Japan Focus reprints a series of four articles first published in the English-language version of the Daily Yomiuri about what rapidly increasing Chinese energy consumption means to the future of Japan. To whit, although “Japanese people seemed to cling to the belief that oil (can) be bought on the free market” China’s “voracious appetite for energy has become a destabilizing factor in the international energy market” and Japan should should “use its scientific technology as a trade weapon, furthering research and development in the fields in which it has an edge, such as development of automobiles powered by fuel cells, clean coal technology and bio-energy.”

The Yomiuri articles assert China will do what it takes to procure and protect energy resources, and war between Japan and China may be the end result of this policy.

A little hysterical, perhaps, but portrayals of China as a future global despot isn’t limited to just the Japanese press. In the United States, many are worried about plans by a Chinese state-owned corporation’s plans to purchase Unocal, the ninth-largest American gas and oil production company (that produces less than one percent of American oil needs). There are fears that a Chinese purchase of Unocal “poses a clear threat to the energy and national security of the United States,” but there’s little discussion of why this might be so.

James Surowiecki, writing from his weekly financial column in the New Yorker argues that whether or not a Chinese company (or any foreign company, for that matter) owns an ostensibly American oil company is simply irrelevant because oil is traded on the global market, and is not sold directly from consumers via the oil companies themselves. Surowiecki says:

The United States does not own or control Unocal and has no claim on the company’s gas and oil reserves, which are dotted across the globe. And Unocal does not reserve its oil for American consumers. Like every other oil company, it sells to the highest bidder. In the end, its responsibility is to its shareholders, not to American national security.

He continues:

More important, in today’s world whether or not you own the means of oil production doesn’t affect your access to the stuff. Oil trades in a world market, and every player buys and sells at effectively the same price.

Surowiecki argues that the United States, as a nation, does not own any oil companies, but Americans can still buy all the oil they need.

So relax, already!