Toronto Sun: These Wars Are About Oil, Not Democracy

[marmar]

By ERIC MARGOLIS



PARIS -- The ugly truth behind the Iraq and Afghanistan wars finally has emerged.

Four major western oil companies, Exxon Mobil, Shell, BP and Total are about to sign U.S.-brokered no-bid contracts to begin exploiting Iraq's oil fields. Saddam Hussein had kicked these firms out three decades ago when he nationalized Iraq's oil industry. The U.S.-installed Baghdad regime is welcoming them back.

Iraq is getting back the same oil companies that used to exploit it when it was a British colony.

As former fed chairman Alan Greenspan recently admitted, the Iraq war was all about oil. The invasion was about SUV's, not democracy.

Afghanistan just signed a major deal to launch a long-planned, 1,680-km pipeline project expected to cost $8 billion. If completed, the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India pipeline (TAPI) will export gas and later oil from the Caspian basin to Pakistan's coast where tankers will transport it to the West.

The Caspian basin located under the Central Asian states of Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Kazakkstan, holds an estimated 300 trillion cubic feet of gas and 100-200 billion barrels of oil. Securing the world's last remaining known energy El Dorado is a strategic priority for the western powers.

But there are only two practical ways to get gas and oil out of land-locked Central Asia to the sea: Through Iran, or through Afghanistan to Pakistan. Iran is taboo for Washington. That leaves Pakistan, but to get there, the planned pipeline must cross western Afghanistan, including the cities of Herat and Kandahar. ......(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.torontosun.com/News/Columnists/Margolis_Eric/2008/06/22/5953041-sun.php

[HeresyLives]

1. And Margolis is an American

who served in Viet Nam, and calls himself an Eisenhower Republican.

He's never been wrong once on Iraq or Afghanistan.

[Vilis Veritas]

2. Of course it is. There were plans for the pipeline for a long time.

Here is a link to chart I posted in an OP last week...please take note of Iran and how much oil we get from them...

http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/dnav/pet/pet_move_impcus_a2_nus_ep00_im0_mbblpd_a.htm

Zero. Zip. Not a single drop. Hmmm...gee, you think maybe all this saber rattling with Iran is about the Nuclear plants?

saddlesore

[Bozita]

3. "Iraq is getting back the same oil companies that used to exploit it when it was a British colony."

What a quote!

[indepat]

4. How does the invasion and occupation of Iraq differ materially from the German, Japanese, and

Italian invasions and occupations of the 1930s, a question I've pondered for more than five years on this board and elsewhere, is incontrovertibly and unequivocally answered forevermore imo by the US-brokered no-bid contracts whereby the preponderance of oil revenues will inure to the benefit of four large oil companies: it doesn't differ eos. :D

Edited to substitute three different words and add last differ

[vickitulsa]

5. Excellent brief summary anyone can understand.

This article confirms what a great many people have surmised intuitively, even if they don't know a thing about the inner workings of the oil & gas financial markets.

Related links to the backup info were not offered within the piece, but it is so clearly written that it's a simple matter to pick up key words and perform one's own searches to study that stuff (and well worth the time to anyone interested).

I just love it when a knowledgeable person speaks a terrible truth some are trying to hide, and lays it all out unabashably and directly like this! Makes anyone wanting to argue against the points end up looking sort of like that Aflac duck (and the humans), in the commercial starring Yogi Berra -- you know, with their mouths hanging open, no response possible.

I worked in the "energy industry" for over 30 years, including onsite during the Alaska Pipeline construction in 1974-75, which project was called TAPS in its early stages, like the Afghan-Pakistan one is called TAPI. I can't recall exactly when I first heard about the TAPI plans, but I do know it was YEARS before 9-11-01. All this administration was uncertain about with regard to getting it built once they took office was the particular excuse for taking over the reins politically in that location.

Their plans for the oil itself were simple enough (create huge profits for their financial connections); but their anticipation of the regional political obstacles was sorely lacking in the acumen and understanding needed.

What I hear from my old friends still working in the oil biz is that they're fairly well stymied now due to the ongoing, unrelenting and violent resistance by those in the region who don't want the U.S. to have their TAPI pipeline -- ever.

I never did the research to learn exactly how Karzai came into the picture, but I figured it pretty much like it was explained in this article. These guys always manage to find such individuals in any culture whom they can use for their purposes.

It would all be funny if it weren't so damned wicked and dangerous....

[AntiFascist]

6. Canadian media gets it right again. n/t

[Andy Canuck]

8. Eric Margolis gets it right again.

The Sun tolerates Margolis, generally the Toronto Sun is one gossip story above the Enquirer and just a tad left of Mein Kampf.

[TrogL]

7. NOW they get it

http://members.shaw.ca/trogl/oilwar/

[cliss]

9. So the question then becomes,

"At what price will we hang on to the oil fields?"

THIS is the big question of the day. On the one hand, we have the U.S. appetite for oil, I believe we burn through around 19 million barrels of oil per day (less now). That's barrels, not gallons. We represent 3.8% of the world's population and yet we guzzle over 25% of the world's oil.

How much is that SUV worth?

As the Oil Colonies become more expensive, it becomes more and more difficult to hang on to them. Yeah we can hold on to Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, but at some point it becomes prohibitive.


We just reached that point.

[Raster]

10. We are petroleum addicts. And our dealers--the Texas-American Petroleum Mafia and their

accomplices the Saudi Royal Family don't want us to kick the habit. Oh far from it! Our drug dealers want us to keep mainlining Saudi black as long we can. They in turn are addicted to the American Military/Industrial Complex's wares. It really is a vicious circle.