Points of contention on a european history website?

[Clu]

*Originally posted by Grey *
**No. As an example from here Total Energy Annual Data - U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) you can see that crude oil production in the US was 6.342 million barrels while imports from this cite Total Energy Annual Data - U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) were 0.656 million barrels or roughly 10% of demand in 1954. Hardly what one would consider critical to the survival of the country. Aside from being 50 years after your supposed date of early 1900 to control the gulf region for oil.

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The UK began exploring for oil in Iran around 1900, and it was discovered in 1908. Again, I’m ignorant about a lot of world history, but I have no problems being corrected by you all, so I will say this:

Weren’t the countries of Iran/Iraq/etc. carved up after the fall of the Ottoman empire before WWI? I would say that there was an imperialist interest in the region prior to 1950s. It took the Iranians 50 yrs before they decided that they should profit from their oil & they revolted, correct?

Yea, Iraq production was lacking the in early 1900s, but
The desire to prevent the USSR from engaging the Gulf states and monopolizing the fields (or possibly achieving a warm water port out side the Mediterranean) led to American entanglement in the Gulf. Likely the US (and the rest of the industrialized west) also projected the increase in reliance on imported crude (9.146 million imported vs 5.853 million domestic for the US alone). The fact that the industrialized west had no desire to have their development hobbled by Soviet control speaks only to the fact that we live in a world filled with people of differing ideologies and not some secret cabal secreted away at Yale sipping single malt and giggling manically in the dark. **

You’ve got me here. Again, it all depends on which side you’re on. It is important to stress what’s happening now in Iraq with the context of history. I would speculate and say that now, instead of fighting in the middle-east to keep it from Soviet control, we now fight in the middle-east to keep it from control of forces hostile to us due to our support of Israel.

[Clu]

http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/stories/HL0301/S00097.htm

this site has related info. about intervention in Iran

[cynicismkills]

Wow… it seems a lot of people missed the first rule of the forum: don’t be a jerk…

What is it about our society today that causes people to think it makes them look ‘cool’ to be nasty and belittle others?

The OP (my bro) showed up here to find out if he was really being misled by this site (which I’m sure he was aware of on several issues - duh) but I happen to know that this site was first discussed by us more than two weeks ago, so it’s not as if he just saw it and said ‘screw it I’m too lazy to do research, I’ll just ask them if it’s true’… but wouldn’t you know it… the assumptions abounded from there…

But you know what… even if he did… what’s the major problem with just answering people without being nasty? Sheesh…

Anyway… approaching this subject from the only topic that’s of major interest to me just now, it’s fairly clear that our current ‘adventurism’ in the Middle East is NOT due to any threat from communism… more likely socialism is now the ‘threat’ (God forbid a country be allowed to choose their own method of government… e.g. Allende in Chile)… but the fact of the matter is that the PNAC set out to achieve these goals (control of Mideast oil) REGARDLESS of whether Saddam was in power … so the debate on this topic is pretty much pointless.

And the ‘claim’ regarding the theft of Geronimo’s skull by all evidence appears to be true. Whether secret societies are a threat? Well I’m certainly not comforted that I had to see this for the first time on the internet, where people are more likely to dismiss uncomfortable truths than to accept them as the doctrines they learn to swallow whole throughout academic life.

[Clu]

Thanks for bumping the thread. I was hoping to hear more from the liberals on this board (i think i know who they are), but I’m concerned that the fringe element of the site is scaring them away.

A number of members on this board have shown to me an extensive knowledge of world history. Please check out this site… Hell, if you notice an error, e-mail the author & let him know.

Sorry about the lack of content in the OP, but I think the site can warrant debate of ppl will read & then comment on it.

[Ennui]

I wonder what the “Skull & Bones / Bush = Evil” crowd will have to say if John Kerry gets the democratic presidential bid in 04? It took a bit of searching to find a site more reputable than your average Illuminati / Bildiberger / Gnomes of Zurich conspiracy fare, but it appears the Boston Herald Archives has a piece confirming Kerry’s membership. I didn’t bother to buy the text but the synopsis seems to confirm:

Abstract:
Bonesmen already are buzzing over the prospect of the first Bones vs. Bones presidential race should Kerry win his party’s nomination and face [Bush] in 2004.

Kerry was tapped for the club in 1968, two years after Bush, whose father and grandfather were also Bonesmen. Kerry’s brother-in- law from his first marriage, David Thorne, was Bones. So was the late husband of …

So, is Kerry as evil as GWB or are the bonesmen as soft and cuddly as J.F. Kerry?

[cynicismkills]

Oy… Look, I have not used the term ‘evil’ wrt Skull & Bones, and neither has anyone else in this thread. So let’s not digress into that sort of ‘debate’.

This simple fact is that Kerry, who as you correctly point otu is a S&B member, is a corporate-friendly guy, just as the Bush’s are. Here I’d like to point out that the DNC and DLC are clearly holding Kerry and Gephardt up as the ‘front runners’ for a Dem nomination for candidacy. Contrast with recent attack memos sent by both the DLC and the DNC against Howard Dean, who, while not necessarily unfriendly to corporations, voices opinions which would ‘hurt’ (ridiculous term used to describe infringe on profits of) large corporations.

The issue, IMHO, is that S&B members are more closely tied to corporate-friendly cash, and therefore are less inclined to even consider policies which ‘hurt’ (hah) corporations even when those policies would benefit the public good.

So in other words… yes Kerry is less inclined to serve the public good over the interests of the monied class. If you define that as ‘evil’ then yes, he’s ‘evil’.