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Trump pick for South America command sidesteps China questions at Senate hearing
Lieutenant General Francis Donovan’s answers frustrated even Republicans in favour of a military-first plan to counter Chinese influence
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Igor Patrickin Brasilia
Days after the operation that abducted then Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro, President Donald Trump’s nominee to command US forces in Latin America dodged pressure from senators to endorse a military-first plan to counter China’s growing influence in the region.
Lieutenant General Francis Donovan, who is nominated to lead US Southern Command (Southcom), repeatedly declined to say whether Washington should rely mainly on force projection to push back against Beijing’s expanding footprint.
The evasiveness shaped much of his confirmation hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee, where lawmakers sought clarity on how Southcom would operate under the new strategic environment created by the Maduro raid.
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Donovan’s nomination comes amid heightened strategic tension in the region, with the Maduro operation energising Trump’s political allies, unsettling regional capitals and leaving a substantial US military presence in the Caribbean.
China and Russia’s deepening economic, technological and defence engagement across South America prompted senators to frame the hearing as a test of how Southcom intended to navigate both a transformed security landscape and intensifying great power competition.
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In response to questions about both Beijing and Moscow, Donovan acknowledged the need to balance instruments of influence, saying the US needed to “rely more on soft aspects of power, complemented when required by hard military power to counter those threats”.
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