Dilip Hiro, Afghanistan's China Card

Tomgram: Dilip Hiro, Afghanistan's China Card | TomDispatch: 

Dilip Hiro considers one of those failed efforts -- in Afghanistan, where the planet’s former “sole superpower” now seems to be losing out not only to local Taliban militants, whose strength has been on the upswing, but to the power it may fear most: an economically rising China. In these years, from the Middle East to Africa, that country has had an uncanny ability to sweep up the imperial spoils, especially local energy resources, without sending a soldier into battle. Now, it seems, China may be in the process of doing just that in Afghanistan.