Islamic Oil Could Be Effective Weapon, Iran Says

Reuters | 4/01/02

[Republican Wildcat]

I agree--this would make Russia's day.

[RichardW]

"Here's hoping they do. Then, you guys will come up to Alberta and go through will oil extraction from the sand pits, making us all rich! Muahahahaha!"

Absolutely, I would rather pay you $40 or more a barrel than $20 to the middle east producers. We are nuts to put up with this extortion.

[LarryLied]

ANWR would easily replace the billions of dollars worth of oil we import from Iraq. Guess who voted against it? Lieberman, Nadler, Boxer, Feingold, Feinstein, Schumer etc.etc. Makes no sense to me at all. They all support Israel, why do they want to send American money to Saddam?

[SamAdams76]

These Islamic oil-producing countries are clueless. Like Hollywood movie stars, all this money has given these Arab oil sheiks a sense of exaggerated importance. After all, it is we that hold all the cards, not them.

The typical Muslim country isn't capable of manufacturing a toaster oven on their own. Pull the Western workers out of these countries and there will be nobody left to repair the Mercedes Benz's and nobody left to keep the generators going. It is Western goods and services that allow these Muslims to live in the 21st Century. If they cut off our oil, we simply cut off the flow of Western goods and they will soon enough be forced to go back to their medieval existence.

As for the oil, if we need it, we will simply come and take it. If they try to stop us, we will deal with them as a fisherman brushes off gnats.

[Fish out of Water]

index bump and fyi

[Orion78]

I agree--this would make Russia's day

---

"The second upgraded strategy involves the use of the new 'independent' Muslim states in the CIS to establish and develop economic and political cooperation with the fundamentalists in Iran and elsewhere in the Muslim world. According to this assessment the much-advertised feud between the Armenians and the Azerbaijanis of Turkish descent in Nagorno-Karabakh may be a tactical ploy to involve Turkey, Iran and other Muslim countries in support of eventual alliance with Azerbaijan and other Central Asian Muslim states in the CIS. This strategy takes into account the growing power of the fundamentalists and the possibility of gaining control over substantial oil reserves."

[Colorado Doug]

It is Western goods and services that allow these Muslims to live in the 21st Century

But we don't make goods anymore. Have you tried to buy anything lately that's not made in China?

[TexanToTheCore]

Here...let me explain it in terms of economics....
You use oil as a weapon
We cut your balls off.
Really very simple.

[Psycho_Runner]

None, send in Ken Lay and his cronies. Next thing you know he will had screwed the muslim workers out of their 401k, screwed the stockholders and then blame Allah Anderson, the regional CPA firm.

[RoseofTexas]

We'd better get digging in Alaska pretty soon!!

[womanvet]

How many daisy cutters would it take to burn all the oil under Iran and Iraq?

Last time I checked, oil is flammable. D@mn @$$h%!e @r@b$...

[okie01]

"Stupid question, really dumb answer."

Especially since, without oil exports, the combined economies of the oil-producing states in the Middle East roughly amounts to...Finland's.

If you're an Arab state in the Mideast and you ain't pumpin' oil, you ain't doin' (or earnin') squat!

[2 cents]

Good post, you are right!

[Robert_Paulson2]

I LIKE how YOU think... that is nasty, but it would be fun. UK has its OWN oil.. that would leave FRANCE, GERMANY, SPAIN and the Nordics to foot the bill, for defanging the Islamic viper.

Meanwhile, could we also, in exchange for shutting off Islamic access to oil, also shut down the desalination plants in Saudi Arabia.... Seems like the least we could do.

We could turn on the water, once the Sauds get serious and shut down entirely their support of Israeli and American hating Islamic radicals... or let them drink sand.

[Prodigal Son]

Here is what concerns me. OPEC doesn't necessarily need to actually shut off the oil- they just need to instill the fear that they will. Ref:
From September, 2001 Oil prices soar on supply fears (source: BBC)
and again today: Monday's world markets: Mideast tensions cause rise in oil, gold prices; TSE up, Dow down (source: Canada.com News)

I don't know whether the Arabs have the finesse to play such a game but think about the ramifications. They dole these rumors and rumblings out piece meal, to instigate a 5-10% hike in crude prices over a period of several months. To quote from the Canada.com article:

The Toronto Stock Exchange oil and gas sector rose almost two per cent as crude oil topped $27 US a barrel. There are fears that energy supplies might be disrupted if the Mideast conflict spreads. That could lead to much higher prices and affect consumers' ability to spend, which would hurt the economic recovery.

It would have the dual purpose of hurting us economically- even small changes can have long range knock on effects- and directly hurting Bush. If it hurt the economic recovery, it also would hurt the Bush administration. The left would beat that drum just as loud as they could. The media would have as many stories of Workers Laid Off Due to US Foreign Policy as they could think up.

It wouldn't even have to amount to that much, just simple harrassment of the President when he has more important things to think about. Think about the way the EU is hoping to install target tariffs on hotly contested congressional districts in order to undermine the Bush admin.

I agree that they will only suffer if they actually cut off the oil and they would be unlikely to do so, I believe. But can you imagine the panic if people really believed they would do it? We had the petrol protests over here a while back and it was quite frightening. The farmers blockaded fuel delivery to protest high petrol taxes. Tony Blair pleaded with the public not to panic, naturally ensuring that they did just that very thing. Within days there was no petrol to be had and there were serious lines at the petrol stations that did have it. Supermarket shelves were quickly emptied from panic buying and couldn't be easily restocked because the supermarket delivery trucks had no fuel. If the protest had lasted a few days longer, I'm telling you, it would have been complete chaos over here.

That's something to seriously consider IMHO, especially considering the Arabs could induce such a condition (if they were skilled enough) without even actually doing anything or firing a shot. A long drawn out economic warfare in this vein would not be a good thing.

[F16Fighter]

The oil politics as well as any politics of this bunch of loony tunes doesn't make any sense. That fact is undeniable. Unless they secretly hope for the demise of the Republic of which I'm afraid they contribute greatly.

[a_witness]

It gives us a causus belli. Let's Roll.

[JAWs]

Someone tell the Jihad screamer it ain't 1979. Thanks to oil fields all over the world it won't be nearly as effective and will be more devastating to the Arabs than us. We have alternate oil fields. They don't have alternate products.

[singletrack]

Alberta rocks!(and the skiing is better than the Mid-East) shout from the rooftops how much oil Alberta has.Not enough Americans are aware of the fact.

[A CA Guy]

They keep oil. We keep food.

Sounds fair to me.