Gwadar

The Government of Balochistan in Exile blog has a terrific post on the port of Gwadar in Balochistan, and its importance to Pakistan and China. Here is an excerpt, but read it all, it's quite informative.

With its strategy of cooperation with the Americans, the Pakistani military regime bought itself some time to fortify its position against future threats from U.S. Just four months after the U.S.-led coalition forces liberated Afghanistan from the Talibans, the Pakistanis courted China to counter U.S. hegemony in the region, and broke ground with the Chinese in building a Deep Sea Port on the Arabian Sea. The project was sited in an obscure fishing village of Gwadar in Pakistani-occupied Balochistan, bordering Afghanistan to the northwest and Iran to the southwest. Gwadar is nautically bounded by the Persian Gulf in the west and the Gulf of Oman in the southwest.

Although the Gwadar Port project has been under study since May 2001, the U.S. entrée into Kabul provided an added impetus for its speedy execution. Having set up its bases in Central, South, and West Asian countries, the U.S. virtually brought its military forces at the doorstep of China. Beijing was already wary of the strong U.S. military presence in the Persian Gulf, which supplies 60% of its energy needs. It was now alarmed to see the U.S. extend its reach into Asian nations that ring western China. Having no blue water navy to speak of, China feels defenseless in the Persian Gulf against any hostile action to choke off its energy supplies. This vulnerability set Beijing scrambling for alternative safe supply routes for its energy shipments. The planned Gwadar Deep Sea Port was one such alternative for which China had flown its Vice Premier, Wu Bangguo, to Gwadar to lay its foundation on March 22, 2002.