China's Oil Quest

China continues on its quest to secure access to oil both near home and far away. The oil supply is vital to both the ever growing Chinese industrial and military complexes. It is also trying to secure supplies that would be hard to cut off in case of war, with lets for hypothetical purposes say the US.

Today they signed an oil pact with a new ally in Hugo Chaves of Venezuela. Venezuela is the fifth largest exporter of oil in the world, and one of the main suppliers to the US. The communist Chavez has been trying to move oil exports away from the US and more towards China ever since he came to office. This obviously does not sit well with Washington, but there is nothing they can do since he threatens to cut the oil supply off if the US does anything that he perceives as being threatening.

In other oil news, China finished construction on an oil pipeline to Kazakhstan. This will insure oil supply in case delivery by sea is again for whatever reason, even maybe a US naval blockade, stopped.