Peloni: This is an important article. The loss of Diego Garcia and it’s possible/probable handover to China represents a serious threat to US and Western interests. As Janet states, Trump must keep this from happening.
Am Thinker | February 5, 2026
View of the Chagos Archipelago. By Earth Science and Remote Sensing Unit, NASA Johnson Space Center – JSC Gateway to Astronaut Photography of Earth, Public Domain, Wikipedia
Diego Garcia, a V-shaped coral atoll in the Indian Ocean with a U.S. military base, has become a point of contention between President Donald Trump and U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer. The U.K. has signed a deal to return the Chagos Islands, of which Diego Garcia is the largest, to Mauritius. Conservatives on both sides of the Atlantic fear that this move could give China a strategic advantage across the East African coast, the Middle East, the Indian Ocean, and all the way to Australia’s western coast.
President Trump’s sharp response to the deal was: “Shockingly, our ‘brilliant’ NATO ally, the United Kingdom, is currently planning to give away the island of Diego Garcia, the site of a vital military base, to Mauritius, and to do so for no reasons whatsoever.” He added that China and Russia had noticed this act of weakness, and that the deal was yet another reason why the U.S. must acquire Greenland.
Diego Garcia, located just below the Equator and near the center of the Indian Ocean, is critically important to the U.S. and its allies for deploying naval and air power. From there, America’s Rockwell B-1B Lancers, supersonic bombers with a maximum unfueled range of 7,500 miles, can reach Taiwan and Iran within hours. The Military Sealift Command (MSC) operates numerous logistical facilities on the island. Additionally, it serves as a refueling base for battleships, military aircraft, and submarines, including nuclear submarines. It is also significant for regional nuclear capabilities, since nearby Africa remains nuclear-free.
Post 9/11, the U.S. used Diego Garcia as a forward operating base to deploy B-2 bombers into Iraq and Afghanistan. It has also been utilized to guard and monitor shipping and to launch strikes against the Houthis in Yemen. Last year, during the Twelve-Day War, nearly half of America’s operational B-2 fleet was stationed on the island, ready to strike nuclear facilities in Iran.
The island is also a key site for the Five Eyes intelligence alliance of Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the U.K., and the U.S. Intelligence communications among members are exchanged and transmitted via Diego Garcia, a highly classified base with a no-fly zone around it. As a result, much is at stake, and not just for the U.S., in the U.K.’s handover deal.
During the Cold War, the U.S. began to show interest in Diego Garcia because of its strategic importance and control over the South China Sea. In 1965, three years before Mauritius gained independence from Britain, the U.K. separated its administration of the Chagos from Mauritius and established it as a British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT).
In 1971, when the U.S. showed interest in building a naval support facility at Diego Garcia, the U.K. expelled around 2,000 native Chagossians from the islands. The U.S. constructed an airstrip on the island, which was expanded in the 1980s to a 12,000-foot runway to support B-52s and other stealth bombers.
Later, Mauritius claimed the Chagos Islands as part of its territory and, in 2019, filed a case before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) demanding the return of the islands. In 2025, the U.K. agreed and signed a transfer agreement that is still awaiting approval by parliaments in both countries. One of the provisions in the agreement is for Mauritius to lease the island back to the U.K. for at least another 99 years, receiving £101 million annually.
Today, Diego Garcia has a population of about 4,000, mostly U.S. military personnel and civilian contractors. There are approximately 50 British military personnel responsible for civil administration, customs, and policing. The base is operated jointly, with full cooperation between the British and American militaries and intelligence agencies.
The main concern about the handover is that the Chinese will establish a foothold on Mauritian soil and expand from there. Like Sri Lanka, the Maldives, and the Solomon Islands, Mauritius is strongly aligned with China and is a key partner in the Belt and Road Initiative. A presence on any of the Chagos Islands would also strengthen China’s String of Pearls strategy across the Indian Ocean, connecting commercial and military facilities along major maritime choke points.
Critics of the deal highlight provisions that could endanger America’s and its allies’ strategic advantage in Diego Garcia. Robert Midgley, head of communications at the Friends of the British Overseas Territories (FOTBOT), who recently traveled to Washington D.C. to argue that the deal weakens the security of both the U.S. and the U.K., states that one provision allows Mauritius to reclaim the entire territory if the U.K. defaults on a single payment. Another concern is that a treaty between Mauritius and China does not allow nuclear weapons on Diego Garcia. Therefore, Mauritius will have the right to inspect sites that may have nuclear capabilities.
Midgley states that Diego Garcia supports “long range surveillance and reconnaissance, satellite communication and navigation” and could be significant for the U.K. Cyber and Specialist Operations Command, established in September 2025. Since Diego Garcia already serves as an intel exchange and communications hub for the Five Eyes alliance, it will continue to be crucial to members’ cyber defense efforts.
China is already covertly operating: suspicious Chinese fishing vessels with disabled Automatic Identification Systems and outfitted with advanced electronics and radar systems were spotted near the Chagos Islands in October. They seemed to be collecting undersea data, part of China’s larger military mapping effort in the Indian Ocean.
Midgley describes the deal as a betrayal of the descendants of the displaced Chagossians—there are about 10,000, with 6,000 living in the U.K., while the rest are spread across Mauritius, the Seychelles, and the Maldives. He claims they are overwhelmingly pro-British and oppose a deal in which they have no say.
Another critic, Marcus Solarz Hendriks, a senior analyst at Greenmantle, a geopolitical advisory firm led by conservative historian Niall Ferguson, says that ceding the Chagos Islands was “never legally necessary, nor strategically prudent.” He describes the deal as the U.K.’s act of “strategic self-harm, inflicted under phantasmal duress.”
He says that British officials agreed to the deal, seeing merit in the argument that the islands were an illegitimate remnant of colonialism. This argument gained traction after an ICJ advisory in 2019. However, he notes that while the ICJ’s advisory mentions that the U.K. “has an obligation to bring to an end its administration…as soon as possible,” it is non-binding and does not require the U.K. to comply.
On January 28, 80 prominent American and British security officials, political leaders, and academics issued a statement titled Don’t Surrender Diego Garcia! It states that the plan would jeopardize a crucial military installation, pose a strategic threat to the U.S., and strain U.S.-U.K. relations. It also highlights a way for Trump to block the handover: a 1966 treaty with the U.K., valid until 2036, grants America the final authority over any territorial changes and includes a two-year window to revise the treaty.
President Trump needs to tell Starmer that the U.S. rejects the deal and will take control of Diego Garcia if the British give it up. This security asset cannot be handed over to China, which will eventually take control of the island from Mauritius. Hopefully, the efforts to stop the handover will succeed.
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