Inspired by this thread, When The Oil Runs Out, let’s take a different tack with this scenario:
The Bush-supported Iraqi political party takes a distant third in the recent Iraqi elections. The winners are supported by the Shiites.
The winning Shiites align themselves with the Iran and takes Iraq to a democratic Islamic state.
The US is told to leave Iraq with all due haste.
Insurgents topple the House of Saud. Iraq and Iran pledge public support for the overthrow. Al Qiada is welcomed back in the fold.
The Saudi oil fields are turned off. Period. Twentysix percent of the world’s flowing crude stops overnight. The Saudi insurgents are flush with cash and in no hurry to turn on the oil anytime soon.
Using Stranger On A Train’s words from his OP, “Mad Max-style apocalyptic fantasies aside, how do we cope, and what changes/sacrifices do we make when the” availability of oil supplies drastically change with the turn of the spigot wheel?
We expand the war is all. Islamic/Arab replace Communist, although I am sure that with the oil ‘crisis’ it will be more hot than the last cold war we had.
Why would Wahabbis want to get in bed with Shiite clerics?
Reducing the supply by 25% might increase he cost by a 33% or so right? Makes oil a $66 a barrel commodity. A commodity that gets sold to everyone on the planet unless the newly established states don’t want to sell any oil. Now why would two new states (SA + Iraq) with generally poor residents (50 million) want to give up all that money? SA produces about 7 million barrels a day. You’re saying they’ll give up $500 million a day?
According to many sources, Iraq has hit the peak of their supply of oil. This means that from this point on nobody had a clue how much oil is actually left in the fields. We’ve know this for years that the peak was approaching but I wonder if anyone in the American government has given it a single thought?
America has taken a back seat in Scientific Research due to the lack of academics in our schools and Europe and Asia have taken over this most necessary part of our country. None of you can say you weren’t aware of this because all you have to do is turn over every thing in your home for the “made in China” label. Customer Service for all our supposedly “made in America” products now comes from India.
It is time that America take the initiative and come up with a new energy source and do it before we have to sacrifice anymore of our service men and women.
President Bush is eager to stay at war with as many countries as possible and it should not be allowed to continue. We have killed over a hundred thousand Iraqis to free lthem. Personally I don’t give a shit if Iraqis and Iranians are a democracy or a mass of people living under a theocracy. America is very near to being a theocracy ourselves and we should mind our own damn business.
What happens in the short term: Places like Venezuala and Nigeria turn up production.
Major UN led sanctions on the rogue regimes which prevent them selling their oil even if they want to.
What happens in the medium term: Prices rise and Americans (in particular) use more energy efficient vehicles and industries ie more Honda Civics less Canyoneros.
You say “goodbye” to wildernesses in Alaska and the Antarctic etc. Siberia gets a proper look at too.
Longer term; New, safe nuclear power stations world wide. The regimes that turned the oil off realise that you can’t run an economy on the export of pistachio nuts and start selling again.
If you don’t believe me, ask about 1973! (Apart from the UN bit this is exactly what happened then)
For my enlightenment can I have a cite for the statement that Iraq’s oil production has peaked. And I mean peaked as in peaked, not declining production since 1991 due to international embargo and deteriorating infrastructure.
This comes across as gibberish. America has literally sucked up some of the brightest people from around the globe. Well until 9/11. Now the visa requirements make it easier to either stay home or go to Canada, Australia or Europe.
Aside from that you’re going on about consumer electronics and outsourcing. Not that those aren’t valid issue to debate but they don’t have a lot to do with a SA/Iraq/Iran axel of oil.
If the House of Saud was toppled, whatever new regime takes over would nver cut off the supply of oil to the outside world. That would be economic and political suicide, an open invitation to the US to ally itself strongly with the European Union and Russia. All three would then go to war against the new ruling government to get access to the oil. With victory, the oil fields would then be divided up amongst the three powers.
A more likely scenario is one where the new regime simply demands to be paid for the oil in Euros rather than dollars. The dollar would collapse and bring on an economic meltdown here in the US.
SPR is tapped, millitary is sent to take the oil fields, using tact-nukes if needed, and sort out the details later. The oil must flow, after all I have to change the oil in my car every 3 months.
An abrupt cutoff of Mideast oil will have very severe economic effects and likely to led quickly to military action by the West to take the oil production areas.
Such a cutoff will also have very immediate effects in the Middle East. Cutting off the flow of oil cuts the flow of cash into the region. Whatever one’s political or religous beliefs, an individual is likely to reach for the oil faucet at the point his life drops below the subsistence level. Survival trumps beliefs.
The midterm effects in the industrial world will be like what happened the last time. Changes in lifestyle and greater efficiencies – particularly in the US relative to car fuel efficiency.
I don’t believe your first statement, but even then your second statement doesn’t follow from the first.
Again, if the first statement is true, what does it have to do with the second statement? What does having a flower vase that’s made in China a result of our lagging in Scientific Research [sic]?
A disturbing number of Iraqis have died, but the 100,000 number is BS. And Bush is eager to start a war with as many countries as possible? Riiiight…
Why exactly is it that the radical Wahabi message is spreading around the world? Answer, the Wahabis are able to set up free schools all over the world, support mosques all over the world, proselytize all over the world.
Why are they able to do that? Answer, they have tons of money.
Why do they have tons of money? Answer, because the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is awash in money from selling oil.
What would happen if Saudi Arabia stopped selling all that oil? Answer, Saudi Arabia or whatever the successor state is named, would soon be broke.
What would happen to all those mosques, madrassas, and outreach programs all over the world then? Answer, they would be shut down.
So, would the Wahabi clerics cut their own throats by cutting off their only source of power, the money generated by oil sales around the world? Answer, I don’t know. But either radical Islam implodes because they don’t have any money and we have to wean ourselves off of cheap oil after a sharp economic dislocation, or they sell oil just like Iran does today and we continue our low-level war against radical Islam just like today and nothing much changes.
The thing is, some of us don’t ‘know’ that the peak is approaching…not in the sense that its approaching right now. The jury is still out on how much of this is real and how much of it is basic chicken little thinking. I’m sure though that the government has given it a single thought at some point.
Could you name a few fields where US scientific research isn’t pretty much on the cutting edge or at least in the top 5? Some thing we take a ‘back seat’ too? Could you cite that our academics in our schools, especially our colleges are second rate compared to Europe or Asia? I was always under the impression that they were clammoring to get in here to go to school here. Perhaps you could elaborate?
As for the rest, the US is no longer a manufacturing nation. Thats been the case for quite a while now. Certainly we do some manufacturing still, but its no longer what our economy is geared too. Curiously enough though, we are still one of the top economies in the world…if not THE top economic power. How do you explain this since everything has a ‘made in China’ label on it, or customer service has moved to India?
No doubt, though I don’t think the two things go hand in hand. Even if we went 100% oil free energy we’d still have interests out in the wider world that could potentially cause us to commit our service men and women to being harmed or killed.
I don’t see President Bush being eager to stay at (or start) wars with ‘as many countries as possible’…and I don’t know how we would stop the ones we are currently involved with without fucking over the nations we invaded…and the people in said nations. I’m sure it would be much easier to cut and run…except for the people we would be hanging out to dry who would have to face the civil war that would make whats going on now looks like a party.
The 100k figure is debatable btw, though I know that the Lancet study is practically gospel on this board. You might want to look into it a bit more critically though before you throw it around next as not all of us agree. As for your opinion that the US is ‘near to being a theocracy ourselves’ you obviously don’t have a clue what a true theocracy is like or you would never have made such a stupid statement. Hopefully you will remain ignorant so that you won’t be embarrassed later remembering making that statement.
We didn’t use the word “oil” to justify Gulf I, but it’s not necessary to use a specific word when everyone involved knows what it is essentially about. Cutting to the chase, “it’s about oil.”
Even a casual observer would have known Sadam was after Kuwait’s oil, not a few additional square miles of sand . No Arab country would have allowed half a million infidel troops into their country unless they were concerned Sadam might want their oil as well and no group of countries outside the area would have offered hundreds of thousands of their troops simply to reinstall a displaced government of a small country.
Certainly, though I know you’ve seen the whole debate before about the figures. IBC seems to be one of the more respected sites though, and they are no friend to Bush et al. I’ve seen some cites a bit higher and a few lower…but only Lancet is WAY higher (8000-194k).
As I said before, the Lancet report is debatable and should be taken as gospel or used as if it were confirmed fact…it isn’t. Its a projected estimate that uses several questionable figures to derive a POSSIBLE mortality figure for all Iraqi’s killed since the invasion. Its interesting, and I think it has some use, but it should be looked at critically for what it is and how its figures are derived…not used as an absolute statement of fact. For that matter, so should IBC’s figures.
