“”Historians may record March 2015 as the moment when China’s checkbook diplomacy came of age,” said Paul Taylor and William James at Reuters. Beijing has spent several years trying to persuade Western nations to join its Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), which will soon open its doors and begin handing out billions of dollars in development loans to fund roads, ports, water and sanitation systems, and telecom projects across Asia. The bank will also not so subtly expand China’s influence “at the expense of the United States,” which has dominated the international economic system since the end of World War II.”