Gas costs $1.93 in PA. Anyone still think the war was about oil?

Great Debates
1

Yes, my title was definitely sarcastic, but seriously, folks. For all the “No blood for oil” stuff that was said both pre and post-war, gas prices have done nothing but increase. In the last six weeks prices have increased in my state by approximately 20%, and since the war buildup began the prices have increased about 60%. Clearly, at least to me, it wasn’t about the oil. If it were, why are we paying so much at the pumps?

Now, I know I’m asking for it, given the makeup of this board, but can it be that we actually went into Iraq because it was the right thing to do? Can it be that we really intended to help the Iraqi people? Because if it wasn’t, I’m at a loss. I’m convinced it wasn’t for the oil, I’m convinced that it wasn’t for the alleged WMDs, so all that leaves is the elimination of Saddam for the betterment of Iraq. That it hasn’t gone down that way doesn’t necessarily mean that the intent wasn’t there.

So, you convince me. Why did we go if not for the oil?

2

Heck, I filled up yesterday here in the SF Bay Area and it was about $2.30 per gallon.

Screw Iraq, let’s invade Pennsylvania!

3

The oil was not to make gas cheaper for us. It was to enrich the oil corporations.

4

You wait. Come fall, the prices will drop dramatically, a la Paul Woodword and the Saudi connection. Of course, prices always drop at the end of summer, so there goes that conspiracy theory.

5

OK, all kidding aside, to actually try and answer your question:

I think that Bush invaded Iraq because he and his cabinet honestly believed what they were saying - Iraq has WMD, Saddam was a major threat to our national security and world peace and stability. I’m not saying that I agree with those thoughts, and there was obviously some shitty intel and people who came into the cabinet pissed at Saddam and really gung-ho to get his ass, but the stated reasons were pretty much why we went in.

But you can’t overlook the fact that stability in one of the major petroleum-producing parts of the world was on Bush & Co.'s mind. Like it or not all that gas stuff affects the economic stability of the USA (and many other countries) and that has far-reaching effects. While Bush may not have said “Let’s go into Iraq to make sure it’s $1.50 a gallon at the pump” he must certainly have been thinking about ensuring a constant supply of petroleum at acceptable prices. In his mind stabilizing the region by getting rid of Saddam Hussein would help achieve this, and American corporations would be able to help the flow of oil out of Iraq again (from it’s previous limits under the UN oil for food program).

So…yeah I think cheap oil was on his mind, peripherally at least, and the fact of the matter is that lots of his buddies stand to make a lot of money off it.

6

We went into Iraq for myriad reasons. One of them was certainly to secure a vital strategic resource not only for the US but for the industrialized world. I think this was a major factor in the decision to go into Iraq…to allow the US to have forces in an area of such strategic importance to us in case the whole region goes up in smoke. If that happens and the US doesn’t have a secure base to move from, it could/would be very bad (the thinking would go).

So, in that light, I can certainly say that, yes, the war in Iraq was partly about the oil. However, I don’t think this is the same take on it that the howling anti-war crowd is talking about. They seem to be talking about Bushco enriching itself by a trumped up war for oil and profit in the region. I seriously doubt that this was more than an incidental benifit, nor do I think it factored in heavily.

Myself, I see the major causes of the war as being an attempt for the US to project power in the region, secure a vital natural resource, secure basing priveleges, perhaps cow our enemies by showing how overwhelming our military is (i.e. don’t fuck with us or else), with Saddam being incidental…just the excuse we needed to do what we though was in our best interests as a nation.

Were we right? Time will tell, but I don’t think it was necessary to go into Iraq when and how we did, and I think history will pretty much blast Bush for what he did. I think we would have been better served concentrating on Afghanistan and AQ, and leaving Iraq for another day.

The nature of Saddam and his regime (and his son’s when/if they inherited) was such that oppurtunities for invasion excuses would have been pretty thick on the ground in the future. A US not distracted by Afghanistan and the threat of AQ, and not in a recession, would have been in a better position to put its crank into the meat grinder of Iraq (perhaps).

Reguardless, it was piling on too many things at once IMO to move from trying to actively take out a terrorist network, destroy and unseat a pretty nasty regime in Afghanistan, rebuild something resembling a government in a nation that hadn’t had one in a VERY long time (if ever), and then take on yet another war/rebuilding cycle in a part of the world that is unfriendly to us in the extreme…all while fighting a recession and lack of confidence in our economy.

-XT

7

London Calling had it right: Osama wanted our troops out of Saudi Arabia, so we attempted to oblige him by invading Iraq and putting our bases there instead. Also, the highly influential Prince Bandar, Saudi ambassador to the US and honorary member of the Bush family, was adamant that Saddam had to go after Gulf War I, and was not shy about saying so.
Those are the only two reasons that make any sense. Everything else is window-dressing, IMO.

8

Because we screwed up, and didn’t send enough troops to secure the pipelines.

Iraqi oil pipeline damaged (May 10/04)

(Not that I believe oil was our prime motivation for invading, but others look to be addressing those issues nicely)

9

This may seem obvious, but I tend to think that reelection was also a concern for the Bush administration. It sure sounds nice to say that you’ve brought democracy to Afganistan and Iraq. Now of course, I tend to agree with Valgard and xtisme for the primary reasons, but I’m sure reelection was on their minds. That plan may have backfired, however…

10

By this logic, I also think it can safely been said that, given the abuses of Iraqi prisoners, it wasn’t about ending human rights abuses in Saddam’s prisons either! Seriously though, the fact that a policy has been spectacularly unsuccessful in achieving certain goals does not necessarily mean that these goals weren’t the motivation for the action.

That said, I never subscribed to the “it’s all about oil” point of view. I think it was about a lot of things, including neo-con ideology, politics, settling old scores from Bush I, and geopolitical issues of which oil was certainly a major factor.

11

Clearly, however, the Iraq ploy played out beautifully in the mid-term elections in 2002! That will always be remembered as one of Karl Rove’s finest moments!

12

$2.05 for regular here in WV.

I want my Saddam discount dammit!

13

We needed to kick someone’s ass, in order to establish the Ed Koch rule of international relations:
DON’T EVEN THINK OF FUCKING WITH THE UNITED STATES.

The neocons were feeling “punked” moreover, (see their endlless snivel about how Saddam was kicking sand in the UN’s face)

So, looking around the schoolyard for a victim, it’s not surprizing that we fastened on the one with the shiny lunchbox (as opposed to, say, North Korea, the kid with the brass knuickles in his sweatshirt, we have heard…)

The oil just made Iraq look tasty, as well as useful for an example.

Of course, the Big Dawg strategy DOES require that youi, y’know, win…

14

The fact that the invasion of Iraq has not prevented gasoline prices from rising in recent months should surprise no one who actually has some understanding how the oil and gas development process works. In the near term (from invasion to about five years out) the US occupation of Iraq is unlikely to have any significant effect on oil prices though a major increases in Iraq’s production capacity, except to actually drive futures prices upward due to fear of anti-US actions intended to sabotage production in the region.

The majority of Iraq’s current defined reserves remain undeveloped or marginally developed, mostly because of the lengthy embargo on Iraqi exports during the Saddam years. Even if the US actually possessed title to Iraq’s oil (which it doesn’t) and wished to flow torrents of crude to try and drive down prices, it would take five to ten years of frantic development activity (drilling wells, installing production infrastructure, etc.) before production could be increased enough to provide significant leverage against the Saudis and other OPEC states. Even then, Iraq’s available reserves which, IIRC, are only about a third of Saudi’s alone, would make it difficult to exert all that much leverage.

But, and this is key: the US is simply not going to get oil out of Iraq any more cheaply than it will from any other average Middle Eastern source. The possibility certainly exists that some service companies may make large amounts of money over the next few years by providing development technology and services, but the oil is owned by the Iraqis, and will be sold by them to whomever they choose to sell it to, at market rates.

That said, I’d still be inclined to believe the invasion of Iraq was in part a strategic move to try and ensure a Middle Eastern ally whose hydrocarbon production capacity could eventually serve as leverage against manipulation of the market by the Saudis and other OPEC states. If such is the case, the strategic importance probably has more to do with conditions about forty years from now, when there is a good chance that world oil production will be declining steeply, than anything that might happen over the next few years.

15

The question can be interpreted in different ways.

When someone says, “Was the war about oil?”

I can answer in two ways.

If they obviously mean, “Hi, I’m a typical tin-foil conspiracy theorist SDer, do you think Bush started the war to raid the U.S. treasury by giving lucrative construction contracts to his buddies, and also of course enrich mulitnational oil corporations too, and then himself get massive “perks”, enriching himself?”

I reply, “Hi, you’re really a dumb person. I wish your life could have turned out better for you. Hey, look, I can make it better, here’s some weed, you like weed, right? Of course you do. Good boy!.”

If they mean it as a more legitimate question, I have a more appropriate answer.

Yes, oil had something to do with it. Wolfowitz (IIRC) said it best, the difference between Saddam Hussein and any other dictator is Saddam Hussein is sitting on all the wealth he would ever need to produce and create some very nasty stuff (global destabilization, large conventional army et cetra, even not talking about WMD). For ten years he had been mostly restrained from doing this overtly because of the post Gulf War I sanctions. However, in recent years, those sanctions were slowly being torn down. It was not inconceivable that within a decade or so, Saddam would be free from the world condemnation and then able to easily become vastly wealthier, which makes him a great threat to the world.

Kim for example, was not even as much of a threat, because aside from some nukes, he really doesn’t have anything. He doesn’t have any serious natural resources that could ever make North Korea a huge super power or anything like that.

Furthermore, the oil is important because it is a strategic resource, and it is important that resources that so effect the entire world not be controlled by a madman.

However, the oil aspect was only part of the whole pitcure, and not the overall point of the war. To say the war has nothing to do with oil is wrong, to say it is “all about oil” is also wrong.

16

Haliburton’s currently housing executives at the Hilton Kuwait Resort (complete with six restaurants, two outdoor pools, and 1.75km of beaches) – all on the taxpayers’ money – while their employees in Iraq are working on their lucrative, no-bid, $78 million contracts, remember?

There’s the purpose for the war.

17

Oil was one of the PNAC’s motivating factors for the war back in 1996.

The administration was also busy spruiking the oil angle last year:

The fact that things have turned out differently to the way the Administration expected (what, again?) only shows that they’re a really spectacular bunch of fuck-ups, not that they weren’t really after cheap oil.

18

While I believe the Iraq war was partially to secure a piece of the middle east oil supply, this was only one of the reasons we went there. IMO, a bigger reason was Bush’s desire to avenge daddy’s honor by destroying Saddam, something he was convinced would be a cakewalk. As has been documented by Clarke and Woodward, it is clear that he was focused on Iraq from the very beginning. He also knew that his rich friends and associates would benefit from rebuilding contracts. I’m sure that should he be turned out in November, he will be well rewarded (one way or another) by the people he helped enrich with this war.

Came across this interesting story in Information Clearing House newsletter today. This was written in 1933. Some things never change, eh?

19

I think that Bush et al made a gross miscalculation. They assumed that price of oil would drop just like it did after Gulf War 1, and that would flow through to the economy and things would be rosy for re-election.

OPEC slashed production - who knows why, but probably to make a buck. Higher demand for oil from China and Japan. it’s a different world than it was a decade ago. China is going to push up the price of all commodities including oil if it keeps consuming like it is.

20

Oh no, prices have gone up for you?
You’ve still got the lowest prices in the world!
In Australia it’s cheapest at 2.80US$/Gallon.
I hear in Europe it’s over 5!

Of course Bush went into the war for all his buddies. The fact that he hasn’t been impeached is a mystery to the rest of the world :confused:
Oy oy oy, I’ll stay out of American matters now.