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The Three Energy Wars
Walid Khadduri, Al-Hayat
“We are practically in an energy war. The price of a barrel of petrol has multiplied threefold” (in the last two years), the French Finance Minister Thierry Breton told Europe 1 radio station on July 25.
Contrary to the contention of the French minister, the world in fact is locked in three energy wars, not one: a price war, an investment and deals war, and a geopolitical war.
The first war, which Breton talked about, is economic due to the factors of supply and demand. Prices soared due to a ‘sudden’ demand for oil, resulting from the strong economic growth in India, China and Brazil at a time when sustainable growth in the US continues without stopping or slowing down. Meanwhile, the number of the widespread and developed refineries that can process heavy high-sulfur oil has declined. The problem with this war lies in the demand rather than any shortage of supplies or a policy for deliberate cut down of production. The oil-exporting countries have been producing at almost full capacity for the past three years in order to fix prices. It is not a war but an interaction with the market mechanisms that prevail in the world these days.
The second war is on oil and gas investment deals. In Latin America, agreements are reconsidered and reneged under the pretext that the previous contracts were unfair to the oil producers. In Russia, there is an overt conflict with the European countries that try to have a share in Russia’s oil industry. However, Moscow argues that its companies should be given the same rights and concessions demanded by Western companies, which tried to treat this issue in the G-8 Summit in St. Petersburg, but to no avail….
The third war is armed conflicts within the oil-producing countries, not only in the Middle East but also in Nigeria. These wars have already started since the September 11, 2001 attacks, followed by the occupation of Iraq and, now, the Israeli aggression on Lebanon. Of course, the war in Palestine has been going on for decades, but its impact on oil was very limited in recent years. However, the eruption of simultaneous wars on Iraq, Palestine and Lebanon, with the possible spread of hostilities to include Iran due to its nuclear file, or to Syria, increases fears in the markets, hikes prices, and gives an opportunity for speculators to make tremendous profits….
Dr Walid Khadduri is an energy expert and director of al-Hayat business desk
(31 July 2006)
Seems like a good analysis. Can’t tell much about al-Hayat from its About Us page: “Dar Al-Hayat’s English website is a primary source of information for all English-speaking readers seeking an alternative perspective and in-depth reporting on the Middle East and the Arab world.”. -BA
Sistani Threatens US over Israeli War on Lebanon
Juan Cole, Informed Comment
…Sistani has issued a warning to the United States. He wants Bush to intervene to arrange a ceasefire, i.e. the cessation of israeli air raids on Lebanon in general.
What could he do if he were ignored? Sistani could call massive anti-US and anti-Israel demonstrations. Given Iraq’s profound political instability, this development could be extremely dangerous. US troops in Baghdad and elsewhere are planning offensives against Shiite paramilitary groups, so tensions are likely to rise in the Shiite areas anyway. But big demonstrations could easily boil over into actual attacks on US and British troops. Both depend heavily on fuel that is transported through the Shiite south. Were the Shiites actively to turn on the US for its wholehearted support of continued Israeli air raids, the US military could be cut off from fuel and supplies. The British only have around 8,000 troops in Iraq, and they would be in profound danger if Iraq’s Shiites became militantly anti-occupation.
Since the Israeli treatment of Arabs is an issue on which Sunnis and Shiites agree, there is also a possibility that Sistani could finally get some respect from the Sunni community if he led such a compaign. That development would be more dangerous to the continued US military presence in Iraq than any other I can think of.
The US is already not winning against a Sunni Arab insurgency, backed by around 5 million Iraqis. If 16 million Shiites turned on the US because of its wholehearted support for Israel’s actions in Lebanon, the US military mission in Iraq could quickly become completely and urgently untenable. In this case, the British troops in particular would be lucky to escape the country with their lives.
Sistani does not issue threats lightly, and he has repeatedly shown a willingness to back them up with action. Bush and US ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad will ignore him to their peril.
(31 July 2006)
Related from Juan Cole: What is Hizbullah?:
Western and Israeli pundits keep comparing Hizbullah to al-Qaeda. It is a huge conceptual error. There is a crucial difference between an international terrorist network like al-Qaeda, which can be disrupted by good old policing techniques (such as inserting an agent in the Western Union office in Karachi), and a sub-nationalist movement.
Al-Qaeda is some 5,000 multinational volunteers organized in tiny cells.
Hizbullah is a mass expression of subnationalism that has the loyalty of some 1.3 million highly connected and politically mobilized peasants and slum dwellers. Over a relatively compact area.
Kunstler: Afghanistan, Iraq and The American Dream (Video)
The Electric Wallpaper Co. – creators of The End of Suburbia, YouTube.com
Is “The War That Will Not End In Our Lifetimes” really about maintaining a non-negotiable lifestyle dependent on cheap energy? The End of Suburbia is a 78-minute documentary about the end of the oil age. Clip contains violence and strong language.
(27 July 2006)
35 seconds of raw truth -AF
Lebanon, Syria, Iran and the Coming Imperialist Re-Division of the World
Steve Masterson, GlobalResearch.ca
The sheer brutality of the butchery of civilians by Israeli WMD – bombs and fighter planes provided by the United States – on Lebanon is firstly a warning to the rest of the world from the United States: ‘accept US global domination, or else’; and secondly, it is the beginning of a serious struggle for all-out control over Middle-East, Caspian Basin and Central Asian oil and gas. It is not the puppet Israel but the US itself who sets the tone of this purposefully brutal war, a war which opens up a qualitative change in US aggression and inter-imperialist conflict, a period that will draw the whole world into intensifying horrors and suffering. At the same time this new period opens a large window for the dramatic re-appearance of world-wide mass class struggle bringing workers and youth back into the centre-stage of global politics.
Increasing numbers of analysts and commentators now say the Israeli war against Lebanon was planned and prepared for in detail, in rooms in the White House, Pentagon and no doubt elsewhere. The Lebanon ‘war’ is definitely a proxy-war.
(2 Aug 2006)
Mentions peak oil.
Saudi Arabia rules out oil weapon
Reuters
Saudi Arabia, the world’s biggest crude exporter, believes oil should not be used as a weapon because it is the economic lifeline of Arab states, its foreign minister said.
Asked whether the oil weapon should be used if the conflict between Israel and Hizbollah escalates, Prince Saud al-Faisal said: “The two issues should not be mixed because oil is among the economic capabilities that countries… need to meet their obligations toward their citizens.
“If we ignore this reality and start asking that the foundations of our life (be used) and enter into reckless adventures, the first to be hurt will be our citizens and no wise government can accept this,” he told a news conference.
(3 Aug 2006)
