SIHANOUKVILLE, CAMBODIA – Surrounded by shipping crates and puddles, the equipment stacked on concrete blocks in the center of this dingy port facility on the Gulf of Thailand looks more like scrap metal than anything worthy of protection.

But the piles of metal pipes behind flimsy yellow rope are guarded by an armed security officer, as they may hold the key to this impoverished nation's future.


In the coming weeks, US oil giant Chevron will ferry them hundreds of miles offshore, and use them to reconfirm what many already believe to be true: Cambodia is sitting on a billion-dollar gold mine. Black gold to be exact.

The amount of oil Cambodia will produce in the coming years is likely to have a negligible impact on world markets. But for this impoverished country of 13 million, still recovering from the brutality of the Khmer Rouge and Vietnamese occupation, it could be nothing short of transformative.