The White House is reportedly drawing up a proposal to buy the Chagos Islands, currently owned by Britain despite the best efforts of Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who for almost two years has attempted to give the islands away for free to Mauritius. On the face of it, this is a positive development: The United States ought to pursue a purchase of the islands. Sadly, the administration’s strategy as we currently understand it is unworkable and risks leaving everyone — except China — worse off.
Why should the United States buy the islands? Their strategic importance is obvious: The Diego Garcia base is important in the current war against Iran, just as it was during the Iraq, Afghanistan, and Gulf wars before it. While it is a joint base, the United States’s presence is much greater than Britain’s, and given current geopolitics, it is more important to America. U.S. ownership of the islands would prevent the British from ever preventing usage of the base for American Middle Eastern operations of which the British public (or the voters of the Labour Party) disapprove, as happened earlier in the war.
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