No war for oil, says the Michael Moore branch of the antiwar movement, meaning that the United States shouldn’t fight to advance the interests of the petroleum industry.
There is no war for oil, say true believers in George W. Bush’s strategy, meaning that the United States is in Iraq only to fight terrorism and promote democracy.
But war for oil is U.S. doctrine, as preached and practiced for decades by Democrats and Republicans alike. The potential use of military force to keep oil flowing is a constant in our foreign policy and a promise that underpins our economy. And for better or worse, that seems unlikely to change anytime soon.
Jimmy Carter spelled it out in his 1980 State of the Union address: “Let our position be absolutely clear: An attempt by any outside force to gain control of the Persian Gulf region will be regarded as an assault on the vital interests of the United States of America, and such an assault will be repelled by any means necessary, including military force.” Eleven years later, Bush I backed up those words by kicking Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait, and on the eve of the current war Dick Cheney spoke of the threat Saddam Hussein could pose to oil supplies and the global economy.
None of which means that the current war was launched only to secure oil fields, any more than a list of other reasons to invade Iraq means that oil had nothing to do with it. But obviously we are in that neighborhood in the first place because of its primary natural resource. Yet we can’t seem to discuss the role of oil in U.S. policy without using anything but the most reductive and politicized terms, which is dangerous, since it means that we are often willfully blind to an underlying cause of our own actions.
The hard fact is that our economy and our lifestyles depend on foreign oil, and that dependency is growing. The United States will import more than two-thirds of its oil by 2020. And with more and more of the world’s petroleum supply coming from unstable regions, writes Michael Klare, the author of a new book, “Blood and Oil,” “The American military is increasingly being converted into a global oil-protection service.”
Meanwhile, reports John Cassidy in a detailed and depressing New Yorker article about our oil habit, we’re not getting much leadership when it comes to seeking energy independence. Cassidy quotes Robert Mabro, chairman of the Oxford Institute of Energy Studies, on the rhetoric of Bush and Kerry:?”The two candidates, with due respect, are lying to the people, or they don’t know what they are talking about.”
Maybe a better understanding of the costs of sustaining our oil habit would help us focus on a coherent energy policy. Certainly conservation is not a popular topic in the land of tax-subsidized SUVs and McMansions. Yet even a real effort at conservation and a serious focus on alternative energy sources — even the proposed development of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge — would have only limited impact on our oil needs.
Cassidy cites one expert who says that the cost of U.S. military efforts related to protecting oil-flow is equivalent to about 10 cents per gallon of gas beyond what you pay at the pump. That may look cost-efficient in dollar terms, compared to the gas taxes levied in Europe, but when the price includes the lives of American soldiers it gets a lot more expensive. You might feel that a humming economy and a Hummer in the driveway are worth a dime per gallon plus getting somebody’s kid getting shot in Iraq or Nigeria or Colombia, but you should at least acknowledge that you are making that choice. There are other costs, too. The deals we cut and the people we protect (the Saudi royal family), try to protect (the Shah of Iran), and support until they become our arch-enemies (Saddam Hussein) can make us highly unpopular with the people who live in oil-rich countries, which often become hotbeds of anti-Americanism. That does not fully explain and in no way excuses the terrorism of an Osama bin Laden, but it does put it in some meaningful context beyond “evil.”
“No war for oil” is an empty phrase because it does not address the reality of U.S. policy or suggest alternatives to our very real energy needs. Like it or not, war for oil is the way the United States is set up to do business. Whether we can or should change that, we should at least find a way to discuss it.
Edward Cone (www.edcone.com, [email protected]) writes a column for the News & Record most Sundays.
