Hydrocarbons - the formula of war

[FarCenter]

MOSCOW. (RIA Novosti military commentator Ilya Kramnik) - Hydrocarbon prices, new nuclear and hydro-power plants, oil blackmail - energy is now one of the central issues discussed in the world. Even the defense sector is not immune: many analysts tend to view most 20th century wars as wars for energy. The role and significance of energy resources and the part energy plays in wars is worth examining.

As industrial society forges ahead, energy and energy resources play a more significant role in the affairs of nations. Eventually, a nation reaches a point at which accessible energy resources become vital for its existence, and any shortage in these resources may result in serious consequences for its economy. Control over energy production was not the ultimate goal for Germany, Italy or Japan - the aggressor countries in World War II - but it was one of the overriding objectives.

The significance of that objective can be understood from the objectives set by the armed forces of the three countries. For Germany and Italy, one of the aims of the 1942 campaign was to capture the oil resources in the Caucasus (on the Soviet-German front) and on the Arabian peninsula (on the African front). This was the result of a severe fuel shortage experienced by both, which could not be met either by oil fields at Ploesti in Romania or synthetic gasoline plants in Germany. For Japan, the embargo placed on oil in South East Asia triggered a war for vital resources.

Throughout the war, oil fields, coal mines, tankers, oil storage facilities, fuel-filled freight trains, and power plants were regarded as targets of the utmost importance. For the submarines of all warring nations, tankers, for example, ranked after aircraft carriers and battleships, while oil refineries, synthetic fuel factories and power plants in Hitler's Germany were prime targets for Allied bombers.

The situation did not change much after the war. Oil-bearing regions have become the scene of rivalry between leading nations of the world which rushed to seek allies with the holders of the black stuff. The attractiveness of oil among other energy resources is easy to explain: it is a very calorie-rich fuel (a small amount yields a large volume of energy), its production, transportation and storage are simpler than that of other resources, and it is these advantages that have ultimately led oil and petroleum products to become the main resource of our machine-based civilization. Soon natural gas joined oil to become a near ideal source of energy for thermal power plants.

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