Review of Luke Patey, The New Kings of Crude: China, India, and the Global Struggle for Oil in Sudan and South Sudan, London: Hurst and Company, 2014, pp.357 (with index), Pbk £25.00 If you want to know about oil in Sudan and South Sudan and the fascinating role of China in its development, exploitation and conflicts, then go no further than Luke Patey's new book. It's a complicated, complex work that reads, at times, like the background for a thriller - especially at the start when talking about the cowboy-booted US oilmen from Chevron visiting the dusty south. But make no mistake; this is not a lightweight, sensational swing through the Sudans for dummies. It is a very weighty work, meticulously researched and mixing knowledge and in-depth analysis of the oil industry in both Sudans with the context of the countries' conflicts. It sheds a fascinating light on the Chinese and Indian quest for oil concessions as part of their wider economic and energy ambitions. If there is a criticism, it is that too much time is spent on the travails of the early US oil exploration and exploitation operations in the south with a few extraneous clichés like "the [...]
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