
Life on the Mekong River has changed forever.
Photographer: Daniel Moss/Bloomberg
China and Its Neighbors Are Ravaging the Mekong
Beijing’s formidable influence has traction because no country or authority officially controls the historic waterway.
The Mekong River is more than the sum of its nearly 3,000 miles. It’s one of the world’s most valuable waterways and has been vital to political power in Southeast Asia for centuries. As a prized strategic and financial asset, commerce and violence have marked the basin’s story. The French tried — and failed — to re-engineer the river to anchor their imperial rule. American soldiers fought fiercely in its delta, and the Khmer Rouge casually meted out atrocities not far from its banks.
Today, the river is again under siege. Dams may provide electric power to boost economic growth, but extract a terrible toll on the flora and fauna that villages have depended upon for millennia. Statecraft is colliding with major power tensions and national development goals, and the Mekong is coming off worse. Rarely, if ever, has the river’s future been more embattled. Co-operation is in short supply, just as it’s needed most.