If it's all about the oil why would you intentionally overthrow the guy freely supplying it?

[Very_Boring_Name]

The "it's all about the oil!" argument is custom tailored for the intellectually lazy.

[razorman]

1. I have wondered the same thing. For many of our military actions, we have

heard that we were "doing it for oil". Yet, we never seem to get the oil, even when it would be easy. We could have owned the Iraqi oil fields after the first Gulf War, but we didn't. Apparently, we didn't even have sense enough to use our leverage to make a sweet deal for cheap oil with whoever is operating the oil industry there.

[robinlynne]

25. oh yes we did. Iraqi oil is now ours. (not due to the the first war, but this one.)

and if I understand correctly, the first war was about the oil in kuwait, not in Iraq.

[rfranklin]

2. Perhaps the oil companies want to eliminate the payments to Khadaffi and his family...

Cutting overhead is a favorite method of pumping up the bottom line.

[Junkdrawer]

3. Yep. BP was "years away from any production"....

Reuters) - BP PLC (BP.L) has suspended preparations for exploratory drilling for oil and gas in western Libya due to growing unrest in the north African country, a spokesman for the British energy giant said on Monday.

The company does not produce any oil or gas in Libya but has been readying an onshore rig to start drilling for fuel in the west of the country.

"We are looking at evacuating some people from Libya, so those preparations are being suspended but we haven't started drilling and we are years away from any production," the spokesman said.


http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/02/21/us-bp-libya-idUSTRE71K1CG20110221

But that's me. I'm intellectually lazy:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x697952

[TBF]

4. He had been supplying it - until very recently when he began to talk

about awarding contracts to India, China and Brazil outside the normal bidding process. That is billions of dollars at stake for western oil companies.

Please feel free to educate yourself: http://journals.democraticunderground.com/TBF/41

[Turborama]

8. The awarding of contracts to India, China and Brazil outside the normal bidding process was AFTER...

...the intervention started. I watched the press conference on Saturday when Ghanemo offered it to all the countries who abstained. Live.

And?

That's right.

Following your line of reasoning the billions of dollars were put "at stake" because of the intervention.

So the "It's to get the oil" conspiracy theory is a logical fallacy.

They already had it and now they've lost it.

[TBF]

17. Not so fast -

Gaddafi urges Russia, China, India: invest in Libya oil

Sun Mar 13, 2011 7:08pm EDT

* Libyan oil exports sharply down due to fighting

* U.S. crude eases on Gaddafi territory gains

TUNIS, March 13 (Reuters) - Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi urged Russia, China and India on Sunday to invest in Libya's oil sector, state television said.

It said Gaddafi had made the appeal during talks with the ambassadors of the three countries...

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/03/13/libya-oil-idUSLDE72C0OT20110313


And on March 1, 2011:

http://www.worldnewsco.com/3665/libya-starts-oil-exports/

[Turborama]

20. So? That might explain why they abstained...

...as well as not wanting to set a precedent of endorsing interventions when they might have to quell revolutions of their own somewhere down the road.

Nice try at obfuscating, but we're talking about the awarding of contracts to India, China and Brazil outside the normal bidding process after the intervention began.

Your links show that during the build up to the intervention Gaddafi was begging those countries to get deeper into his bed. So? That's only to be expected when he's losing money because "Libyan oil exports sharply down due to fighting".

I must say you are really good with the Googles, aren't you. Shame all you do is copy and paste stuff and hope some conspiracy theory thread joins it all up for you.

[TBF]

21. What is your date of intervention please?

Nice try but it is a billion dollar industry and the western oil companies do not want to lose that money. As for your insults, you can shove those.

[Turborama]

27. You know when it was. I'm going to correct myself. It was a terrible attempt at obfuscating

Maybe you think you can try and pull this further into a tangent to hide the logic fail, but you can't.

As we both clearly explained above...

It's not that they "do not want to lose that money".

They already have.

[TBF]

29. The date of intervention is not a "tangent" when your theory rests

clearly on when things occurred. Fail.

[Turborama]

33. The abstentions occurred on March 17 2011

March 17 2011 - The United Nations Security Council, acting under the authority of Chapter VII of the U.N. Charter, approved a no-fly zone by a vote of 10 in favour, zero against, and five abstentions, via United Nations Security Council Resolution 1973. The five abstensions were: Brazil, Russia, India, China, and Germany.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_military_intervention_in_Libya

As for my snarkiness earlier, I sincerely apologize. It's out of character and caused by coming across too many people acting as apologists for Gaddafi (and I don't mean you - you have been trying to look under the surface, which is different and I actually admire people who have intellectual curiosity, carry out research and look into things, even if we end up coming to different conclusions) One person even started an OP singing his praises and making Libya sound like some kind of utopia and another replied to me listing reasons why they think Gaddafi is an awesome guy.

[TBF]

38. Gaddafi is unpredictable and unstable - I'm not a fan.

I'm pretty confident that the oil is the main deal, but obviously nothing occurs in a vacuum. Our economy is still bad here (with an election coming up), and instability in the Arab nations in general could be making UN members nervous. This military action kills several birds with one stone ...

Obama's initial leanings toward renewables were the right way to go, but he's been pulled into the empire game (not a crack at him personally, anyone in his position would face the same situation).

At this point, watching them bomb, I can only hope they finish their "mission" soon.

[meow mix]

5. K&R

[Motown_Johnny]

6. and why not go after countries with even more oil than Libya?

[Erose999]

10. We did. #2 on the list is Iraq, and the Neocons are gnashing their teeth to go after Iran.

[Ikonoklast]

14. China and India will get any and all oil out of Iran, now and in the future

Logistics trumps everything.

[Statistical]

15. How much oil did we get from Iraq? n/t

[Erose999]

30. Ask Halliburton. They made lots of money upgrading the oil fields.

A lot of the revenue generated thusfar went to the recunstruction. Contractors were paid in cash because the Iraqi banking system was so corrupt and vulnerable. Remember that the original plan centered on us being "greeted as liberators". I don't think that the Bush administration expected that there would be people in the Middle East opposed to the presence the of American military.

Anyway, those fields should be pumping soon. All the big names (BP, Shell, Exxon) are in there drilling in Iraq now.

http://money.cnn.com/2010/01/12/news/international/iraq_oil/index.htm

[cui bono]

7. The White House did say this was not about ousting Gaddafi. n/t

[TBF]

18. I don't think it is about ousting him necessarily, it's about keeping that

oil flowing. Billion dollar industry. Shell Oil has a lot of influence.

[UTUSN]

9. K&R #1 (for as long as the +1 lasts!1) n/t

[conspirator]

11. Price haggling. Better deal. Have you ever seen the confessions of an economic hitman

youtube it

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

12. We did it with Saddam

He was the oil dealer. We got rid of him.

Maybe that was not about oil, either.

[ButterflyBlood]

13. EXACTLY. If it was about oil the US and allies would be BACKING Gadaffi

That snake spent all of the past decade cozying up to the west and would do it even moreso for assistance. Hell his son was basically asking for assistance.

[leftstreet]

16. What difference does it make?

Why is everyone trying to fine-tune the reasons the bombs are flying?

Oil (Spices)
Terrorism (Communism)
Humanitarian efforts (Save the_____)

The question needs to be:

WHY DOES WESTERN 'DIPLOMACY' ALWAYS FAIL?!

:shrug:

[quinnox]

19. I think its better when you make really silly polls n/t

[PurityOfEssence]

22. He HAS been changing the contracts, and we could also get a better deal

Your premise is completely false; he's not just doing as we please and giving us all we want at whatever price we want to pay. In June of 2009, as shown by a Wikileaks document, he pissed off France's "Total" by cutting the percentage of oil they produce that they're allowed to take from the country. That didn't make them happy, but under threat of nationalizing the wells, they did what he said. Even though part of the deal was extending the contract, it's obvious how little this means when the person promising a longer deal claims the right to nationalize the wells whenever he damned well pleases.

Does this make sense now? We've been told that he's not an impediment to the oil, but he IS. Beyond this, an even better deal can be had from the opponents; they're in a very precarious position, and that's when people sell the family silver on the cheap.

Sorry for the snotty tone, but there's a lot of mocking coming from the war camp today, and it's gotten me in a rather testy mood.

[sabrina 1]

23. He wasn't 'freely supplying it' for one reason.

But that's a long story.

However, as everyone is finding out now, the U.S. backs dictators almost exclusively around the globe. They do so because dictators, like Qadaffi, will sell their resources to the highest bidders in order to enrich themselves and their cronies and to maintain power.

We like dictators so long as they can keep their populations under control. Keeping the voices of dissent, the 'left' usually, suppressed, by torture and imprisonment and death if necessary, helps keep things stable as far as the production of oil etc.

But if one of them decides to make some deals with say, China or Russia without our consent, or if they begin to lose control of their populations, resulting in uncertainty, causing the price of oil eg, to go up, then we have no more use for them. They have to go.

Once Qadaffi, and Mubarak and Ben Ali lost control of their countries, destabilization was the result, from the POV of Global capitalists. They are very pragmatic. They would have preferred their friendly dictators had remained, but once it was apparent they might not, then something had to be done.

If the revolutionaries had succeeded on their own, the future of Libya was an unknown, it might have turned into Latin American type democracy where the governments believe their resources belong to them.

And Qadaffi was not ever an easy dictator to deal with. He was demanding, he held up contracts to force the West to comply with demands, such as supplying him with more weapons, or nuclear power. If they refused, as he told them, 'I have other options'. That is not the kind of dictator they could rely on.

[Junkdrawer]

26. +1000

[Cali_Democrat]

34. +1001

[snot]

24. Who was in line to succeed him, if he were left in power?

[n2doc]

28. Saddam sold us oil, too n/t

[Erose999]

31. Actually we had him under embargo. And he had let the fields deteriorate to the point that

production dropped way below their pre-Gulf War 1 capacity.

The goal was to clear a path for American companies to develop Iraq's oil fields. Which is happening now as contracts are being awarded to Western oil companies.

[Mimosa]

36. ^ Great observation, ERose999 ^

The oil men knew back in February that Gaddafi was going to be taken out if he didn't take a permanent vacation.

http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Newsfeed/Article/127181609/201102231623/Oil-majors-jump-despite-Libya-uncertainty.aspx

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- Shares of petroleum producers -- including ones with interests in Libya -- rallied on Wednesday as Wall Street bets that $100-a-barrel oil will help the fortunes of energy producers for now, more than the damage from lost production.

About two thirds of Libya’s oil production comes from the eastern portion of the country, the base of opposition to Col. Moammar Gadhafi. The Libyan dictator lost control of that area earlier this week, according to reports.

The NYSE Arca Oil Index (XOI) of major oil producers rose 1.9% to 1,253, its highest close in nearly three years, as oil rose above $100 a barrel. See: Futures Movers for more on oil prices.

Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM) and Chevron Corp. (CVX), the largest U.S. oil companies, saw their shares rise about 1.9% each.

Among U.S.-based oil firms, Marathon Oil Corp. (MRO) was expected to get about 13% of its 2011 production from Libya; followed by 7% for Hess Corp. (HES) and 2% for ConocoPhillips (COP) , Deutsche Bank analyst Paul Sankey said.

Despite the turmoil, Marathon rose 3% to $49.18. Hess Corp. jumped 5.2% to $84.95 on Wednesday. ConocoPhillips rose 2.6%.

[StarburstClock]

32. To control the oil yourself and the speculation that surrounds it

Looks like you are intellectually lazy. Do you like country music? LOL.

[Mimosa]

35. Because -like Saddam- he was taking too big a cut.

Anybody who really follows the issue can supply plenty of info. Gaddafi and his family started getting greedy.

http://www.platts.com/RSSFeedDetailedNews/RSSFeed/Oil/6863374

Of course the oil men knew the toppling of Gaddafi was in the planning:

http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Newsfeed/Article/127181609/201102231623/Oil-majors-jump-despite-Libya-uncertainty.aspx

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- Shares of petroleum producers -- including ones with interests in Libya -- rallied on Wednesday as Wall Street bets that $100-a-barrel oil will help the fortunes of energy producers for now, more than the damage from lost production.

About two thirds of Libya’s oil production comes from the eastern portion of the country, the base of opposition to Col. Moammar Gadhafi. The Libyan dictator lost control of that area earlier this week, according to reports.

The NYSE Arca Oil Index (XOI) of major oil producers rose 1.9% to 1,253, its highest close in nearly three years, as oil rose above $100 a barrel. See: Futures Movers for more on oil prices.

Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM) and Chevron Corp. (CVX), the largest U.S. oil companies, saw their shares rise about 1.9% each.

Among U.S.-based oil firms, Marathon Oil Corp. (MRO) was expected to get about 13% of its 2011 production from Libya; followed by 7% for Hess Corp. (HES) and 2% for ConocoPhillips (COP) , Deutsche Bank analyst Paul Sankey said.

Despite the turmoil, Marathon rose 3% to $49.18. Hess Corp. jumped 5.2% to $84.95 on Wednesday. ConocoPhillips rose 2.6%.

[Runework]

37. Answer to the OP right here

http://www.platts.com/RSSFeedDetailedNews/RSSFeed/Oil/6863374

Libya's 93% tax rate on oil production makes production not especially profitable, Gheit said, estimating that the unit profit/barrel of production was well below the company's average at about $6-$7/b. "Pound for pound the impact on earnings is less than 5%" for the US companies, Gheit said.

In commentary earlier this week, Barclays analyst Paul Cheng said "even at $100/b Brent, we estimate the companies are making only about $5.5/b."