Pompeo makes unannounced visit to Baghdad amid rising tensions with Iran

Washington Post ^ | May 7, 2019 | Carol Morello

[Innovative]

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo made a sudden, unscheduled trip to Baghdad on Tuesday, as an aircraft carrier and Air Force bombers headed to the Middle East amid warnings that Iran was contemplating an attack on U.S. troops in the region.

The surprise visit came after Pompeo abruptly canceled a trip to Germany, where he was scheduled to meet with Chancellor Angela Merkel and Foreign Minister Heiko Maas. The State Department initially said only that the change was made because “pressing issues” had arisen.

Pompeo’s visit to Baghdad, which followed an Arctic Council meeting in Finland, took on an air of urgency as regional tensions rose on the eve of the first anniversary of President Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Iran nuclear agreement.

[NorseViking]

“” “” Saddam could have rolled over all the Gulf kingdoms.”” “”

So what? There could have been Israel, Iran, Egypt and Lybia left for balance of powers.
And US has its own oil. It had oil back to 1990 too.
If Saddam had eradicated Gulf tyrannies there wouldn’t be 95% of Islamist terrorism.
No 9/11 for sure.

[Zhang Fei]

[So what? There could have been Israel, Iran, Egypt and Lybia left for balance of powers.]

---

Why would we acquiesce in Iraq’s conquest of the Gulf oil fields again? Because we feel gasoline prices are too low? Because we think Iraq would really benefit from having a revived atomic bomb program? Because Russia would benefit from high oil prices?

I understand Iraq was a longtime Soviet ally under Saddam, and Putin has benefited hugely from the rise in oil prices from $20 in the late 90’s to about $60 today, and would have benefited if oil prices had spiked to $100. The average American consumer, however, would not be pleased, since all domestic oil profits go to the producers and the mineral rights holders. American industry would be devastated. And in 1991, we’d still need to import 10m barrels a day, since our production was 7m barrels and our consumption was 17m barrels. At $100 per barrel, that would have been an annual oil import bill of $365b. By comparison, the $60b tab for Desert Storm, paid for by Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Germany and Japan, was a bargain. It was probably the only war in which the Treasury received more in donations from Allied countries than it disbursed to the Pentagon.

I understand why you don’t like the Saudi royals. They were in part responsible for the strangulation of the Soviet economy by engineering the oil glut that killed Soviet export earnings. Part of the credit for the fall of the Berlin Wall must go to them. The fact, though, is that Russian interests are very different from, and mostly opposed to, American interests, which is why I find it very strange that you’re posting on an American opinion site.

[NorseViking]

In fact all of the above is not the case. I am just pointing at the fact that US has own oil and a lot of it. It is currently among top producers. It could be there in 1990 too.
And Saddam still had to sell his oil somewhere US included.
You are heavily exaggerating the above development impact on both oil price and US industry.
I think everyone agree that 9/11 was a price too high. And 9/11 is actually just a drop in the ocean.

[Zhang Fei]

[In fact all of the above is not the case. ]

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Which of the above? The import of 10m barrels a day in 1991? I wasn’t exactly right, but it was close. We imported ~11.5m barrels a day in 1991.
https://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=MTTIMUS1&f=M

You do realize that Saudi Arabian government, which gets the profits from oil production, redistributes* this money to the population in the form of universal welfare benefits, don’t you? Whereas the only Americans benefiting from higher oil prices are the people who work in oil companies and their suppliers. Chemical companies, car companies, etc all take hits, in addition to which the US consumer takes the biggest direct hit.

Even today, with US oil production at a record 12m, US oil imports are around 8m barrels a day. Because we consume 20m barrels.

* Russia’s actually the same way. It’s the Saudi Arabia of the north. Low oil prices are why Russia is having problems paying pensions.

[NorseViking]

We are mostly talking about terrorism and not the economy.
I am talking about 9/11. Was it worth it?
And no. Russia is not alike Saudi Arabia economically. It is a theory from McCain’s school of Kremlinology.

[Zhang Fei]

[We are mostly talking about terrorism and not the economy.
I am talking about 9/11. Was it worth it?]

---

Of course it was worth it. It’s a given that new enemies arise once old enemies collapse. No one expected a band of pickup terrorists to take the Twin Towers down, but it’s the kind of thing that brigands have been doing since the beginning of recorded history. It was something new, tactically, but it failed, and it took down with it Saddam Hussein, as well as the Taliban. By the way, helping the Soviets beat the Nazis was also worth it, despite the fact that the Soviets helped kill 100K Americans during the Korean and Vietnam Wars. Similarly, helping China beat the Japanese was also worth it, despite the Chinese helping to kill 100K GI’s* during the Korean and Vietnam Wars. The difference between the Russian and Chinese involvement in GI deaths and the Saudi involvement in the 9/11 casualties is that the Russian and Chinese governments were behind those deaths, whereas the Saudi terrorists were rebels who wanted to put themselves in power at the expense of the Saudi royals.

Now, Russians think of the Saudi royals as the sponsors of the Chechen rebels who caused big problems in Chechnya and that’s certainly true. But they weren’t the sponsors of the 9/11 Saudi terrorists, whose leader, bin Laden, wanted to overthrow the Saudi royals and put himself in their place. Think of the Saudi government sponsorship of the Chechens as payback for the Soviet sponsorship of Yemeni rebels back in the 60’s, not to mention the Soviet takeover of Afghanistan in the 70’s. Of course, when Chechens started participating in al Qaeda and attacking Americans, the Saudi royals pulled back, which is why Chechnya has been relatively peaceful since 9/11. Money is the lifeblood of all war, including guerrilla campaigns. No money, no guerrilla war.

[Zhang Fei]

I agree that Russia is not like Saudi Arabia - Russia is poorer and less well-managed, despite having abundant natural resources and superior human resources, in the form of a higher IQ population. Russia’s average IQ, at 97 is just one point lower than the US (98). Saudi Arabia’s is 84. And yet, despite far superior mineral resource wealth and a far smarter population vs Mexico’s 88 IQ average, Russia’s nominal per capita GDP is similar to Mexico’s. Heck, Russia’s GDP per capita is lower than Poland’s, whose principal natural resource is *coal*.
https://brainstats.com/average-iq-by-country.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal)_per_capita

[NorseViking]

You have near religious views on both Middle Eastern history and Russia. These are as wrong as any other myths but no logical arguments would fix it.

[Zhang Fei]

[You have near religious views on both Middle Eastern history and Russia. These are as wrong as any other myths but no logical arguments would fix it.]

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I’ve explained my views with a mix of verifiable facts and historical events. No beliefs in the supernatural are necessary. You challenged me on US oil import numbers. I demonstrated that they were even larger than I had expected. The real issue is that you’ve looked at the world from the prism of Russian interests and have at your disposal only the data supporting those interests, whereas I know enough to argue from basically any side’s perspective, including yours, because I used to be a left winger and am familiar with all the old Russophile/pro-Soviet arguments. I used to read publications like Mother Jones, In These Times and The Nation a lot. David Corn, Victor Navasky and Alexander Cockburn used to be some of my favorite columnists. Then I read a little more widely and realized that these people were basically anti-American Russophiles.

[trebb]

Yep - and China wants to leverage Iran’s economic woes (which affect China too) against President Trump and they will overstep...

[Zhang Fei]

I completely understand why you dislike the Saudi royals. They did fund the Chechen separatists who tried to break free from Russian rule. You should similarly understand why I have an antipathy towards the Chinese and Russian governments. They were responsible for the deaths of 100K American deaths through their material support for North Korea and North Vietnam during the Korean and Vietnam Wars. And we sent huge amounts of aid to Russia during WWII to help them fight a war that had begun through a Russian alliance with Germany that gave Germany a free hand to invade the West.

[NorseViking]

I am familiar with all the numbers you brought too. Including US oil production and consumption over time.

[Zhang Fei]

[I am familiar with all the numbers you brought too. Including US oil production and consumption over time.]

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But you claimed the daily numbers I cited were too high. Then I provided the Energy Department numbers which were even higher than ones I remember reading off a chart a while back. Not 10m barrels a day in 1991. 11.5m barrels. Even today, it’s about 8m barrels, if we take the average for the past 12 months.

[Zhang Fei]

The real bottom line is that gasoline and diesel used as transportation fuels are behind over 50% of the daily consumption of oil stateside and any big increase in prices is a major hit to family budgets across the country. That’s why Trump keeps jawboning the Gulf oil producers. He’s reminding them that they aren’t provinces of another country only because Uncle Sam is on the job. Imagine trying to jawbone a nuclear-armed Saddam with all the oilfields in his possession.

[NorseViking]

I didn’t claim any of it. All I said is that US had the capacity to produce own oil and no Saddam’s actions could actually push the oil price too high to become unbearable.

[bert]

Pompeo sin....... we did not know in advance so we could write fake news condemning the trip

[Bonemaker]

Kuwait was one thing but the post 9/11 invasion quite another...in my opinion.

[NorseViking]

Desert Storm was crucial and the following embargoes turned Iraq into a banana republic. By 2003 Iranian mullahs pulled the strings there.

[Paulie]

There is no way anyone can justify 18 years of sacrificing American blood and treasure in the Middle East. The fallout of this includes millions of refugees that causes it’s own serious long term problems.

Still, you don’t seem to acknowledge the real reason for our interest in oil-rich ME, namely, the preservation of the petrodollar.

It’s not simply they sit on top of vast amounts of black gold, but it is absolutely imperative all that crude be sold for US Dollars.

Unless I missed it, I don’t think you mentioned that part.

[Zhang Fei]

[I didn’t claim any of it. All I said is that US had the capacity to produce own oil and no Saddam’s actions could actually push the oil price too high to become unbearable.]

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So your argument is that when the number of major independent Gulf oil producers goes down from 5 to 1 due to Saddam’s unification of the Arabian peninsula under his rule, the oil price won’t change significantly? OPEC’s not even a single country, and the moment they got organized, oil prices quadrupled.

As to the US having oil, it makes no difference. “The US” doesn’t have oil. Individual mineral rights owners and oil companies have oil. Consumers pay every penny of price increases, which is why presidents get upset when oil prices increase. US companies produce every barrel they can at prevailing prices. The only reason they are showing record production at these price levels is because large numbers of companies went bankrupt and have liquidated their capital equipment at pennies on the dollar. Investors lost billions. Once that capital equipment is worn out, it will have to be replaced with non fire sale equipment and production will drop again, as production costs begin to exceed prices.