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To: mattdono; gubamyster; marron
In Crude Politics, Paul Sperry presents alarming evidence that the Bush administration diplomats resumed talks with Pakistani officials over gas and oil pipelines in Afghanistan while the United States was still reeling from the horror of September 11, 2001.

Well, a gas one Pakistan always wanted for itself from Uzbekistan. So what? I wonder if he uses the word "Unocal."

3 posted on 09/09/2003 5:25:57 PM PDT by Shermy
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To: Shermy
I wonder if he uses the word "Unocal."

We were negotiating with Pakistan for airspace access, and basing rights. We only have a few chips to play with Pakistan. #1 is our ability to keep India off of them. #2 is our willingness to sell them weapons. #3 is our willingness to stop hounding them about nukes, human rights violations, and the like. #4 is our ability to deliver a gas pipeline.

We actually can't deliver on that, no one can. But we could use it as a negotiating point, to tell them that if we get rid of the Talibs, they could finally get the pipeline.

After all, Pakistan needs it, Turkmenistan needs it. Afghanistan needs it. But no one in their right mind will build it. If you want to know why, consider the cost ($3 billion+) and consider the history of the Colombian pipelines, and the recent history of the Iraqi lines.

Any fool with a souvenir handgrenade can disable it, and in Afghanistan and Pakistan there are plenty of both. And Turkmenistan is not a land where commercial law has penetrated.

The only way it will get built will be if you can interest Saudi money to invest in it, to protect yourself from Saudi-funded saboteurs. And even at that you could never secure it, in that part of the world there are thousands of amateurs who would blow it just out of sheer exuberance. Its a cultural thing.

8 posted on 09/09/2003 8:18:43 PM PDT by marron
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