Lucia dateline on communist China's activities in the Caribbean under the headline "China in the Caribbean: The new Big Brother." It reported extensively on the visit of Wu Banggou, chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPC), to The Bahamas in September of 2009, noting that it "quickly became clear that he was not on vacation." "As China's top legislator and the highest ranking member of the Chinese Government to ever visit The Bahamas, Chairman Wu's entourage included 150 Chinese officials and business leaders," the article noted. "The delegation signed a series of critical economic deals, including an agreement for mutual protection of Chinese and Bahamian investors, a multimillion-dollar loan to help build a highway to Nassau's international airport, and additional support for a major cricket stadium." The article also noted that Chairman Wu "was greeted warmly by Bahamian Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham, who had overseen the normalization of diplomatic relations between China and The Bahamas in 1997, during a previous term in office." "Indeed, as this rising Asian power becomes more deeply engaged with the tiny micro-states of the Caribbean, China is positioning itself to be an increasingly influential actor in a distant part of the world traditionally attached to its principal rival, the United States," the article stated. Unquestionably, this declaration should be most troubling for Bahamians who cherish and appreciate the freedoms guaranteed to those who live in a country where democracy flourishes. Surely, the United States of America must also be concerned that its "principal rival" is being so successful in convincing island nations that have "traditionally" shared very good relationships with the United States to embrace the world's largest communist country. Exactly how and when the United States will make it very clear to its "friends" in the Caribbean that it is not pleased with the course of action they are pursuing is not known, but the last time there was such an "open" threat to the safety and security of the United States from a Caribbean country being established as a communist satellite nation, the U.S. reacted with the kind of force that could easily have led to the third World War. Having established a dictatorship in Cuba, Fidel Castro forged a strong relationship with the Soviet Union, at the time the world's most powerful communist country, in the early 1960s. What became known as the Cuban Missile Crisis was the closest that the world ever came to a nuclear war. After reconnaissance photos revealed that the Soviet Union was building secret missile bases in Cuba, then U.S. President John F. Kennedy ordered a naval blocade of Cuba to prevent Russian ships from bringing additional missiles and construction materials to that island. There was a very tense period as Russian ships approached the blockade, but sensing that the Americans meant business, Russian Premier Nikita Khruschev ordered the ships to return to Russia and announced on October 28, 1962, that he would dismantle the installations and return the missiles to the Soviet Union. The United States does not have to take such drastic steps to stop China from establishing The Bahamas as a communist satellite country. It can accomplish this by squeezing us economically, given the fact that the lion's share of the tourists to The Bahamas come from the United States, and tourism is our number one industry. This being the case, Prime Minister Ingraham would be wise to revise his current policy with regard to communist China. Tuesday, January 12, 2010