As Americans celebrate their country's 250th anniversary on Saturday, many may not realise their country got its start with support from Morocco in 1777.
Just a year after 1776, when the 13 American colonies declared independence from Great Britain, the kingdom of Morocco gave diplomatic recognition to what would eventually become the US.
“Morocco was one of the first countries to recognise the newly independent United States, opening its ports to American ships by decree of Sultan Mohammed III in 1777,” a bilateral relations fact sheet from the US State Department explains.
In 1786, according to the State Department, the US and Morocco signed a treaty of peace and friendship, “a document that remains the longest unbroken relationship in US history".
Washington often refers to France as America's oldest ally, but Paris did not officially recognise the US until 1778 and bilateral ties were severed with Vichy France during the Second World War.
Several years after Morocco recognised the colonies, the new country’s first president, George Washington, wrote to Sultan Mohammed.
"Within our territories there are no mines, either of gold or silver … but our soil is bountiful, and our people industrious; and we have reason to flatter ourselves, that we shall gradually become useful to our friends," he wrote.
In a historical quirk, Morocco's football team are playing in the US on Saturday, July 4, America's 250th Independence Day. They hope to keep their World Cup dreams alive and beat Canada.
Timothy Kneeland, a political scientist and public policy historian at Nazareth University in western New York, said the origin of the friendly relationship between the US and Morocco is complex.
Sultan Mohammed was viewed at the time as one of the most progressive rulers, Prof Kneeland said.
“He recognised the US as a sovereign state and opened his ports to American ships, thereby signalling his interest for peaceful relations with the fledgling republic, hoping to draw the new nation into the same web of Mediterranean trade and diplomacy that bound the other North African corsair states – Algiers, Tripoli, and Tunis,” he said.
The US, however, became bogged down by the Revolutionary War with Great Britain, and Prof Kneeland said the struggling country was not able to pay much, if any, attention to Morocco.
To prompt further dialogue, Sultan Mohammed decided to seize the US merchant ship Betsey.
Prof Kneeland said that the important aspect of the ship seizure was that Morocco made sure not to imprison or harm the crew.
It was a relatively amicable seizure, which resulted in the US deciding to sign a treaty of friendship and peace with Morocco after making a $20,000 payment to regain control of the Betsey.
Prof Kneeland says Sultan Mohammed’s efforts to turn Morocco from its dependence on piracy towards a stable trading network were largely successful because it took the US ship.
"The Treaty of Peace and Friendship from 1786 is still remarkable," he said, pointing out that it is brought up whenever the US and Morocco have official meetings.
Shortly after the resignation of disgraced president Richard Nixon in 1974, one of Gerald Ford's first letters to a foreign leader was to Morocco’s King Hassan II.
"I am very aware of the long tradition of friendship between our two nations, dating back to my country's first Treaty of Peace and Friendship signed with Morocco in 1787," Mr Ford wrote.
"It is my intention to continue this tradition and to seek the same kind of personal dialogue which President Nixon enjoyed with Your Majesty."
During a state dinner in 1991, then-president George H W Bush also pointed out the durability of the friendship between the US and Morocco.
“At critical moments in history our two nations have acted in concert,” Mr Bush told King Hassan II.
He said 300,000 Moroccans fought with the Allies against the Axis powers in the Second World War, and later assisted with the US-led coalition that liberated Kuwait from Saddam Hussein in 1990.
In 2025, a congressional resolution honouring Morocco as the first to recognise the US made note of the impact Morocco has had within US borders.
"Moroccan-American communities contribute to the cultural diversity of the US and maintain deep connections to their heritage," the resolution stated.
In Morocco, a building in Tangier that was presented to the US in 1821, still stands as a testament to the partnership.
The Tangier American Legation, as it is now known, has the distinction of being one of the only historic US landmarks abroad.
"The aged complex served a record 140 years as a US diplomatic mission – a US embassy, a consulate and the official residence of US ambassadors to the kingdom of Morocco," a US State Department document says.
A proclamation issued by President Donald Trump on Tuesday said Morocco would assist US farmers facing a fertiliser shortage that could affect crop yields. Fertiliser supplies are down after the closure of the Strait of Hormuz.
"It is imperative to immediately facilitate importation of phosphate fertilisers from the kingdom of Morocco to mitigate the significant risk to the agricultural food production of the United States," the proclamation reads.
