The issue is not the EXISTENCE of a pipeline. It is the CONTROL of a pipeline.
The oil mostly originates in the Saudi regions. Russians backing Assad’s Syria control the volume and pricing of the oil passing through the Syrian pipelines. Combined with oil and gas passing through Russian pipelines to Europe, they hope to corner the market.
The Euros are at the mercy of Russian oil and gas pricing.
I was posting years ago that construction and upgrade of LNG and oil ports in the US would be necessary as hydraulic fracturing technology would be making the US the largest exporter of oil and gas in the world.
And here we are.
I was actually working with a US NG company (a T. Boone Pickens company) to close contracts with S. Korea and Europe via Rotterdam. The S.Koreans KOGAS were ready to fund construction in the US for new or expanded LNG facilities.
And the Obama Administration would not grant the export license.
That business plan would have supplied the Euros with NG to provide relief against Russian dominance. My Euro contacts were begging, pleading for relief.
You can research the news of the Euro predicament with Russians and NG. Euros need NG to survive the winters and for power generation. It’s essential to them.
So oil and gas pipelines into Europe are a BIG DEAL and that’s why the Russians are trying to corner the market by controlling the ground in Syria.
In the past 5 years or so I have thought the best way to bring Russia to heel would be the threat of opening large LNG terminals on the East Coast.