The Cheney/Bush Oil Strategy

When the Bush administration invaded Iraq last year, it was evident, despite the fear-mongering rhetoric, that the ultimate motive had little to do with Saddam Hussein or terrorism. The notion that Saddam Hussein presented an imminent security threat to the U.S. was even then transparently phony. Though many (including me) believed administration claims that Hussein possessed nerve gas or other such weaponry, still it was evident that Hussein’s use of such weapons against the U.S. would have been suicidal—and Hussein, a secular and self-aggrandizing dictator, had no interest in suicide.

It is by now well established that the Bush administration deliberately exaggerated the security threat and lied about the evidence for weapons of mass destruction and about Hussein’s alleged connection to al-Qaeda. What most Americans do not yet understand is why.

The official reason, of course, is that Hussein had to go. That’s not a bad reason. But it is another diversion, not the truth. The real reason is that the Bush Administration wanted (and still wants) control of Iraqi oil.

Consider our situation. America’s domestic oil production peaked in the 1970s and has been declining ever since. We now import over 60 percent of our oil. Iraq has world’s second largest oil reserves. America’s transportation system and much of its economy runs on oil. The administration has taken no effective action to increase automotive efficiency or stem the drop in gas mileage; fuel economy is at its lowest level in 20 years. Bush and Cheney have extensive personal and financial ties to the oil industry and have repeatedly opposed initiatives for sustainable energy, energy conservation and transportation alternatives. (Bush’s proposal for hydrogen-powered vehicles is a red herring, of dubious technical merit and almost certainly not practically achievable within the next two or three decades.) So how do Bush and Cheney really plan to fuel our economy (and line their pockets) for the remainder of their lifetimes? It’s not too hard to connect the dots.

To this circumstantial evidence we may add the testimony of U.S. Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Karen Kwiatkowski, who recently resigned in protest from the Defense Department’s office for Near East South Asia, which handled intelligence for the Middle East before and during last year’s war. Her revelations about the deliberate distortion of intelligence before and during the war are astonishing (see the February 20-26 issue of LA Weekly). Less astonishing, but more important, is her clear and cogent insider information on the Bush administration’s objectives in Iraq. Here, in her words, are the administration’s objectives: “[they] needed to do more than just topple Saddam Hussein. They wanted to put in a government friendly to the U.S., and they wanted permanent basing in Iraq.” The purpose of the friendly government and the permanent basing is “to secure the energy lines of communication in the region”—in plainer language, to control the flow of oil.

There is another oil-related reason as well. Hussein had started selling Iraq’s oil in euros, not in dollars. Once sanctions were lifted, this would have meant a big boost for the euro as against the dollar. But that problem has already been solved: last May, Bush issued an executive order restoring trading on Iraq’s oil back to the dollar.

Thus the Bush/Cheney oil strategy is clear. The U.S. may restore some sovereignty to the Iraqi people, but there will be strings attached. Among those strings are permanent American military bases in Iraq that can threaten any Iraqi government whose oil policy does not conform to U.S. interests. The fundamental purpose of the invasion was and is control of Iraqi oil. Removal of Saddam Hussein was a beneficial side effect—and a diversion.

Thus does the addict plunder the drug-dealer, supporting and prolonging the addiction.

Not exactly the way to a hopeful future.