China, Oil, and US Bureaucracy

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/13/business/worldbusiness/13unocal.html?th&emc=th

"Many economists and oil specialists are skeptical that owning oil is vital to national security. Controlling the oil and gas reserves in the ground, they say, does not increase a nation's energy security as long as there is a deep worldwide market for buying it by the barrel or tanker.

But the national security concern raised by members of Congress, their advisers and some oil experts is that the petroleum market may be changing because of tight supplies, rapidly rising demand from fast-growing nations like China and India, and the increasing strategy among state-owned oil companies to control reserves."

China wants to buy a company in the free market. But, instead of selling that company's products on the free market, it is going to horde the products for itself, build a dominant military, and conquer the rest of the world.

China has gotten rich trading with the free world. It sends developed countries cheap goods, while the developed world educates its children and provides returns on its capital investments.

It is sad that members of Congress do not understand the mutually beneficial nature of trade. The national security problem is protectionism that will starve the world of increased productivity.