International Trade, Mergers, and Acquisitions

Sweet Deal - Newsweek Business

Ok so all my other posts on outsourcing and the like presume that the playing field is fair (or tilted in our favor), which it *usually* is, especially with regards to Latin America and Africa. Europe generally plays the same game the USA does, so things even out there, and OPEC and the like have their own cards up their sleeves. But what about communist command economies, or, as it's translated from the Mandarin in the fabulous book I just completed (River Town: Two Years on the Yangtze by Peter Hessler), "socialism with Chinese characteristics"--that peculiar mix of controlled and capitalist economy? Or for that matter, any of the private sector-government mixes that seem so prevalent in Asia and a few other corners of the world? How does a more pure (although no one is fully pure) economy react when we have situations like the current UNOCAL situation? CNOOC is effectively leveraging itself *far* beyond what anyone in the private sector could accomplish (it only intends to cover $3 billion with cash in hand, the rest of the $19 billion is a loan, largely from very friendly government-owned sources). Now this isn't per se illegal (definitely not in China), but is it fair competition? How do other parties react? What's the best strategy to counter these behaviors? and even though the current impetus is towards barring CNOOC and steaming ahead with a Chevron buy-out, under what circumstances *should* these behaviors be approved and allowed to progress?

Anyone? Let's hear a reader's opinion, because I for one am (for once) definitely undecided on this one..... coming from the USA, even the most leftist of commentators will often have a capitalist bias, but consider that a command economy is able to achieve things like a complete urban planning overhaul or the development of supermodern transporation infrastructures just by saying "make it so." Nothing is that simple and rarely can things just happen, but when China is sitting on the cash stockpile that it is, it can.... once it gets past all the corruption.