Imagethief was shocked (shocked!) to find out through this AP article on CNN.com that the scalliwags in the Chinese government are giving money to the government of Suriname. Apparently, this is being done not out of philanthropy, but out of naked self-interest! Read on, if you dare:
China's 'dollar diplomacy': $2.5 million to Suriname

Thursday, December 29, 2005 Posted: 1924 GMT (0324 HKT)

PARAMARIBO, Suriname (AP) -- China's ambassador to Suriname has signed an agreement worth $2.5 million, or 2.1 million euro, for civil construction projects in this Suriname in South America.

"This shows that China is committed to help their friends in this part of the world," Ambassador Chen Jinghua said.

China and Taiwan have used dollar diplomacy for decades to win over Caribbean nations, and Chen said Suriname is a strong ally in China's claim on Taiwan, the so-called One China policy. Although democratic Taiwan is self-governing, communist Beijing insists the island that broke away amid civil war in 1949 still is part of China.

China also gave a $10 million (8.4 million euro) donation to Suriname's foreign ministry for the construction of a new building, and regularly donates money, training and equipment to Suriname's military. In return, state-owned Chinese companies receive contracts using Chinese laborers for various civil works in former Dutch colony.
Scurrilous. Well to prove to myself that the United States would never be guilty of such self-interested "checkbook diplomacy", I hopped on over to USAid's website, where I crushed to discover (click on the "historical dollar" link) that the United States has forked over 450 billion dollars in loans, grants, repayments and forgiveness since the end of World War II.

Eager to reassure myself that this can't have been self-motivated at all, I check the mission statement in USAid's 2004-2009 Strategic Plan (page 9) where I found the following:
Create a more secure, democratic, and prosperous world for the benefit of the American people and the international community.
For the benefit of the American people. It's right there in black and white. US aid is motivated by a desire to confer benefit upon the people of the United States, presumably by fostering American foreign policy goals. Some of these are, no doubt, noble. Some probably less so.

So going back to the same page on which I found the total aid figures (above), I checked the list of 2003 donations by country (the most recent available) to see where our money was going. Among the savory regimes cashing US checks:
  • Egypt (just rigged an election) at 460 million.
  • Iran (giving us the finger on their nuclear reactors) at 1.5 million.
  • Yemen (kidnapping is the national sport) at 28 million.
  • Sudan (massacring the residents of Darfur) at 186 million.
  • Venezuela (anti-American president with oil) at 15.7 million.
  • Pakistan (dictatorship) at 139 million (down from 770 million the year before).
  • Uzbekistan (just massacred demonstrators) at 76 million.
  • Suriname at 1.2 million (the Chinese have outbid us!).
  • And, yes, China at 24.2 million.
Oh dear.

Imagethief is a supporter of well placed foreign aid, for a variety of reasons. Fundamentally, we're rich and we can afford to share. And some of the aid above goes through despicable regimes to get to truly needy people who should not suffer for the depradations of their governments. But let's get real here: no nation has a fatter checkbook for lubricating diplomacy than the United States (unless you count aid as a share of GDP, in which case about twenty come in ahead of us).