From Jamestown Foundation’s China Brief, via Asia Media:
The CNOOC bid came at a sensitive time in U.S.-China relations. Since earlier this year, the members of the second Bush administration have repeatedly warned that the United States had previously underestimated the speed of the Chinese military’s modernization drive. With the U.S. trade deficit going further into the red, Washington has put more pressure on Beijing, calling for the appreciation of the Chinese currency. And the U.S. government has recently imposed duties on a range of Chinese textile products. No wonder when CNOOC, 71 percent controlled by the Chinese government, made a “friendly merger” offer to the 9th ranking U.S. energy firm Unocal, American politicians and the public in general reacted as if a “red storm” was coming to the U.S. shores. However, an examination of the Chinese perspectives and Chinese press, both official and unofficial, reveals substantially different concerns than the kind of debate the bid has generated in the United States.
