In his vital book The Devil’s Chessboard,[1] David Talbot spells it out—underneath our veneer, behind the curtains of power, our government plays chess against the world. The global stage is the board. World leaders are the pieces. We always get to move first, and our moves are often mortal for pieces that we take. “Check mate,” we state with vanity and pride upon our endgame maneuver. The term evolved from the Persian—“shah mat,” it means, “the King is dead.”[2] And the blood, by proxy, is on our own red hands.

As was the case of Patrice Lumumba, the first prime minister of the Democratic Republic of Congo.[3] He was elected democratically, and Lumumba led his land away from the colonial yoke of Belgium. His vision included unity for his people and independence for all African nations. But President Eisenhower wished Lumumba “would fall in a river of crocodiles.” Lumumba may have preferred that fate to the torture. But, reportedly, he never let go of his dignity throughout his ordeal. And our intelligence organization, the CIA, maintained a stoic pose of neutrality and innocence when Lumumba was gone. When President Kennedy took office, he had high hopes for Patrice Lumumba and his independence movement. JFK was crushed and incredulous in 1961 when they told him Lumumba was dead.

Yes, the Church Committee absolved the CIA of complicity in Lumumba’s fatal rendition. Yes, Lawrence Devlin, the CIA station chief in the Congo, would later rise to become the Chief of Africa operations. Yet, “… we now know that the people who beat Patrice Lumumba to death were on the payroll of the CIA,”[4] Sadly, the CIA’s naming of Patrice Lumumba as communist and the taking of his life put an end to his movement. This also coincided with the beginning of a 32-year bloody dictatorship by Mobutu Sese Seko. His reign was rife with the blood of Africans and the oppression of poor workers. African soil continued to yield its bounty to Western states and corporations, as it does to this day, in the forms of blood diamonds, coltan and, yes, even precious uranium. By then, this was an established tradition. African ore, you see, was used to create Little Boy and Fat Man, the atomic bombs used in our “shah mat” of World War II at Hiroshima and Nagasaki.[5]

Trace the loose line of history. Follow the moves upon the grand master’s board.  We smugly nod and smile approvingly as colonial arrangements are made. Then trade begins. We approve. Banks are burgeoning. Blood has neatly been washed from the funds. Success. Traditions are soon painted and dried into culture. And anti-colonialism is frowned upon.

It is time to look back. The yarn can be unraveled. Understand why it happened. And agree in growing numbers upon a future in which no one is crushed—by us. Call it Peace—Peace Without Poverty—A Future Without Cruelty.

Image: Patrice Lumumba (1925-1961)[6]—“His white shirt was now spotted with blood, but his head was still erect. He personified the best of a race that would never again be slaves.” Andrée Blouin

[1]  The Devil’s Chessboard, David Talbot © 2015, HarperCollins, p. 375-388; available at: http://www.powells.com/SearchResults?kw=title:devil%27s%20chessboard
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Checkmate
[3] http://www.biography.com/people/patrice-lumumba-38745
[4] http://www.democracynow.org/2015/10/13/the_rise_of_americas_secret_government
[5] See Talbot, p. 377 and http://www.atomicheritage.org/history/little-boy-and-fat-man
[6] https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Anefo_910-9740_De_Congolese2.jpg See details regarding sharing of photo under Creative Commons licensing (quote from Andree Blouin, see Talbot, p. 382)