Posted on 05/20/2008 10:57:54 AM PDT by Sub-Driver
We're getting all we deserve.
We have officially gone insane, as a country.
Boy howdy!
BTW, if you had a chance to read the text of the bill, you'll notice that they're also calling it "NOPEC:"
SEC. 101. SHORT TITLE.
This title may be cited as the `No Oil Producing and Exporting Cartels Act of 2008' or `NOPEC'.
Stupid is as stupid does.
I seriously believe there will be a complete social collapse, within about 5-10 years.
Argreed. Perhaps that's part of their plan. Keep your powder dry.
Maybe they oughtta be more worried that it revealed their unprecedented stupidity.
Congress puts the “more” in moron....
Even if they were to win this lawsuit....how they gonna collect? You cant force a foreigner to pay a US judgement
Also...since these are the same type of liberal globalists who passed the Foreign Soverignty Immunity Act some years ago...preventing such lawsuits like this
Of course...the GOP is no longer conservative....no wonder so many GOPers voted w the Dhimms on this
Although I don't use this product, since people are starting to use bicycles more, people might be interested in this autoshifting bicycle.
Autoshifting bicycleAlso, I'm keeping an eye on developments in bio-fuel production.
First, the bad news about ethanol. Ethanol fires are evidently harder to control than gasoline fires.
Ethanol fires hard to control 1Hopefully, ways will be developed to make controlling ethanol fires easier.
Ethanol fires hard to control 2
On the brighter side concerning ethanol, there's now evidence that people might get as much, or more, bang per buck for their gas dollars with gas / ethanol mixtures.
Gas-competitive gas / ethanol mixturesAlso, I was surprised by the introduction of a machine (popularly known as a still) for making home-made ethanol.
EFuel100In stark contrast to the 1700 gallons of water required to make one gallon of corn-based ethanol as indicated by the OP, the EFuel100 uses only 170 gallons of water to produce 35 gallons of ethanol In other words, the EFuel100 uses less than 1% (about 0.2%) as much water as corn ethanol, under five gallons, to produce one gallon of ethanol.
But also note that the water used in the EFuel100 process does not take into account the water needed to grow the sugar that is used for this process.
And watch out for fines for violating biofuel regulations.
Fines for violating biofuel regulationsAlso, progress is being made in the development of other non-corn ethanol production technologies as well.
Non-corn ethanolFinally, I've also been hearing good things about biodiesel production but need to find some links.
JERKS in DC.
I agree, But how do we get rid of the Jerks and replace them with some hard thinking adolescents. My congressman was one that voted for this juvenile bill, and in the past he voted pretty much straight line conservative.
Somehow this headline seems emblematic of the sheer impotence of the U.S. Congress as led by liberals.
Is there any doubt that the author and sponsor of this bill are completely serious. Does this not demonstrate as proof beyond any doubt that liberals honestly think that the Middle East and the rest of the world thinks as we do? In other words, Obama wants to talk to terrorists because deep down they are like us and if they only know us they will like and us respect us. How insane is this?
http://harpers.org/SeizingArabOil.html
Originally from Harper’s Magazine, March 1975.
Seizing Arab Oil
How the U.S. can break the oil cartel’s stranglehold on the world
“Will the world condemn America? Some of it will, and will mean it. Others,
including some Europeans and unfortunate Japanese will condemn, cry, and
partake of lower oil prices with a sigh of relief.”
By Miles Ignotus *
(Henry Kissinger)
After more than a year of extraordinary passivity, the United States
and the other oil-consuming nations of the West have slowly-very
slowly-begun debating ways to break the oil cartel’s power. So far,
they have pursued a futile policy of appeasement. Instead of mounting
an economic counteroffensive against the price-rigging of the
Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), the victims have
talked only of accommodation. Instead of a forcible reaction to
protect national interests—vital national interests—they have talked
about cooperation. In response, the oil cartel has predictably raised
prices again, twice.
Meanwhile, economic growth in formerly developing countries, from
Brazil to Taiwan, has stopped. India and the rest of the hopelessly
poor have been driven into even deeper poverty. Virtually every
industrialized oil importer is in deep recession, with its threat of
social instability and, in turn, political disarray. Although the
price of oil is not the sole cause of these troubles, it is by far the
single major factor propelling inflation, unbalancing the balance of
payments, and disrupting capital markets. The policy of appeasement
has failed, again.
In the 1930s the craven men of Munich displayed not only an almost
complacent defeatism, but also a constant need to justify German
demands. Similarly, the modern appeasers have constantly tried to
justify Arab oil extortion. When OPEC members began accumulating
billions of dollars in unearned reserves, we were told that this was
merely fair compensation for past “exploitation”—as if men who for
years had been receiving huge royalties (for a product they had
neither made nor found) could be said to have been exploited. When
OPEC prices brought worldwide economic growth to an end, it was said
that growth had been too rapid in any case—as if we had any other way
to relieve poverty, and as if the military dictators and megalomaniac
kings of OPEC had been chosen to oversee the ecological balance of the
planet.
Many Western intellectuals have put forward an even sillier equation:
OPEC = Third World = Good. To be sure, the oil cartel is bringing
about a massive redistribution of the world’s wealth, but it is a
rather peculiar redistribution: Indian peasants buying kerosene are
subsidizing the super-rich, while Americans are buying smaller cars
because sheiks want bigger jets.
Just as men persisted in seeing moderation in Hitler’s policies when
there was none, so we have persisted in seeing painless solutions to
the problem of OPEC. The first of these was private “recycling.” The
bankers said that the massive transfer of funds to OPEC, which most of
the recipients could not possibly spend, would not drain the monetary
system of its liquidity, nor would it destroy the equilibrium on which
the world economy depends. The bankers assured us they would take care
of the problem: surplus OPEC funds would flow into their banks as
deposits, and the bankers would re-lend the money to the oil
consumers, who would pay OPEC, which would deposit the money, thus
closing the circle.
All this depended on the willingness of government bank regulators to
overlook private bank practices that were essentially
unsound—borrowing from the few to lend to the many, and borrowing
short—term money to lend it long. And so the regulators overlooked,
and the banks recycled, until the banking failures began. By then some
of the world’s largest banks had shouldered commitments (notably loans
to Italy and Japan) that may yet destroy them.
The economists, with their trained inability to understand the real
world, had an even simpler solution. Paper money (dollars, marks, et
cetera) would flow to OPEC, whose members would have to spend it, lend
it, or bury it in the sand. If they spent it, we would get the oil and
pay for it with our exports, a workable exchange even if at unfair
prices. If they lent the paper money we would borrow it and thereby
get the oil in exchange for bonds and deposits, the sophisticated IOUs
of modem finance. If they buried it in the sand, we would get the oil,
and they would get slowly rotting and quickly depreciating paper.
Missing from this classroom version of the world were institutions
such as the gold and Eurodollar markets, where vast infusions of Arab
money could destabilize small currencies overnight, and undermine the
credibility of even the largest. Above all, the economists overlooked
a fourth alternative: Arabs who did not want to spend the money or
lend it or bury it in the sand could simply avoid earning it—by
reducing the output of oil. At present, the world is being denied more
than 3 million barrels of oil per day, mainly owing to production cuts
in Kuwait and Libya.
As to the political effects of all this, even the most informed
pessimists may be too optimistic. For example, Italy’s endemic
unemployment of 5 to 7 percent represents the men who have failed to
leave the rural South and are trapped in its decaying economy.
Socially and politically, Italy could survive such unemployment for
centuries. But when inflated oil prices increased Italy’s
unemployment, the extra percentage points forecast an ominous future.
Behind those numbers are men who did have the initiative to seek work
in the North, and who now have the initiative to destroy the fragile
institutions of the Italian republic.
>From Bad to Worse
Those who make it their business to understate the depredations of
OPEC invariably point out that Italy and the rest were unstable
anyway; if one speaks of global economic consequences they reply that
the poor were starving already, and inflation did not begin with oil.
All these arguments are valid, and they are all irrelevant. What
matters is that OPEC’s price-rigging has made all these troubles—from
the malaise of Italian politics to the muddle of world economics—far
graver than they were before October 1973. This alone is important.
The real enigma is the behavior of the poor countries that have no
oil. After all, the tax that OPEC has imposed on all oil-consumers is
hideously regressive and the incidence of suffering very different:
Indian peasants are paying exactly as much for their oil as Swiss
bankers are, and the man who will no longer be able to afford
fertilizer and fuel to grow food for his family is suffering far more
than the American who can no longer afford to visit Yellowstone in his
eight-cylinder car. And yet, leaders of the poor countries have
praised OPEC and given it their support at the United Nations.
There are two very different explanations for this anomaly. The first
is that the actions of OPEC are only a prelude to a much broader
rearrangement of the world economy. This vision is embodied in the
proposals for a “new economic world order,” recently blessed at the
U.N. General Assembly by the usual automatic majority. Schemes are now
circulating according to which raw materials produced by the poor
would be indexed at 400 percent of present prices (almost matching
that of oil), while all industrial goods would be indexed at present
prices. In short, the high price of oil would be lanced by equally
high prices for other raw materials produced by poor countries. Only
industrialized nations would continue to pay high prices while selling
their own products cheaply. Wheat and other cereals have been excluded
‘from the magic circle, since they are exported primarily by rich,
white countries. But this is not enough to make the scheme workable,
let alone fair. If not the poorest of the poor, India is certainly the
most important, and it is not primarily a raw-material exporter. No
conceivable way could be found to make Indian tea and Bengali jute
sufficiently expensive to balance the price of oil. In reality, the
distribution of raw materials simply does not correspond with the
distribution of poverty: rich Canada has a great deal, and Bangladesh
has virtually none. Hence, no workable or just scheme of global
redistribution can be hinged on raw-material cartels, and the argument
that OPEC is merely leading the way is false, mere propaganda.
The second explanation suggests why the leaders of the poor should
have acquiesced in peddling the first explanation, hollow as it is.
The truth is that the voices praising OPEC do not belong to the poor
but to those who control their lives-narrow, self-appointed ruling
groups (elections have become a rarity in Africa and Asia) fond of
shiny black cars and numbered Swiss accounts. Westernizing, yet
fiercely anti-Western, these dictatorial elites see in OPEC a force
that can humiliate the West, and perhaps even destroy its prosperity.
Those who eat three ample meals a day in Dacca or Bamako instruct
their nephews serving as delegates to the U.N. to applaud when the
Kuwaitis say that the price of oil is low, and that the recent 500
percent increase was only fair. It is doubtful whether those who are
starving because of the shortage of oil-based fertilizer have been
asked for their opinions. Their rulers value the license of unfettered
sovereignty and anti-Westernism far more than mere food for hungry
people.
With the oil-price crisis compounding every human misery, the time for
action has surely come. For in the end it does not matter whether the
latest solution, Dr. Kissinger’s government “recycling,” would
actually work or not. If the OPEC countries lend back a portion of
their huge unearned revenues to those they deem credit-worthy, such as
the United States and Western Germany, and if the countries so
privileged re-lend funds to other countries which are denied direct
loans, such as Italy, the only result would be a massive and ruinous
transfer of capital[1]
and, of course, of power.
If we do make Dr. Kissinger’s recycling scheme work, we will have
created the engine of our own impoverishment. Oil payments to the Arab
members of OPEC amounted to $8.5 billion in 1972, and are projected at
$65.4 billion for 1975, and $101 billion for 1980—an increase of just
under 200 percent in eight years. And the transfers to OPEC are not
just a matter of paper money. Right now, the Kuwaitis could easily buy
British Leyland Motors, the largest industrial combine in Britain.
Built up through the work of tens of thousands of English workers over
a period of more than seventy years, BLM would then be acquired by a
single family in Kuwait with only six days’ worth of oil production.
Why should we countenance the transfer of hundreds of billions of
dollars worth of real estate and industry to the ownership of reverse
colonialists? In the West such property may be owned by the rich, but
at least our rich are taxed and regulated. And even the top 5 percent
of our home-grown rich cannot be compared to the handful of families
that control such a large portion of OPEC revenues.
If at last we resolve that OPEC must be broken, the question remains:
how? The nonviolent methods have been discussed so much that mere
mention suffices:
* Financial denial: Western nations in solidarity refuse OPEC
deposits unless they are long-term, evenly distributed, and at low
interest—or possibly under any circumstances.
* Ownership denial: OPEC money is forced to remain paper money since
no transfer of real assets is allowed.
* Market manipulation: Conservation and substitution are used to cut
the demand for oil, thus depressing prices once a surplus
develops.
Some of these nonviolent strategies are more plausible than others,
but all would in fact be utterly ineffectual. As long as OPEC controls
oil supply, it will prevail: it can deny supply in the face of
financial denial; withhold supply so long as purchases of Western real
estate and industry are forbidden; and cut supply pro rata to offset
any contrived decline in demand. As the Saudi oil minister has already
explained: “If you cut demand hoping to depress prices, we will cut
supply even more so as to raise prices still further.” In theory
again, we could cut demand to the point where the market share of OPEC
producers who do need the cash is affected. To do this we must cut
demand by more than the low-population, cash-surplus OPEC producers
can cut supply; by the time that demand level is reached, half our
industry will be without fuel, and half our work force unemployed. Nor
is there any hope that enough “new” oil will be found to solve the
supply problem. The finds in the North Sea, Alaska, offshore Vietnam,
offshore China, and the promising structures being explored elsewhere
are all useful. But their combined output—when fully developed—will
not amount to half of Saudi Arabia’s. And this assumes high rates of
output: when it comes to reserves, all the oil found worldwide since
1965 is equivalent to a tenth of the Saudi reserves already fully
proven. Even if vast new oil fields were found, it would still take
five to seven years to bring them into production and there is
absolutely no reason to expect major new discoveries.
The fallacy of all the nonviolent strategies is fundamental: to break
OPEC by economic means, we must break its power to control supply—and
this power can always defeat the strategies first. Moreover, there are
some minor practical difficulties. For the financial strategy: the
Swiss would never play, but would instead launder all the money that
OPEC would ever want to deposit. For the ownership-denial strategy:
Japan and the gold market would never play, while OPEC investors might
just want to buy all the gold in the world, plus every Japanese
factory and scenic inn. Finally, for the market-manipulation strategy:
for every producer willing to sell a few cargoes under the table,
there is likely to be a consumer willing to buy two, in order to keep
the factories running and the workers off the streets.
The Use of War
There remains only force. The only feasible countervailing power to
OPEC’s control of oil is power itself—military power. But the lack of
any other alternative does not, of course, mean that the use of force
is ipso facto feasible. First, the essential question: could we start
a war on OPEC just because the price of oil is too high? Surely the
answer is no. And it would probably remain so even if OPEC raises
prices again, citing the rising prices of caviar, Cadillacs, and
fighter-bombers.
That, however, is not the end of the story. Fortunately for us, while
all members of OPEC are extortionists, some (the Arabs), are also
blackmailers. Sooner or later, their demands on Israel will become
excessive; the Israelis will then refuse to concede further territory
without reciprocal concessions. Then there will be war, and then, at
whatever cost, the Israelis will prevail again. The last Arab-Israeli
war ended with the Arab armies in disarray and both Cairo and Damascus
in danger. The next war is likely to end with the same result, but
sooner. This time, the massive surprise of October 1973 cannot
possibly be repeated, and the contest in the air will no longer
feature a pre-Vietnam Israeli air force with dumb bombs and few
electronic countermeasures facing post-Vietnam Arab air defenses. The
Arabs may have more and better missiles, but the Israelis now have
smart bombs. With Israeli fighter-bombers now making one pass instead
of five or six to hit each target, Arab air defenses would have to
improve by 500 to 600 percent to retain their power undiminished.
Eventually the Russians will no doubt supply better guns and better
missiles, but fivefold improvements would require totally new
technologies, and many years to mature. Meantime, it is back to 1967
for the Israeli air force. The Arabs know this, otherwise Syrians
would have opened fire in 1974. But the Israelis know this also, and
they will resist Arab demands: hence war, and an embargo.
When the price problem did not exist, and Persian Gulf crude was
changing hands at $1.80 per barrel or less, an Arab oil embargo was a
danger to be feared, and Israel was pressured to make concessions. Now
an embargo is no longer a threat but an opportunity. Some, captive to
the old politics, fail to make the connection, repeating endlessly
that war in the Middle East must be averted at all costs, for if
Israel loses, then catastrophe, and if Israel wins, an embargo
follows. There they stop. Their advice, of course, is to comply with
blackmail by blackmailing Israel into further concessions. But if this
dishonorable deed is done, the result will only ensure the
continuation of supply at present prices, and the damage these prices
are causing is altogether more fundamental than any short-term embargo
could inflict. This, then, is the scenario: an Arab embargo or supply
cut, an atmosphere of crisis, most probably in the aftermath of a
short but bloody war. Then we go in.
The first question is where. The goal is not just to seize some oil
(say, in accessible Nigeria or Venezuela) but to break OPEC. Thus
force must be used selectively to occupy large and concentrated oil
reserves, which can be produced rapidly in order to end the artificial
scarcity of oil and thus cut the price. Faced with armed consumers
occupying vast oil fields whose full output can eventually bring the
price down to 50 cents per barrel, most of the producers would see
virtue in agreeing to a price four or five times as high, but still
six times lower than present prices. This being the ultimate goal,
there is only one feasible target: Saudi Arabia.
Oddly enough, some have suggested that Libya would make an ideal
target. It is true that Libya is a good deal more open to attack, but
in fact an invasion of Libya would be worse than useless. Far from
having enough oil to make OPEC vulnerable to market pressures, Libya’s
oil would not even suffice to cover current needs. Hence the rest of
OPEC could defeat any invasion of Libya by simply cutting off oil
production for as long as it would take to force a withdrawal.
With roughly 200 billion barrels of published, proven reserves (they
could be substantially higher), Saudi oil fields are now being worked
at a rate of just over 8.5 million barrels a day, for an annual output
of just over 3 billion barrels. In other words, at present rates of
production Saudi oil would last for more than sixty years. By
contrast, oil fields in most other parts of the world are developed
much faster, with output/reserve ratios of 1: 10, or at most 1:20.
Producing Saudi oil fields at Texan rates would mean producing almost
55 million barrels of oil a day, enough to supply current worldwide
needs almost twice over. It would take huge investments and several
years to install the required capacity, but in order to break OPEC we
need not go to such heroic lengths. It would suffice to increase
output by a little, and then by a little more, each time eroding the
remaining market shares, until a compromise is reached. If none is
forthcoming, then the time will have come for large output increases
to flood the market.
In short, if the use of military force is to be limited and therefore
efficient, the real leverage must come from market pressures, and only
the Saudi oil fields can provide the means. Fortunately, those fields
are not only prolific but are also concentrated in a small area, a
fraction of Saudi territory. Even better, the areas involved are
scarcely settled except for the oil workers, some 20,000 in all,
American technicians included. If Vietnam was full of trees and brave
men, and the national interest was almost invisible, here there are no
trees, very few men, and a clear objective. There could be serious
risks in the operation, but at least there would be no sense of
futility with 200 billion barrels of oil underfoot—oil that would
restore jobs to the unemployed and supply the wherewithal for a
gradual program of substitution.
Now for the problems. There are many, starting with the pure
logistics. For one thing, the region is remote and not open to the
oceans. Except for staging and refueling points in Israel itself
almost 1,000 miles away (Hatserim to Dbahran) there would be no
friendly bases within easy reach. The Israelis owe a great deal to the
United States, and it is inconceivable that they would deny airfield
facilities, even if the operation entailed serious risks for them. It
would have to be a long-distance operation and a large one. The Saudi
forces that could resist an occupation are small and deficient in
training. For all the best efforts of our own advisers and weapons
salesmen, the Saudis do not yet have a serious military force: 36,000
soldiers scattered over a vast land. But the scale of the operation is
set by the nature of the target itself: some hundreds of wellheads,
dozens of miles of pipeline, several loading jetties, and much else
besides will have to be secured, reactivated, and thereafter
patrolled. Moreover, to deter sabotage and counterintervention (of
which more below), it will be necessary to have a sizable force,
diversified in composition.
The first wave should include the combat echelons of one Marine
division: 14,000 men, with one or two battalions amphibious-landed and
the rest simply to be unloaded from aboard ship. The Marines could be
gathered quietly in the Pacific, but by the time their shipping sailed
past Singapore across the Straits of Malacca, the threat would become
pretty obvious, even to the New York Times. At twenty knots, the
passage from the straits to the gulf would take almost a week, too
long. Though some resistance and sabotage are unavoidable, the less of
it the better. An effort must therefore be made to minimize warning
time.
Hence the need for a preliminary airlift wave: the combat echelons of
the 82nd Airborne Division, sent with its nine infantry battalions but
without its too-heavy armor or armored cavalry battalion. Instead, the
division should be equipped with two additional battalions of
helicopter-borne “air cavalry” detached from other divisions, as well
as extra antitank missiles and many Jeeps fitted with recoil-less
rifles. If the Marines of the first wave are due to arrive in and
around Dhahran on the shores of the gulf at day D, and if warning is
given by their transit at Singapore by D-79 the 82nd Airborne must
arrive on D-3, to restore surprise by arriving three days before the
Marines are expected. Flown out of the U.S. without fanfare, briefly
staged and refueled in Israel, the 82nd’s heavy C-5 and C-141 jet
transports would fly straight across Saudi Arabia to Dhahran, escorted
all the way by air-refueled Phantom fighters, also based on Israeli
fields or aboard carriers in the Arabian Sea. One or two paratroop
battalions would jump to seize the Dhahran airfield, and to take up
positions around the U.S. residents’ housing a few miles away. Once
the airfield was secured, the paratroopers would signal other aircraft
waiting overhead to fly in the rest of the troops. As the troops
landed and began to spread out, the empty aircraft would be reloaded
with the families of American and other foreign oil technicians who
would be evacuated to Israel and the U.S.
Immediate targets of the advance force would include the Ras Tanura
jetties as well as storage tanks: it would be ridiculous to have to
airlift oil into Saudi Arabia. The air cavalry battalions, powerful
and highly mobile, could secure some of the installations of the
Ghawar oil field (the largest by far), which is seventy miles at its
northern extremity from Dhahran. They could also seize the entire
nearby Abqaiq field.
The Marines would arrive seventy-two hours later to consolidate the
base and expand the coverage. Having vehicles including some armor,
they would complete the occupation of Ghawar and other Saudi oil
fields. Having small boats and more helicopters, they could also
occupy the non-Saudi offshore oil fields near Doha, Adma, and Dubai,
as well as patrol to the north toward oil-rich Kuwait, and dangerous
Iraq beyond it. Very soon after the Marines landed, on D + 1 at most,
a second Army division would arrive, the First Cavalry, with its
infantry, armor, and helicopter-cavalry. This too would come by air,
staged by way of Israel, except for its battle tanks, for which air
transport is inefficient. The tanks would be loaded aboard fast
landing ships and fast freighters, and offloaded with heavy derricks.
Finally, on D + 3 or D + 4, the expedition would be reinforced with
more Marines, the combat echelons of a second division. This would
arrive entirely logistic-loaded, for an “administrative” landing—no
storming of beaches here.
By then the occupation force would have its own air power. Some
fighters would be flown into Dhahran from Israel as soon as the
airfield was seized; the two Marine divisions would come with their
organic air “wings,” no mean force: eight Phantom fighter squadrons,
two reconnaissance squadrons, and another eight “attack” squadrons,
with light and not-so-light bombers. Not that any bombing, is planned;
the mission is to deter others. At this point, the basic force would
be in place, with resupply coming by air or by ship, depending on
bulk, weight, and urgency. With some 40,000 men by now mobile on the
ground and in the air, the physical occupation of all the major oil
fields on and off-shore would be complete.
Tactics
So much for logistics. Now the strategy and tactics, starting with
“industrial” tactics. Much has been said about the dangers of
pre-emptive sabotage. Alarmists have conjured up visions of oil fields
burning till the year 2000. Not so. The world’s supply of oil field
firefighting talent is to be found in Texas. Given all the other
resources available in the U.S., the chances are that fire and damage
could be handled quickly. Assuming fairly extensive but unsystematic
sabotage, preinvasion output levels could be resumed in one to two
months so long as certain essential items (e.g., segments of scarce
large-diameter pipe) are sea-lifted with the first Marine convoys and
plenty of skilled manpower.
The difference between the operating cost of the Saudi oil barrel and
the OPEC price is the difference between 10 to 30 cents and $11.
Multiplied by the output of more than 8.5 million a day, this means
that one month’s production could pay for $2.5 billion worth of
skilled manpower and equipment: enough to repair or replace every
damaged wellhead, every interrupted feeder line, and every sabotaged
gas separator, as well as to replace as much large-diameter pipe as
could possibly be needed.
Of course, if the Saudis did to their oil fields what the departing
Germans did to the Romanian oil fields at Ploesti in August 1944, it
could take longer to restore full production and begin adding to it.
It took the Russians almost three months to restore production at
Ploesti. Still, a well-organized rehabilitation task force would be
better prepared than the chaotic hordes of Marshal Rodion Malinovsky,
and the Saudis are not Germans. Even if they were, they would not have
enough time to do a thorough job. In making advance preparations for
sabotage, the Saudis face severe limits: there are too many underpaid
and radical non-Saudi oil workers; if plastique charges were pre-set
to demolish oil facilities, they would be apt to go off whether there
was an invasion or not.
As for postinvasion sabotage, if the oil workers cannot be trusted to
work reliably—at higher postinvasion wages—they should be replaced.
No labor force is more mobile: from Texas and from Europe, all the
labor that could possibly be needed would come, at the right pay. The
local oil workers know this, and they also know that if they are
expelled from Saudi fields, their next available employer is going to
be hundreds of miles to the north, at much lower Iraqi wages.
Initially, squads will patrol the installations in constant crisscross
patterns, covering every wellhead every few minutes, protecting repair
squads from those who might try to stop them. Helicopter teams will
circle overhead, ready to end at the first hint of trouble. Given the
vast stretches of open desert around the heavily guarded oil fields,
infiltration will be utterly impossible during the day and perhaps no
less so at night, since the clear desert sky allows almost perfect
visibility with modern night-vision devices. Pipelines, highly
vulnerable in theory, can be kept under total surveillance by
helicopters and small ground-support teams. The Israeli experience has
proven quite conclusively that guerrilla tactics are simply
ineffectual in desert areas, there being no ground cover for
concealment. The whole of the Negev and Sinai are secured by a few
Bedouin guards and a handful of soldiers; once consolidated, the oil
fields can be reliably secured by a handful of battalions, a fraction
of the total force.
Even discounting the effect of sabotage, there would still be a
problem of short-term oil supply. Aside from the temporary cutoff in
Saudi production that must be expected between D + 7 and D + 60 (or at
the very most D + 90) it is virtually certain that radical Arab oil
producers (Iraq, Libya, possibly Algeria) would cut off production in
sympathy. The shortfall could range from 3.5 million barrels a day to
4.5 million. It is probable that nonradical Arab oil producers would
partially deny oil to the U.S. and other consumer countries that did
not dissociate themselves from its deed; this could mean an additional
shortfall of up to 2.5 million barrels a day. It is possible, but
unlikely, that at least some non-Arab oil exporters would also reduce
output in sympathy with a fellow OPEC member.
Nevertheless, the problem is manageable. Ninety-day stocks are being
built up in all the industrialized countries, and oil shipped on D + 8
will still be at sea for many destinations on D + 90. By then, if not
sooner, the smoke will have thoroughly cleared, and OPEC members will
be faced with U.S. control of Saudi oil reserves, which, if worked to
the full, could put all of them out of business for fifteen years. At
this stage, reason is likely to prevail, and production is likely to
be restored. But if the risk seems high, something can be done to
reduce it: in Kuwait, Abu Dhabi, Dubai, and Qatar there is a
production capacity of 6.6 million barrels a day, a good deal of it
now shut in for “conservation” (read price-rigging). If Arab or even
non-Arab oil solidarity strikes are in the cards, battalion-sized
detachments can be sent to seize much of this capacity for the
immediate purpose of short-term supply (rather than reserves for price
leverage). The seizure of Kuwaiti capacity, however, would require a
division and entail a serious strategic problem, of which more below.
Next, the minor tactics. One or perhaps two Saudi brigades and some
U.S.-made Hawk missile batteries will be in the target area. Prior to
getting there, the airlifted elements would have to cross 975 miles of
unfriendly airspace in large, vulnerable transports. But opposition
would be thin. The twenty-four-jet Jordanian air force can be
grounded, and the Israel-Dhahran air route would be totally out of
range for Egyptian, Iraqi, or Syrian fighters an important
consideration, these being very large, if poorly trained, air forces.
In the October war, the Israelis scored fifty dogfight kills for every
one of their own shot down. But relative superiority is not enough:
not a single transport must be exposed to risk.
Hence ample fighter cover will be needed against the six fighter
squadrons of the Saudis, and any chance arrival of Egyptians,
Jordanians, Iraqis, or Syrians. This will require perhaps six
squadrons of air-refueled Phantoms and tankers out of Israel, readily
supported, if necessary, by more Phantoms, this time Israeli (flying
outer patrol tracks, to avoid misidentification and fratricide).
Finally, for the Hawk missile batteries so shortsightedly supplied,
there are different remedies, and prudence demands that all be used:
active and passive electronic countermeasures. (Those who designed the
missiles are not unfamiliar with their weak points.)
On the ground, the tactics must stress mobility and avoidance. In the
first stages, every available truck—and Cadillac—found on the ground
must be commandeered to give mobility. Otherwise troops that had
crossed thousands of miles by air would be totally immobile on the
ground. Speed is of the essence to secure the oil fields, as well as
U.S. civilians for rapid evacuations. Lastly, avoidance: Saudi troops,
if prudent, will avoid combat, and they must not be needlessly
provoked. Very quickly it will become entirely obvious that the oil
fields alone are to be occupied in one small corner of Saudi Arabia.
Between them and most of the inhabited areas of the country, there are
vast distances (except for Riyadh, only 400 miles away by road) and
broad deserts, easily turned into buffer zones by air interdiction,
here effective and totally unhampered since there are neither trees
nor village targets: any military traffic would simply be stopped by
air patrols.
Now for the real problems, the strategic. What options are open to the
Russians? They could not hope to anticipate the first American move.
Nor is it imaginable that the ruling Saudis would invite their
presence: the Saudis know that with Americans some compromise might
well be possible, but with Russians the Saudi leadership, fiercely
Islamic and fiercely anti-Communist, would not last long. An
invitation to the Russians would merely ensure the overthrow of the
ruling family. And that is not a figure of speech. It would mean
defenestration and mutilation by the mob, as when the Hashemites of
Iraq were overthrown. If the Russians landed forces in Iraq, Russian
policy would thereafter be captive to Iraqi hyperactivism, or at least
the landed troops would be. Still, the move would have a ready payoff.
Even if their troops did nothing, the Russians would score a major
political victory, since they could then claim to have deterred an
imperialist attack on Iraq—an oil producer like Saudi Arabia, but one
whose leaders (it could then be said) had been prudent enough to seek
the friendship of the U.S.S.R and to sign a treaty of mutual defense.
If still more reckless, the Russians could encourage and support an
Iraqi move south into Kuwait. This would deprive the West of Kuwait’s
2.8 million barrels of oil a day, a serious loss if only in the short
term. It would also make Iraq, Russia’s chosen client, a more
important client. But it would risk Iraqi-American armed clashes,
entailing the further risk of direct U.S.-Soviet conflict.
Direct Russian counterintervention need barely be considered. The
rules of nuclear parity, are no mere paper rules to be changed at
will. They reflect the harsh and looming danger of annihilation.
Americans may open fire on Saudis, and Russians may open fire on
Czechs with near-impunity; at a much higher level of risk, each side
can attack the clients of the other. If Iraq were attacked, for
example, the Russians would be forced to react because there is a
public Russian commitment to Iraqi defense, both in policy and on
paper—the Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation of April 1972. But for
the Russians to counterintervene directly, by blocking American forces
or opening fire on them, is another matter altogether. Neither side
could afford to lose the local battle, and the potential loser would
then have to transform it into a regional war; neither side can afford
to lose a regional war, and the potential loser would have to use
tactical nuclear weapons—beyond that one need not go.
Some suggest that the Russians could use their naval forces for
“interposition.” This notion is fanciful. The U.S. Navy would send at
least four aircraft carriers, twenty frigates and destroyers, and ten
nuclear submarines into the area. Russian mining could only serve as a
delaying tactic. Russian warships could not physically block the
Strait of Hormuz at the entrance to the gulf. To prevent passage, they
would have to shoot, and shooting at American warships would mean
jumping on the escalator to destruction.
The essence of the Russian question is not technical but political.
Before one considers the balance of superpower forces in place, one
must consider the balance of interests between Americans and Russians.
Under conditions of nuclear parity, it is primarily “resolve” that
settles the issue, and resolve is not a matter of machismo but a
reflection of the true value to each party of the interests in
dispute. The control of Saudi oil is a vital national and all-Western
interest for the United States. By contrast, its denial would merely
be a desirable bonus for the Soviet Union. Hence the risks that each
side can accept, and must anticipate that the other side will accept,
are not evenly weighted. To seize the oil the United States must seize
some tracts of desert. To deny the oil, the Russians must kill
American troops. This, neither the collection of tired bureaucrats in
the Kremlin (who agonized over the low-risk Czech invasion for months)
nor even another Stalin could possibly do, for escalation to
catastrophe could follow. As against this, there are the rewards of
inaction, already high: even if the Russians do nothing at all, their
prestige and influence would immediately increase all over the
Middle-East, and beyond. Let the Russians have the influence, and let
us have the oil.
So far no mention of Iran. With a large army of 175,000 men,
well-equipped and heavy in tanks even if poorly trained and worse led,
with an air force that includes 100 Phantoms, with more coming, and
with a navy already not insignificant, Iran could in theory do a great
deal to oppose intervention. The risk must not be discounted, but
there are offsetting factors. At a minor level, there is the fact that
Iranian aircraft fly by the grace of American technicians serving on
contract, most of whom could depart on vacation just before D day. On
a high political plane, there is another factor. Even though a sharp
cut in oil prices would seriously damage the Shah’s dreams of
grandeur, Iran and the Shah would nevertheless remain dependent on the
United States. With a common border to the north, with its client Iraq
to the west and its semiclient Afghanistan to the east, the Soviet
Union already embraces Iran far too closely for comfort. Reluctantly
and privately, the Shah would most probably accept an American action
he cannot prevent, for the alternative would be war with Iran’s only
protector.
One way to cope with the Iranian problem is to combine it with the
planning dilemma of Kuwait. On the one hand, it might be wise to send
a composite Marine/armor division (after wave two, D + 3) into Kuwait
to deter Iraqi intervention. But if the Iraqis descended across Kuwait
toward the main zone of operations some 300 miles to the south, real
fighting could take place, entailing risk of Russian involvement in
support of its junior partner. Also, the acquisition of Kuwaiti oil
capacity—even if damaged—would alleviate the short-term supply
problem. On the other hand, if Kuwait is left unoccupied, a buffer
zone, it will be easier to avoid clashes with Iraqis and reduce the
risk of direct conflict with Russians. There is also a severe tactical
problem: while the Kuwaiti army of 10,200 men can be brushed aside,
Kuwait does contain more than a million people in a small area. By
contrast, the population in the main zone of operations, even if
extended to Abu Dhabi, Dubai, and Qatar, amounts to less than 300,000,
widely scattered.
Why not then discreetly ask whether the Iranians might be willing to
“protect” Kuwait—and, incidentally, appropriate their oil. This oil
would largely offset Iranians’ loss of revenue on their own output as
prices decline. To be sure, if the Iranians move into Kuwait the
Russians may be tempted to invade northern Iran, but this would be a
high-risk operation for the Russians, since Iran is already a
protected area of the other superpower, the U.S. Still, this is a
danger that cannot be dismissed, and that would be reduced by Iranian
tranquility before, during, and after the occupation.
Afterward
Next, the problem of management, that is, politics. Clearly, the
operation would not be conducted to serve the interests of ARAMCO,
which is American-owned but has long been subservient to the Saudis.
To maximize output and avoid commercial entanglement, we should throw
open the oil fields to any and every operating company, American or
not, large or small, so long as it is ready to come in quickly,
repair, and lift the oil, fast. Each company would receive the acreage
it could begin to work immediately. Each would be compensated at cost
plus a generous fee for every barrel lifted, every well dug, and every
facility repaired. Assuming maximum inefficiency and a great deal of
petty graft, the oil would cost an average 30 cents per barrel—in
other words, less than 3 percent of present prices.
But the oil should not be sold at cost, for many reasons. First, all
measures of energy substitution being taken worldwide would be
discouraged, and eventually stopped. Second, to reach a compromise
with the uninvaded members of OPEC, some reasonable revenues must be
left to them in bargaining for their early resumption of full output
(the short-term supply problem again), in exchange for a guarantee
that Saudi oil will not be used to bring the price down to near
nullity. Finally, oil cannot be sold at cost because there is a wider
political purpose to be pursued.
If oil raised at an average cost of 30 cents were sold, at say, $2 per
barrel, each day of output would at first generate profits of $14
million. When output reached the OPEC-compromise level, profits could
rise to as much as $30 million per day. Now these profits should not
be appropriated by the world’s richest country, whose compensation, in
secure supplies at low cost, would already be ample. Instead, the
profits should be handed out to the poor on conditions. An
International Oil and Aid Organization would be created to lift the
oil, allocate funds for investment, give some money for the Saudis et
al. to pay for essential imports, and then distribute the rest of the
money to those of its members whose a annual per capita income is less
than, say $500. In other words, any poor country in the world would
immediately be entitled to a share in the oil profits if it joined the
IOAO, and so politically endorsed the fait accompli.
This would provide the poor with a vastly greater flow of aid funds
than all current aid programs combined—in fact, almost five times as
much, once full output is reached, even if all eligible recipients
join. In view of what was said earlier about the regimes of the Third
World, it can be safely assumed that the Indian government for one
would prefer to let millions of its people starve rather than
associate itself with the IOAO. But already for Bangladesh matters are
less certain: throughout 1974, this poorest of the poor nations, which
is fervently Muslim to boot, failed to extract more than $100 million
from all the Arab oil producers combined—truly a case of crumbs to
the starving. The IOAO, with $10 billion or so eventually available to
it, would do much better than that and all for a symbolic association.
The IOAO would obviously use similar tactics with the oil workers. The
Saudi regime, not exactly the most progressive in the world, did not
allow ARAMCO to pay its workers lavishly, lest sheiks lose their
low-paid servants. The IOAO would not have to defer to the Saudi
version of the housemaid problem; it could announce a 50 percent wage
increase.
Will the world condemn America? Some of it will, and will mean it.
Others, including some Europeans and unfortunate Japanese will
condemn, cry, and partake of lower oil prices with a sigh of relief.
Certainly the image of the Soviet Union will improve in contrast and
the United States will lose “influence and prestige in the Third
World.” But what influence? What prestige? And what would the
spectacle of American acquiescence in the political blackmail of the
kings and dictators of Araby do to American prestige? The weak respect
power more than do the strong, who know its limitations.
The crucial factor, however, is domestic opinion. First, there is the
why in the raison d’etat. The American people instinctively felt that
in Indochina the national interest was not at stake and only the
commitment itself made for further commitment. Not so here. All would
understand, all those affected by inflation and unemployment, that is.
Second, performance. All agree that had the U.S. done well militarily
in Vietnam, public opposition would have been limited to the tiny
minority of those who oppose war, or their own country, in all
circumstances. The first group is certainly entitled to its elevated
conceptions, but the vast majority of the people think otherwise. A
neat and rapid operation is possible in Saudi Arabia owing to the
terrain and the men, mostly absent. Moreover, the four required
divisions are fit, trained, well-equipped, and battle-ready. On that
score we need have no anxieties.
Third, duration. Americans were wearied by a war that was not only
unsuccessful but also far too long. This operation will not be over in
a day. It will last for years, though surely not until the last drop
of Saudi oil is exhausted. Instead, the American-controlled
distribution office of the IOAO would allocate oil to consumers at the
new low prices, but demand that they finance serious substitution
efforts with some appropriate share of the vast savings on cheaper
oil. Given rigid controls pressure, diplomatic pressure, and their own
caution, strong substitution policies are sure to follow in Europe,
Japan, and wherever possible. And it is much easier to build nuclear
power stations, hot rock generators, solar arrays, and windmills when
the balance of payments is no longer in deficit, inflation has been
curbed, and recession a memory—all of which $2 oil could ensure.
Hence an occupation of ten years and probably much less would suffice.
Once the dust of the invasion settled, once every evidence of
permanent intent became apparent, the remaining members of OPEC would
see reason, and accept a binding commitment to maintain supplies at
agreed prices in exchange for American withdrawal. From their point of
view, the great danger is that Saudi oil could be used to bring the
price down not to $2 but to $1.50, $1.40, then $1.30 ... and so on.
In a sober assessment, mindful of all political costs and all the
strategic risks, it can be done. It must be done. For if we do not do
it, Project Independence will in fact be Project Isolation, with a
somewhat impoverished America surrounded by a world turned in a slum.
Almost everywhere, this would be an authoritarian slum, the product of
utter hopelessness among the poor and mass unemployment among the
former rich, all of us being forced to finance the executive jets of
the sheiks and the fighter bombers of the dictators.
If we will not do it, future generations will see through our
protestations of moral restraint and recognize craven passivity. Many
of those who took the United States into the jungles of Vietnam to
look for the national interest are now saying that we need not do it,
since we can comply with political blackmail (by blackmailing Israel
in turn), and since we can afford to pay the economic extortion. True,
we can do both. But the price—moral, political, and social—would be
far too high. We would no longer be able to look each other in the
face. Many who saw prudence and reason in bombing an ally of the
Soviet Union and even blockading its ports, are now saying that we
cannot do it, for behind the Arabs stand the Russians, and the
Russians would not let us. That, it has been argued, is false. And
since no one denies that the dependence of the Western world on Arab
oil is absolute, if their analysis were correct, it would mean that we
are living at the mercy of the Arabs, that is to say, as Prof. Robert
W. Tucker has pointed out, of the Russians. And if that is true, we no
longer need a foreign policy establishment, and we might as well
disband the armed forces unless we double or triple their strength:
there is no sense in paying $85 billion a year for impotence.
Notes
1. Internal World Bank estimates project the unexpended reserves of
Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Libya, and Qatar at
$453 billion by 1980 and over $1,000 billion by 1985.
This is Seizing Arab Oil, a feature, originally from March 1975,
published Thursday, January 22, 2004. It is part of Features, which is
part of Harpers.org.
Why does congress remind me of NATO?....Ah yes!....pissing in the wind comes to mind....
This from the same bunch of idiots who have made 85% of our know off shore oil reserves off limits to drilling and don’t let me get started on ANWAR.
Gawd, how I hate the people who allegedly run this country. The whole notion of an entrenched elite who feel themselves empowered to steal taxpayer monies and game the political system is such a misdirected, stupid waste of time and effort. Instead of Democrats and Republicans, why don’t we just elect our reps from the Crips and the Bloods in San Quentin and Leavenworth? At least it would save some transportation costs.
Perhaps, but I believe that if we were to open up resources such as the rest of the Gulf of Mexico that we could proceed in developing those resources more quickly than 10 years.
OPECs a trust, technically illegal were it residing in the united states. Their principles, as I understand it, are not necessarily free-market. However, if we were drilling all-out, rather than sitting around banning drilling all over the country, we would probably force the world price of oil closer to one based on the free market principles of supply and demand.
They got my normally-right-headed rep. to go along, too. Just unbelievable. How do Americans do a ‘no confidence’ vote of their government? Time for a part-time legislature at minimum.
nope, didn’t work...oil closed up near 130.00 a barrel today....try again dummies...
Not sure of the time line, but honestly, it seems like we have willingly decided push the fast track to collapse. It is coming, and with it will come the iron fist of government. Watch.
Part of me wants OPEC to say “screw you” - but in that “cut off your nose to spite your face” kind of manner. Plus - OPEC wants to make money, so they will continue to sell it in the manner that they deem suitable.
What the congress doesn’t seem to remember is that words have consequences. Remember how they snubbed Turkey by bringing up some genocide issue that was a hundred years old or whatever? I wonder how many of our troops suffered or lost their lives because Turkey told us to find another way into Iraq?
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