Why for the oil if we are already in bed with the Saudis
Moving from GQ to Great Debates.
Colibri
General Questions Moderator
To keep the oil away from, say, China. To create a price spike in oil. To steal the Iraqi’s oil profits for ourselves. To conquer other oil rich nations in the region next.
There were more reasons than oil, too.
Afghanistan wasn’t exciting enough to clinch 2004 for him, so he needed something more exciting.
In all seriousness, I believe he wanted to “show up” his father.
From all I’ve heard, Bush the Elder despises his boy. I think the brat wanted to show everybody that he was better than Daddy.
He was a “war president”, and you can’t be a “war president” without starting a war.
He was manipulated into by the neocons who wanted to establish a military base in the Middle East, and eventually go into Iran. It was absolutely about oil. Richard Dreyfus (as Dick Cheney) totally explains it in the movie, W.
Hmmm. Aside from your cite being a theatrical film, we already had a military base, and the fungibility of oil made who controls it almost irrelevant.
Bingo. Gold prize. Question answered.
IMHO anyway.
The Stargate. We must not allow an Annunaki Gap!
I’ll echo what other people have been saying.
Here’s roughly the line of reasoning they followed:
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It would be a Good Thing if the United State had more control over the Middle East. We loves our oil and there’s lots there. But what if they stop selling to us and sell it all to Russia or China or Europe instead? Oh noes! It would be teh bad!
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The three big dogs in the Middle East are Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and Iran. If they were all our buddies then all the little states would fall in line and we would be happy-happy. But, only Saudi Arabia is our buddy. Iraq and Iran hates us, yes they do, precious. What if they start hating us so much they only sell oil to Russia or China!? OH NOES!
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But we are teh superpower! We beat up the Nazis. We beat up the Commies. We have big muscles and it would be easy to beat up both Iraq and Iran even with one hand tied behind our backs! Let’s invade and kick out their bad dictators and their people will love us so much they will be our buddies just like Saudi Arabia is. Yeah, that’s the ticket!
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Hmmm … which to do first? Well … Iraq is smaller. Plus, if Iraq is our buddy, they will help us invade Iran when the time comes. Plus Saddam is a big meanie who tried to kill George’s daddy. It’s settled … Iraq first, then Iran.
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But … how to convince the American people to go along? We can’t just say we’re invading because we’re scared about the oil going away! America is a cowboy in a white hat. We’re the hero of the story. We don’t do things for petty, nasty little reasons like that.
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9-11. Woot. Game on.
I have to give what is (IMO) the scariest answer: he thought it was the right thing to do.
Because Iraq is in the middle of the Middle-East, it is central and can be an invasion point for either Iran or Saudi Arabia.
Also because of the oil.
No Diogenes is absolutely correct. It was all about controlling the Middle-East from a central location. I mean oil is part of it but also it’s the cradle of civilization and the center of the Eurasian continent. The cite he gives is a great example because it shows you in plain detail where all the bases are, and you can see that they basically surrounded Iran.
That’s not an answer though. Why did he think it was the right thing to do?
Our first goal in the Gulf War was to defend Saudi Arabia – that’s why the first phase was called “Operation Dester Shield.” And they’re still our allies AFAIK.
Well, my take is similar (sort of) to DtC’s take…except without the invasion of Iran part. I think Bush et al saw 9/11 as a golden opportunity to move against Iraq and do three things…establish a ‘friendly’ government in the region, provide the US with a secure base of operations so we could keep a closer eye on the region (all that oil stuff we need being there) and to show US dominance (militarily as well as politically…but mainly militarily). Afghanistan did not provide much of an opportunity for any of that, being too far to really stage out of (and also harder to do a large scale invasion of at the time, given the limited ‘friendly’ nations in the regions access to it). Saudi of course had all kinds of other issues…namely that they wouldn’t let us have the permanent bases and staging areas we wanted. Kuwait was similar…plus in both of them there was substantial resentment of the US being there (this was what originally set AQ off after all).
The perception at the time plans were being drawn up to invade and conquer Iraq was that Iraq was mainly secular and would be a fairly easy victory, would be fairly palatable to the other powers in the region (Saddam being feared and generally disliked), and that a new emergent Iraq could be shaped into an ally and a democratic show piece nation…and also would be easily dominated by the US who would extract permanent bases and such from the Iraqi’s. Of course all of these assessments were flawed, to say the least…but I think that they made up the basis plans for the invasion were based on.
Or it could be as Der Trihs said…it was all a massive plot to keep the oil from China (which it hasn’t, Iraqi oil being sold on the world market), steal the Iraqi oil (which also hasn’t happened) and make Bush et al rich beyond the dreams of avarice (no idea, but I don’t think either Bush or Chaney is substantially richer than they were)…
(I predict this thread won’t end well)
-XT
What is this word ally that you speak of? Allies, pshaw, they are our greatest enemy, the biggest threat to us in the world. Having bases right next door keeps them in check.
Operation Desert Shield was to defend Saudi Arabia, but so what? The Saudi people hate us with a passion, Hell, the royal family funds Saudi terrorism against us. They are not our friends, it’s just that having the Saudi royal family keep the Wahabists under their thumb is better for us than the alternative.
Also Operation Desert Shield was about defending all of our allies that bordered Iraq after Iraq invaded Kuwait. The Kuwaiti royal family of course being close personal friends of George HW Bush, being that his first big contract with Zapata oil was building refineries for them in the Gulf.
In the Middle-East, our allies are the people who have the most to lose by pissing us off, but everyone hates us, and they work contrary to our interests at every opportunity.
Only if the world continues to be a global marketplace the way it is now. But the world doesn’t have to be organized that way. In the future the world might revert to something more closely resembling the Cold War where each bloc has it’s own relatively self-contained economy.
One can imagine a future where dwindling oil supplies would lead one bloc to try to get a lock on the remaining reserves. And since petroleum drives the modern war machine, once such a lock was achieved, it would be permanent. The other bloc (or blocs) wouldn’t have enough oil to wage the sort of major war that would be required to break the lock.
The Iraq War only makes sense if you believe two other things:
#1 Peak Oil is a reality.
#2 Globalization will fail … probably because of #1