Oil-Control Formula

[Peace_Maker]

Oil-Control Formula

By Robert Dreyfuss

Monday 18 July 2005

George W. Bush's war in Iraq may not be going as planned. But for those who've stopped believing the myth that prewar Iraq represented any sort of threat to the United States, there is plenty of circumstantial evidence mounting that the real reason for the American invasion of Iraq was the most obvious one: Oil. In this case, "oil" doesn't mean that we went to war for the commercial benefit of U.S. oil companies-and in fact, as I reported in Mother Jones magazine in early 2003, before the war, most U.S. oil firms and their executives were against the war. But in Iraq, "oil" means the strategic commodity that is the single most important world resource. Even a novice geostrategist knows that who controls oil controls the world. And in this case, America's rival for control of oil is, first and foremost, China.

Last week, China, Russia and four Central Asian "Stans," including Uzbekistan, rather impolitely asked the United States to withdraw from Central Asia. That part of the world is a significant oil and gas region, and neither Moscow nor Beijing want the United States to put down roots there. But Central Asia's oil and gas resources pale next to the Middle East, and that is where America's imperial presence has set off alarms in Beijing.

Consider oil the Occam's Razor explanation of the war in Iraq.

A June 24 New York Times article subtly attacked China and its CNOOC oil firm over its bid to buy Unocal, a U.S. oil company with long experience in Asia, calling the intended purchase (in its page-one headline) a "costly quest for energy control." But if any nation "controls" energy, it is the United States. Buried in the article was this fairly explosive paragraph:

Privately, Chinese officials and analysts say oil is treated as a strategic crisis. They have sounded the alarm about Western and particularly American domination of oil supplies and influence over major oil-exporting nations, including Saudi Arabia and now Iraq, which has made China dependent on what many here refer to as American economic and military hegemony.

Together, Saudi Arabia and Iraq control roughly half of the world's oil deposits, a share that is likely to rise as oil countries deplete their reserves. Saudi Arabia has long been in America's back pocket, and now Iraq- though not going well for the United States-is occupied by the American army and its quisling government is comprised of American puppets. It isn't shocking for the Chinese to have a legitimate beef here. Consider the following from the July 13 Washington Post . The headline read: "Big Shift in China's Oil Policy" and the subhead, more revealing, was "With Iraq Deal Dissolved by War, Beijiing Looks Elsewhere." It began:

Until recently, China's view of the global energy map focused narrowly on the Middle East, which holds roughly two-thirds of the world's oil. Special attention was directed toward one well-supplied country: Iraq.

Through cultivation of Saddam Hussein's government, China sought to develop some of Iraq's more promising reserves. Beijing advocated lifting the United Nations sanctions that prevented investment in Iraq's oil patch and limited sales of its production.

Then the United States went to war in Iraq in 2003, wiping out China's stakes. The war and its aftermath have reshaped China's basic conception of the geopolitics of oil and added urgency to its mission to lessen dependence on Middle East supplies. It has reinforced China's fears that it is locked in a zero-sum contest for energy with the world's lone superpower, prompting Beijing to intensify its search for new sources, international relations and energy experts say.

So. We went to war in Iraq, "wiping out China's stakes" in Iraq. And so, Chinese "officials and analysts" call the current situation an oil crisis, says the Times.

Meanwhile, neoconservatives, Bush administration officials, some members of Congress and (unfortunately) a few labor-connected liberals are making a big deal of CNOOC's Unocal bid. For perspective, let's recall that Unocal is the company that did more to support the Taliban than any other U.S. entity, courting those Islamic radicals in search of a pipeline, oil and gas deal in central Asia-and hiring various malleable U.S. strategists to support the Taliban on its behalf, including incoming U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad. It's hard to imagine anything that China could do with Unocal that would do more damage to U.S. interests than Unocal has already done. Still, the outcry goes on, most recently during a congressional hearing at which Jim Woolsey, the former CIA director, and Frank Gaffney, the neocon-linked military strategist, railed against China. (CNOOC, by the way, is partly owned by Shell Oil, which bought a big chunk of the mostly state-owned firm when it conducted a public stock offering in 2002.)

According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, road transportation in China will be the driving force for that country's enormous oil appetite in the next two decades, noting that "the Chinese passenger car market grew tenfold between 1990 and 2000." By 2025, says EIA, China's oil demand will reach nearly 13 million barrels of oil per day. (Saudi Arabia's entire output is only about 8 million barrels a day.) To meet such demand, China is searching everywhere, from Sudan to Venezuela to Central Asia. Iran and China are making oil deals, too. But by invading and occupying Iraq, the United States has pretty much locked up the most easily expanded source of oil in the world; Iraq, which manages to eke out about 2 million barrels a day, can produce six to eight times that much oil if it made sufficient investments in production facilities. Quite a prize, Iraq-if Washington can hold onto it. No wonder various neoconservative world hegemonists consider talk of an Iraq exit strategy to be treasonous.

-------

Robert Dreyfuss is a freelance writer based in Alexandria, Va., who specializes in politics and national security issues. He is a contributing editor at The Nation, a contributing writer at Mother Jones, a senior correspondent for The American Prospect,

[Leonard]

Ah! More Communist 'fellow travelers' have begun posting!

Are you actual, knowing Communists, who do what they do knowing how evil it is, or are you just what Lenin called his 'useful idiots?'

So, the war is for oil? Really? Then where is the article in the new Iraqi Constitution, that America gets 1/3 of the Iraqi oil? Or 1/6. or 1/10, or 1/10,000,000???

WAKE UP!!!

[Peace_Maker]

Ah!  More Communist 'fellow travelers' have begun posting! 

Are you actual, knowing Communists, who do what they do knowing how evil it is, or are you just what Lenin called his 'useful idiots?'

So, the war is for oil?  Really?  Then where is the article in the new Iraqi Constitution, that America gets 1/3 of the Iraqi oil?  Or 1/6. or 1/10, or 1/10,000,000???

WAKE UP!!!

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

From Time magazine: "For more than a half-century, American foreign policy dealing with oil has typically been manipulative and misguided, often both at the same time. The pattern of intrigue has ranged from U.S. officials' secretly writing tax laws in the 1950s (so the Saudi royal family could collect more money from the sale of its oil and American companies could write off the added payments on their tax returns) to overthrowing a government that showed too much independence in handling its oil sales. To illustrate the dark side of American oil policy, we offer two tales, stitched together from declassified government documents and oil-industry memos, involving a pair of Iraq's neighbors, Iran and Afghanistan. The first one begins with the rise of a member of Iran's parliament, Mohammed Mossadegh, an impassioned speaker and popular politician who had long chafed at British domination over his country's oil.... In 1951 Mossadegh successfully pushed to nationalize Anglo-Iranian, became Iran's Premier and established the National Iranian Oil Co.....On Aug. 19, 1953, after the deaths of about 300 people in street riots, the 71-year-old Premier was overthrown.....The American-friendly Shah, Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, who had earlier fled the country, returned triumphantly, resumed the throne and reasserted his control....The CIA's fingerprints were everywhere."

MSNBC observes, "In the words of Grant Goodman, the 2001 EPA Local Entrepreneur Award Winner: "Let's start with national security--the billions and billions we waste dancing around the issue, protecting those pipelines, invading Iraq, doing whatever else we're doing in the Middle East. It all gets down to continuing the flow of oil to this country."

From The Observer (UK): "Paul Wolfowitz, Assistant Defence Secretary, and Richard Perle, a key Pentagon adviser, see military action as part of a grand plan to reshape the Middle East. To this end, control of Iraqi oil needs to bypass the twin tyrannies of UN control and regional fragmentation into Sunni, Shia and Kurdish supplies. The neo-conservatives plan a market structure based on bypassing the state-owned Iraqi National Oil Company and backing new free-market Iraqi companies. But, in the run-up to war, the US oil majors will this week report a big leap in profits. ChevronTexaco is to report a 300 per cent rise. Chevron used to employ the hawkish Condoleezza Rice, Bush's National Security Adviser, as a member of its board. Five years ago the then Chevron chief executive Kenneth Derr, a colleague of Rice, said: 'Iraq possesses huge reserves of oil and gas - reserves I'd love Chevron to have access to.' "

From The Age (Australia): "Ahmed Chalabi, leader of the exiled opposition Iraqi National Congress, which is financed in part by US oil companies, has said he would not feel bound by contracts signed by Saddam and that "American companies will have a big shot at Iraqi oil" under a new regime. The stakes are beyond imagination. According to a report for the Global Policy Forum, a think tank with consultative status at the UN, based on conservative assumptions of oil prices of $US25 a barrel and reserves of 250 billion barrels and a 50-50 profit split, yearly profits for the oil companies would run to $US29 billion a year - which is two-thirds of the $44 billion profits earned by the world's five major oil companies combined in 2001. The costs are also beyond comprehension, but trivial compared to the prize, which is control of prospective oil fields capable of producing more than $3 trillion of oil.

From The Independent (U.K.) : "Once an American regime is installed in Baghdad, our oil companies will have access to 112 billion barrels of oil. With unproven reserves, we might actually end up controlling almost a quarter of the world's total reserves....The US Department of Energy announced at the beginning of this month that by 2025, US oil imports will account for perhaps 70 per cent of total US domestic demand. (It was 55 per cent two years ago.) As Michael Renner of the Worldwatch Institute put it bleakly this week, "US oil deposits are increasingly depleted, and many other non-OPEC fields are beginning to run dry. The bulk of future supplies will have to come from the Gulf region." No wonder the whole Bush energy policy is based on the increasing consumption of oil. Some 70 per cent of the world's proven oil reserves are in the Middle East."

From the Indo-Asian News Service: "Sources said control over Iraq and its oil wealth would allow American firms to manipulate global market prices by deciding on production levels. Analysts said Iraq -- with proven reserves of 112 billion barrels of crude oil, next only to Saudi Arabia -- could throw the global oil market into a tailspin by resuming full-fledged production if U.N. sanctions against it were lifted. ....Iraq is permitted to produce 3 to 3.5 million barrels of oil a day under a U.N. oil-for-food programme, but actual production is about 1.5 to 2 million barrels. This ensures that crude oil prices are kept high, as a steep drop is not in the interest of U.S. companies, a source said. "If prices fall, it could jeopardise their deep water exploration, as it would not be viable due to the high costs involved. "By keeping Iraqi supplies disrupted, the U.S. is able to ensure that Saudi Arabia and Kuwait are benefited, as they are able to raise their production to meet the shortfall and earn more revenue." The source noted that U.S. President George Bush and Vice-President Dick Cheney have strong links with the oil industry and alleged that the threat to attack Iraq was aimed at helping American oil companies. In 1973, Iraq nationalised all oil companies. By displacing Saddam Hussein and installing a friendly regime, U.S. and British companies would be able to re-enter the country and get a major share of its oil industry."

From Mother Jones magazine: "To the hawks who now set the tone at the White House and the Pentagon, the region is crucial not simply for its share of the U.S. oil supply (other sources have become more important over the years), but because it would allow the United States to maintain a lock on the world's energy lifeline and potentially deny access to its global competitors. The administration "believes you have to control resources in order to have access to them," says Chas Freeman, who served as U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia under the first President Bush. .... Iraq, in this view, is a strategic prize of unparalleled importance. Unlike the oil beneath Alaska's frozen tundra, locked away in the steppes of central Asia, or buried under stormy seas, Iraq's crude is readily accessible and, at less than $1.50 a barrel, some of the cheapest in the world to produce. Already, over the past several months, Western companies have been meeting with Iraqi exiles to try to stake a claim to that bonanza.... "Controlling Iraq is about oil as power, rather than oil as fuel," says Michael Klare, professor of peace and world security studies at Hampshire College and author of Resource Wars. "Control over the Persian Gulf translates into control over Europe, Japan, and China. It's having our hand on the spigot."....It is "highly possible" that the United States will maintain military bases in Iraq, Robert Kagan, a leading neoconservative strategist, recently told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. "We will probably need a major concentration of forces in the Middle East over a long period of time," he said. "When we have economic problems, it's been caused by disruptions in our oil supply. If we have a force in Iraq, there will be no disruption in oil supplies."

Form Counterpunch: "The Washington, D.C. Council on Foreign Relations, whose members include Vice President Dick Cheney and former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, and the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy prepared the report, Strategic Energy Policy, Challenges for the 21st Century. Key executives in the energy industry helped prepare the report, including former Enron Chairman Kenneth Lay......Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfield has been asked numerous times whether the U.S. is after Iraq's oil supplies and if that's what is driving this war. Rumsfield's most recent response to the question was "absolutely not." Yet the Baker report suggests that the U.S. should explore the possibility of a regime change in Iraq, line up "key allies" in Europe and Asia and "target (Iraq's) ability to maintain and acquire weapons of mass destruction" as the reasons behind attacking the country all in an effort to import oil into the U.S."

[Leonard]

No. I simply stated you were Communist 'fellow travelers; Pamenyuchics if you will. Actually I just made the observation that you are doing the work of the Communist Party. I then ASKED if you were knowing Communists, in which case you would, by definition be evil, or whether you were simply deceived, and believing the typical anti-American, pro-communist clap-trap. These are the only two alternatives.

Leftism is a sick, anti-Christ worldview, which has nontheless decieved some good people, including Christians. Vladymir Ilyich Lenin called these people his 'useful idiots.' Those are not MY WORDS, but Lenin's own. If you don't like them, consider with whom you stand.

I know all the tricks; I was raised in a Socialist home. I got the Weekly Worker from my mother's milk.

Regardless of what you may think, the 'glory of God' with which you claim to be so concerned, does NOT lie on the side of Marxism. This great nation of America has stood for more good in the world than any nation in the history of the world. We are a nation of great moral failings in the last 60 years, IN PROPORTION to the growth and acceptance of Marxist/Materialist thought in this nation. If you wish to discuss America's failings, let us do so intelligently. But I will not have my nation accused of things of which we are NOT guilty, nor let the 'evangelists of Lenin' go unchallenged.

So my question stands: WHICH ARE YOU?

[Leonard]

I think I've posted these in the past, but it does bear repeating. Go down the list, and see how many are ACTUALLY ALREADY ACCOMPLISHED! See whether Conservatism or Leftism assents to such antics, and observe which political party backs the various goals. It is an interesting read......

THE FORTY-FIVE COMMUNIST GOALS

(From the Congressional Record of January 10, 1963.)

1. U.S. acceptance of coexistence as the only alternative to atomic war.

2. U.S. willingness to capitulate in preference to engaging in atomic war.

3. Develop the illusion that total disarmament by the United States would be a demonstration of moral strength.

4. Permit free trade between all nations regardless of communist affiliation and regardless of whether or not items could be used for war. Extension of long term loans to Russia and Soviet satellites.

5. Provide American aid to all nations regardless of communist domination.

6. Grant recognition of Red China. Admission of Red China to the U.N.

7. Set up east and West Germany as separate states in spite of Khrushchev's promise in 1955 to settle the Germany question by free elections under supervision of the U.N.

8. Prolong the conferences to ban atomic tests because the U.S. has agreed to suspend tests as long as negotiations are in progress.

9. Allow all Soviet satellites individual representation in the U.N.

10. Promote the U.N. as the only hope for mankind. If its charter is rewritten, demand that it be set up as a one-world government with its own independent armed forces.

11. Resist any attempt to outlaw the communist party.

12. Do away with all loyalty oaths.

13. Continue giving Russia access to the U.S. patent office.

14. Capture one or both of the political parties in the United States.

15. Use the technical decisions of the courts to weaken basic American institutions by claiming their activities violate civil rights.

16. Get control of the schools. Use them as transmission belts for socialism and current communist propaganda. Soften the curriculum. Get control of teachers associations. Put the party line in textbooks.

17. Gain control of all student newspapers.

18. Use student riots to foment public protests against programs or organizations, which are under communist attack.

19. Infiltrate the press. Get control of book review assignments, editorial writing, and policy- making positions.

20. Gain control of key positions in radio, TV and motion pictures.

21. Continue discrediting American culture by degrading all forms of artistic expression. An American communist cell was told to "eliminate all good sculpture from parks and buildings, substitute shapeless, awkward and meaningless forms".

22. Control art critics and directors of art museums. "Our plan is to promote ugliness, repulsive, meaningless art".

23. Eliminate all laws governing obscenity by calling them "censorship" and a violation of free speech and free press.

24. Break down cultural standards of morality by promoting pornography and obscenity in books, magazines, motion pictures, radio and TV.

25. Present homosexuality, degeneracy, and promiscuity as "normal, natural, healthy". (Alternative life-styles). Infiltrate the churches and replace revealed religion with "social" religion.

26. Discredit the bible and emphasize the need for intellectual maturity, which does not need a "religious crutch".

27. Eliminate prayer or any phase of religious expression in the schools on the ground that it violates the principle of "separation of church and state".

28. Discredit the American constitution by calling it inadequate, old-fashioned, out of step with modern needs, a hindrance to cooperation between nations on a world-wide basis.

29. Discredit the American founding fathers. Present them as selfish aristocrats who had no concern for the "common man".

30. Belittle all forms of American culture and discourage the teaching of American history on the ground that it was on a minor part of "the big picture".

31. Give more emphasis to Russian history since the communists took over.

32. Support any socialist movement to give centralized control over any part of the culture------education, social agencies, welfare programs, mental health clinics, etc...

33. Eliminate all laws or procedures which interfere with the operation of the communist apparatus.

34. Eliminate the house committee on un-American activities.

35. Discredit and eventually dismantle the FBI.

36. Infiltrate and gain control of more unions.

37. Infiltrate and gain control of big business.

38. Transfer some of the powers of arrest from the police to social agencies. Treat all behavioral problems as psychiatric disorders which no one but psychiatrists can understand or treat.

39. Dominate the psychiatric profession and use mental health laws as a means of gaining coercive control over those who oppose communist goals.

40. Discredit the family as an institution.Encourage promiscuity and easy divorce.

41. Emphasize the need to raise children away from the negative influence of parents, attribute prejudices, mental blocks and retarding of children to suppressive influence of parents.

42. Create the impression that violence and insurrection are legitimate aspects of the American tradition; that students and special-interest groups should rise up and use "united force" to solve economic, political or social problems.

43. Overthrow all colonial governments before native populations are ready for self-government.

44. Internationalize the Panama Canal.

45. Repeal the Connally reservation so the U.S. cannot prevent the world court from seizing jurisdiction over domestic problems. Give world court jurisdiction over nations and individuals alike.

[Guest yod]

those used to be exclusively Democrat ideas...unfortunately it is even infiltrating the Republican platform now.

Our hope is not in the systems of this world but we also don't have to sit on our hands while the enemy encroaches

By the way...IF this really is American policy then it's ingenious. You mean we aren't going to just wait for China and Russia to strangle us? Good foresight, brilliant thinking....

And since we have an elected government, then everyone gets a share of the credit and the blame.

[Leonard]

BY YOD: By the way...IF this really is American policy then it's ingenious. You mean we aren't going to just wait for China and Russia to strangle us? Good foresight, brilliant thinking....

And since we have an elected government, then everyone gets a share of the credit and the blame.

Thanks Yod; you are a hoot!