A paper by Theodore H. Moran published in the Milken Institute Review discusses China’s appetite for commodities. The author raises the possibility that the nation could be trying to control the world’s access to natural resources. Should we be worried? Read the full article here.
Excerpt:
Has China embarked on a long-term strategy of controlling access to natural resources from around the world? There are, after all, precedents for such a strategy – and in China’s own backyard. Resource-poor imperial Japan rationalized its military adventures in East Asia in the 1930s as an attempt to become self-sufficient in raw materials critical to military and economic survival. Indeed, the nominal trigger for going to war with the United States in 1941 was Franklin D. Roosevelt’s export embargo on iron, steel and aviation fuel.