Oh, yes.
China's playing a pretty clever game, alright.
Some months ago, they bought (well it's only a 99 year lease, so that's OK then) Australia's northernmost port, Darwin.
Of course, the fact that the port is also used by Australia's military is neither here nor there, innit?
Just recently, a Chinese bid for one of this country's largest pastoral leaseholdings was deemed to be "Not in the National Interest".
(You can have everything else you fancy, just not that one - because a mate of mine has his eye on it.)
They've been buying up, in the past number of years, a considerable amount of both Australia's (and New Zealand's) pastoral, agricultural, mineral
and infrastructure assets.
The line from certain politicians and their clients who are, in the short term, benefiting from all this is ... "We welcome overseas investment".
One could weep.