An unfriendly ghost
Remember Caspar Weinberger, the hawkish Reagan-era defence secretary who campaigned against Hutchison Whampoa's contract to run port operations on the Panama Canal? He was not exactly a disinterested observer, being a board member of United States mega-contractor Bechtel, which was also bidding on the deal.
The old communist-battling war horse seemed to have lost little of his fire when Lai See caught up with him at this week's Forbes conference in Shanghai.
'Li [Ka-shing] has benefited so much from the Chinese government and has big interests in China. He will do what China wants him to do.'
While admitting that reds under the Panama bed had yet to materialise, he stuck to his guns: 'There is the potential.'
Car trouble
