From: Terry W. Colvin (fortean1@mindspring.com)
Date: Sat Jan 18 2003 - 13:02:03 MST
a cogent summary from Jonah Goldberg:
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This was all the rage when I was in college during the first Gulf War and it
hasn't gotten any better with age. The basic argument goes like this: Bush and
Cheney are oil guys. They want to get their grubby hands on Iraq's oil. Ergo,
this is a war for oil. I guess it could be stated with more sophistication, but
why go to all the trouble of putting a dress on a pig? As Peter Beinart of The
New Republic notes in his latest - and excellent - column (registration
required), war is not the best means to get at Iraq's oil. If all we wanted was
a bigger slice of the Iraqi petro-pie, all we'd have to do, literally, is say
so. Dick Cheney could negotiate that with Saddam over Turkish coffee and a few
tortured lackeys tomorrow. Saddam has made it known that he'd be perfectly
willing to sell a lot more oil to the United States, and that he'd certainly
write up some fresh contracts if the U.S. would drop its sanctions and forget
about this "regime change" nonsense.
Going to war just to boost Iraq's oil production from three or so million
barrels a day to 6 or so million barrels a day involves massive risks, both
political and financial. A war on Iraq could ruin Iraq's oil fields. It could
foment instability in the region or a civil war inside Iraq. It could easily
cost the Republicans the White House if it went badly. In short, if this were
all about oil, any good businessman would simply say, "Let's just lift the
sanctions." And, as Beinart notes, if all Bush wants is oil, why is the U.S.
making assurances to the French and Russians that they can keep their existing
contracts if they approve an invasion?
In fact, if Bush and Cheney are doing the bidding of the oil industry, someone
needs to explain why the American Petroleum Institute lobbied for the lifting of
sanctions prior to the 9/11 attacks. Also, you might ask why oil prices go up
when war becomes more likely, and go down when the prospects for peace improve.
But, in my mind, the most compelling response to the blood-for-oil argument is a
simple one. The people who make it are morons. Oh, I don't mean the folks who
say that, as a geopolitical necessity, the U.S. must assure stability in oil
markets, or those who (rightly) argue that we need to lessen the power and
influence of the Saudis. I mean the people who argue - Cynthia McKinney-style -
that Bush and Cheney and Rumsfeld want to get rich off the war. This is the
Carlyle Group argument you hear on Pacifica Radio and in the sweatier fever
swamps of the web. The simple problem with this thesis is that it betrays a
fundamental misunderstanding of rich people.
Rich people who want to get richer do not run for president or vice president.
They don't take jobs as secretary of defense or treasury secretary. And, for
that matter, they don't run for senator - like John Edwards and Jon Corzine.
Such people may have selfish motives, but greed for filthy lucre isn't one of
them. They may like the power, they may want to do good, they may want their
names in the history books, they may even want to prove something to the
third-grade teachers who said they'd never amount to anything. But they don't do
it to make a killing in the stock market. Every day, I hear from people who
honestly think Bush & co. want to invade Iraq to make a few more bucks. These
people are either stoopid or they are trapped in a Twilight Zone where Thomas
Nast cartoons seem real.
Indeed, this is the problem with most goofy theories about a war: They reveal a
profound naiveté about how government works. If Bush were doing this for oil or
for money or for "revenge" against the man who tried to kill his dad, he
wouldn't be able to say so in a single meeting. He couldn't say such a thing to
his inner circle, let alone his senior staff or the hundreds of people below
them who make the policy. Word would get out. Opponents would leak it. Ambitious
men would blow the whistle and become heroes. Decent men would blow the whistle
too.
In other words, Bush would have to keep all of his motives secret from the
people he'd have to convince to go along. Now, since most of these anti-Bush,
antiwar types also think the commander-in-chief is an idiot, it's hard to
imagine how they think he'd be smart enough to pull off a con like that.
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--
Terry W. Colvin, Sierra Vista, Arizona (USA) < fortean1@mindspring.com >
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