for those who believe the war is for oil..

Originally posted by GarryB

The US invaded Iraq and removed the normal controls that maintain society as we know it (ie police etc). It is their responsibility to gain order and maintain it… they chose instead to protect the things they were interested in… the oil ministry and oil fields. To say that it is Iraqs fault that Iraqis were looting Museums and Hospitals would be like blaming America for training Osama Bin Ladins terrorist hijackers to fly planes and offering them the aircraft they used to destroy the WTC and damage the Pentagon.

….didn’t you say that anyways? Says much about you doesn’t it Garry? Pick one, or else you’re a hypocrite…or that just means your inconsistent “opinions” isn’t worth @$@!$

“Americans do loot, but they didn’t loot the museum, again, GarryB what exactly happened to you to make you find everything the US does wrong?”

The US invaded Iraq and removed the normal controls that maintain society as we know it (ie police etc). It is their responsibility to gain order and maintain it… they chose instead to protect the things they were interested in… the oil ministry and oil fields. To say that it is Iraqs fault that Iraqis were looting Museums and Hospitals would be like blaming America for training Osama Bin Ladins terrorist hijackers to fly planes and offering them the aircraft they used to destroy the WTC and damage the Pentagon.

“d) Russia is coming online spectacularly BUT they have higher costs than Saudi and the infrastructure isn’t all there”

But the potential investment is there… the West is quite happy to provide loans for oil infrastructure… not so happy to help hospitals or aid with other civilian infrastructure like water, electricity, or sewerage, or roads… but they are only interested in the welfare of the people.

a) OPEC controls 40% of the world market

b) Saudi Arabia is the main country in the world with the most spare capacity (a LOT of spare capacity)

c) The target price by open for oil is $25 a barrel – for Saudis $21 / $22 is break even and $23 / $24 pays national debt

d) Russia is coming online spectacularly BUT they have higher costs than Saudi and the infrastructure isn’t all there

e) Venezuela is a problem

f) The USA only imports about 10% of its oil from the Middle East (but Venezuela – above – is a big source)

g) In terms of oil demand it goes down in the summer BUT rises in the winter as North America uses oil for heating unlike Europe that uses natural gas – hence in winter prices rise

h) Iraq was contributing 3% to world oil pre war but has the second largest reserves

Actual effect on war for the UK will be a petrol price drop of 4 to 6 pence (nb chancellor raises tax by 1p so 3p to 5p) – that’s on a litre costing on average round my way 79.9p at wartime rates

So on the Iraq front the infrastructure and stuff will take time to set up again – it will be in the US’s interest to keep prices high to pay for reconstruction – as I’ve said $25 is the world goal, keeping the price at $25 stop the world economy form overheating or going into recession 😉

rabie 😉

GarryB,

I said, “I didn’t see any Marines looting that museum”

You then go on a diatribe about how Americans never loot, and that we think were better than everyone else, I don’t know how you jump from one point to the other. Americans do loot, but they didn’t loot the museum, again, GarryB what exactly happened to you to make you find everything the US does wrong?
My analogy of the barking poodle still stands

dude, russia alone won’t be enough… if russia managed to pump twice the amount of oil as it did right now, so the oil price will probably drop by 5-10%…but if OPEC wants to sustain the previous b4 the price drop, they will cut production…. Russia can’t do a thing about…cuz russia doesn’t provide over 50% of the world oil………………………. OPEC does….

“if they can pump alot of oil per day to sustain themselves, they won’t be importing oil from OPEC member countries….”

If they can get oil cheaper on the open market they might buy.
The West has invested rather more in helping Russia exploit its oil wealth than it has in say helping them with their other problems.

“OPEC does not have complete control over the price of oil.
During desert storm The Russians offered to increase production for America to counter any reduction by OPEC to increase the cost of oil. Equally countries like Indonesia and Venesuala are not members of OPEC, or is the UK with its north sea reserves or the US with the oil in Alaska.
OPEC is reasonably powerful… but certainly not all powerful… in the 60s or 70s OPEC tried to increase the cost of oil by greatly reducing pumping rates… the fuel crises being reduced in effect on the US by Iraq violating OPEC limits to sell oil to the US.
Countries like the Iraqis at the moment and Russia as well that need a steady income will not reduce pump rates when OPEC drops production… when OPEC drops production the price goes up and Russia and Iraq and any other producer makes more money per barrel than they normally make… it is not in their interests to reduce production at such times… of course to greatly increase their production rates would be to reduce the price of oil and would be counter productive for them too… they will try to achieve a balance.”

first of all indonesia and venezuela are OPEC member…
russia/uk/us alone certainly will not be enough to reduce the oil price if OPEC decided to raise the price….
if they can pump alot of oil per day to sustain themselves, they won’t be importing oil from OPEC member countries….
as for the rest of the world (non-OPEC), most of them are oil importer not exporter.

“secondly even if in 5 years the US manage to pump alot more oil than OPEC permitted, OPEC will cut production in other countries…
OPEC basically set the oil price in this world… if it’s too low they will cut production and too high they increase production…that’s y they increase production to ease the high oil prices.”

OPEC does not have complete control over the price of oil.
During desert storm The Russians offered to increase production for America to counter any reduction by OPEC to increase the cost of oil. Equally countries like Indonesia and Venesuala are not members of OPEC, or is the UK with its north sea reserves or the US with the oil in Alaska.
OPEC is reasonably powerful… but certainly not all powerful… in the 60s or 70s OPEC tried to increase the cost of oil by greatly reducing pumping rates… the fuel crises being reduced in effect on the US by Iraq violating OPEC limits to sell oil to the US.
Countries like the Iraqis at the moment and Russia as well that need a steady income will not reduce pump rates when OPEC drops production… when OPEC drops production the price goes up and Russia and Iraq and any other producer makes more money per barrel than they normally make… it is not in their interests to reduce production at such times… of course to greatly increase their production rates would be to reduce the price of oil and would be counter productive for them too… they will try to achieve a balance.

“so oil is not an energy source for the future, that y every developed country is rushing to find alternative energy source (ex. hydrogen fuel cell)”

I fully agree. If you look at some of my chats with Jonesy he will argue the attack on Iraq is justified to help keep the global economy ticking over, my reply was basically that as long as oil remains a cheap and viable fuel source only token amounts of money will be spent on alternative fuels that might be more expensive initially but are renewable, cleaner, and healthier for the world. Ironically the major oil distributers already have a supply network for oil based fuels and it will probably be quite natural for them to use basically the same network to distribute the new fuels, but as long as oil is cheap they have no incentive to change.
The only driving force behind Fuel cell technology is for conventional submarine propulsion… otherwise the oil companies would have bought up all the technology and sat on it.

“and France wants it to continue the sanctions. “

The Arab countries around Iraq want the sanctions to continue till an Iraqi is in charge of Iraq.

“It seems to me the decision was likely to have been save the means to treat a couple of thousand Iraqi civillians or save the means to rebuild an entire country. Not a hard decision in those terms is it?”

Yes, it was the bits of paper in the Oil Ministry that will pay for everything in Iraq, not the Iraqi people… not a hard decision at all.
In fact now that the Iraqi people can see what the Priorities of the US was all along then I think the US wish to get out of their as quickly as possible might be granted… even if it wasn’t true.

“and it wasn’t the Americans who looted the Iraqui museum, it was Iraqii’s..I didn’t see any Marines running away with 5000 year old artifacts…”

Of course when law and order breaks down in the US no one steals anything… the looting that took place during the Rodney King affair were just made up… I am sure if the whole of LA was without police or any form of government control everyone would just sit at home in the dark and wait for the new occupiers to come and allocate jobs to everyone… Boy you Yanks are so much more civilised than the rest of us heathens.

Also, this was a war!!! I know of very few war planners who worry about non-military targets or objectives such as the Museum, I agree 100% that it was unfortunate and its a shame that we didn’t do a better job preventing the looting, but in the “big picture” of warfare, I seriously doubt that any planners even considered the museum as an objective. The oil ministry was an important objective due to the information contained within, and the importance of revenues from oil for the rebuilding of Iraq. I know it looks bad, but militarily its the correct course.

monster…

you seems to be those suckers that fall for “success” stories from infomercials on how to make money from nothing. Notice they don’t ever tell you failures? There’s a HUGE list of what “people” asked to protect and “predict” what might be looted or destroyed. You want every item on that list protect? Or else if just one of them becomes true, “oh no, the Americans didnt’ protect anything and they had warnings before the war even started. They must be incompetent and at fault for everything” kind of BS..After just one week of war there’s already this huge media hysteria of how the war is a failure. After 3 weeks, Baghdad is mostly liberated. So, now these nay sayers are pointing to lootings and things like “where’s the WMDs”. Boy, these people sure are setting themselves up for constant dissappointments.

monster:

as i said b4, the marines that came in from the east of baghdad expected a bloody fight and their mission is to neutralize the special repulican guard and saddam’s diehard. but when they got there, those guys already ran away…this sudden victory left baghdad into a lawless city… at the time they can only protect the mostly likely target to be looted. certainly no one even thought hospitals and culturals place would be top of the list for looter.

i also blame the US war planners for failing to predict all possible senarios when they enter baghdad. they certainly failed to predict
baghdad would fall this easy….

Originally posted by TTP
Monster 500,

The left/democrats here in the US and abroad are really trying to elevate the looting of this museum as an apocolyptic event that has destroyed the lives of millions!!! its so sad people who were against this war, who predicted doom and gloom, and probably secretly hoped that the US and England would fail, have been proven wrong!!so they are grasping at anything that would besmurch this victory.
Monster 500 tell me are you more outraged by the looting of this museum, or the fact that coalition forces have found tons of weaponry banned by the UN sanctions, soon the WMD’s will emerge, thousands of unmarked graves, thousands of political prisoners telling stories of torture and murder, women and children used as human shields, the discovery of $800 million dollars in Oil for food money, found in Saddam’s palaces instead!!!!do any of these small insignificant facts outrage you as much as the looting of the museum, your hypocracy can be smelled from across the Atlantic!!!

Saddam had to go, i am hot disputing that. i wasnt expecting the coalition to not come away empty handed. the less weapons of any nature on the streets anywhere the better i say.

the two grievences i have are the loss of innocent civilians and the looting which should and could have been prevented.

what ****s me is that the military made a concerted effort to conserve the oil ministry, but there was not adequate protection given to priceless antiquities or hospitals.

seems like a pretty big mistake to me.

Good points TTP and Jonesy

Hey Drunkenmonkey…. if you are a fellow Canuck put it on your bio so we can all see it when you post.

You are correct that the war wasn’t about the US stealing Iraq’s oil. The US is concerned about supply, not ownership. I notice that the UN continues skimming the top of each barrel of Iraqi oil being sold and France wants it to continue the sanctions.

I was also surprised by the degree of looting in Iraq. I can understand them targeting Saddam’s palaces and the large government centres but I thought they would have shown more respect for one another than to loot hospitals, museums and the like. I can only assume that is a result of living in a police state for 30 years and if that is the case then they were past due for liberation , oil or no.

What strikes me about the manner in which the international press covered the looting was the degree to which they blamed the US/UK military but never once asked the Iraqis who were doing the looting, why they were also targeting hospitals and one another.

On minute we were being told by the press that all the hospitals in Baghdad were overflowing with civilian wounded and a short time latter we were being told that those same hospitals had all been looted by the civilian population. Never once did I see or hear a reporter explain or ask anyone… what happened to the wounded? Did they get dumped on the floors? Were they killed? Did they die before or after their medications and beds were taken? Nor did I ever hear anyone explain where the hospitals are located in Baghdad and how US forces were supposed to prevent looting in areas they hadn’t secured in a city of 5 million.

Lets face up to the facts….Iraqis for whatever reasons, went into the hospitals, sole the medications and beds needed by their own injured, stole from one another and looted the museums, not the US/UK military.

Regards

Sauron

Monster 500,

The left/democrats here in the US and abroad are really trying to elevate the looting of this museum as an apocolyptic event that has destroyed the lives of millions!!! its so sad people who were against this war, who predicted doom and gloom, and probably secretly hoped that the US and England would fail, have been proven wrong!!so they are grasping at anything that would besmurch this victory.
Monster 500 tell me are you more outraged by the looting of this museum, or the fact that coalition forces have found tons of weaponry banned by the UN sanctions, soon the WMD’s will emerge, thousands of unmarked graves, thousands of political prisoners telling stories of torture and murder, women and children used as human shields, the discovery of $800 million dollars in Oil for food money, found in Saddam’s palaces instead!!!!do any of these small insignificant facts outrage you as much as the looting of the museum, your hypocracy can be smelled from across the Atlantic!!!

Well no it doesnt really make me wonder at all I’m afraid. It’s already been quite clearly written down on this thread that the oil reserves are the route to Iraqs reconstruction who is suprised that a prime concern was the protection of the source of that reconstruction?.

Certainly we took serious enough heed of the physical oil installations that, apparently, the timetable of the whole conflict was advanced to the extent of going in and securing the southern fields when the first hints of a demolitions order on them was given. It would be held up, by exactly the same people who’re whining now, as grossly irresponsible and negligent on the part of the yanks and the brits, to protect the oil production facilities and not secure all the records and administrative facilities that orchestrate that oil production. Especially if the destruction of those administrative faciities hampered the generation of revenue to alleviate the suffering of the poor Iraqi citizenry.

Should there have been more protection of hospitals, museums and the suchlike. Yes of course there should have been. If the situation was that they had the uncommited troops to protect the oil infrastucture or a few hospitals in the centre of Baghdad though I’d say they made the right choice. It seems to me the decision was likely to have been save the means to treat a couple of thousand Iraqi civillians or save the means to rebuild an entire country. Not a hard decision in those terms is it?

Originally posted by drunkenmonkey
monster: i kno the money from the oil will be used to rebuild iraq but it’s still not enough….

yes it is a bad mistake for the pentagon for failing to protect all the civilian and cultural sites… but it’s not fully their fault…

1. they expect a bloody battle in baghdad, no one expect it to fall so easy like it did… i kno they managed to protect the oil infrastructions, but those are in unpopulated area and seized in beginning of the war…

2. after all it’s the iraqi people who looted the places, who would actually think they gonna loote the hopitals and musium? i mean it’s ok to loote the presidential palaces and govt buildings but hospital? i duno wut those people in baghdad are thinking….

the people have had nothing for so long is it any wonder that this kind of looting took place.

adequate measures should have been in place to protect certain infrastructure from this kind of stuff. the oil offices were well looked after.

gotta make you wonder dont it?

TTP.

the US govt was warned many times before invading Iraq that there would need to be some sort of protection for these museums.

i noticed they managed to protect the oil ministry offices with dilligence, yet the most important parts of western civilization have been raped, pilliged and plunderd.

this is a civilization that gave us the wheel, the calendar and so on. yet the US thought it more pertanent to protect the goddamn
f$%^&@ oil ministry. you cant seriously believe that may not have been a likely occurance in the US militaries eyes??

in some ways its even more of a disgrace than the civilian casualties.

GarryB,

The reason Americans enjoy “cheap Oil” is our government doesn’t tax oil 500% !!oil is sold on the open market so every country should pay the same price, Your country and some European nations tax the hell out of each gallon to pay for all the expensive social programs that its citizens desire,Americans don’t desire all this social welfare and wouldn’t stand for outrageous taxation to pay for them…and it wasn’t the Americans who looted the Iraqui museum, it was Iraqii’s..I didn’t see any Marines running away with 5000 year old artifacts…keep on blaming the US…like a yelping little poodle…all noise no bark!!!!

monster: i kno the money from the oil will be used to rebuild iraq but it’s still not enough….

yes it is a bad mistake for the pentagon for failing to protect all the civilian and cultural sites… but it’s not fully their fault…

1. they expect a bloody battle in baghdad, no one expect it to fall so easy like it did… i kno they managed to protect the oil infrastructions, but those are in unpopulated area and seized in beginning of the war…

2. after all it’s the iraqi people who looted the places, who would actually think they gonna loote the hopitals and musium? i mean it’s ok to loote the presidential palaces and govt buildings but hospital? i duno wut those people in baghdad are thinking….

most of the money for the reconstruction will come from Iraq’s oil profits. US govt even said this.

most of that money will be going into construction companies such as Halliburton, which has none other than VP **** Cheney as a director, or a former director i think.

in a round about way it is a war about oil profits, its those profits from the sale of oil that will finance the rebuilding of Iraq.

pity noone bothered to think of protecting the cultural heritage.

🙁