This colonialism thing ain’t what it used to be. Without spending the hundreds of billions of dollars and countless lives the United States has invested in the effort to determine Afghanistan’s future, the Chinese government managed to swoop in and walk away with as many as 87 million barrels of the country’s oil.

The Amu Darya Basin may not have the world’s most lucrative oil fields, but the deal gives China “a foot inside the door,” in the words of one consultant quoted by the BBC. — PZS

BBC:

The approval is a major win for China as it has been looking to invest in resource-rich Afghanistan.

However, analysts said that resources is not the only sector that China is looking to invest in.

“The deal is a way of getting a foot inside the door,” said Charles Chaw of China Knowledge Consulting.

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