This War is About Oil -- And Rightly So
Duke professor says Middle Eastern petroleum is too important for Saddam Hussein to control
Monday, March 3, 2003
Last Monday, Britain, Spain and the United States submitted a new resolution to the UN Security Council specifying that Saddam Hussein's Iraq has failed to disarm, and warns that "serious consequences" -- that is, war -- will follow if he persists in defying the international community.
Yet, in making their case, U.S. and British leaders have been unwilling to give us straight talk about the central reason why such disarmament must be achieved by diplomacy if possible and by war if necessary. That central reason is oil.
To date, it has been the opponents of war who have stressed the link between oil and the Anglo-American policy of confronting Iraq. They argue that America and Britain want a war against Iraq in order to control that country's oil resources and thereby enrich a few big oil companies. Reacting defensively, British Prime Minister Tony Blair said recently that the whole issue of oil and Iraq is a "conspiracy theory."
Blair is partly correct - what's at stake is not merely the Iraqi oil reserves, but the oil resources of the entire Persian Gulf. There is absolutely no reason why Blair and President Bush should not forthrightly stress the importance of those oil reserves when they make the case for war against Iraq if diplomacy fails.
The world needs assured access to Middle Eastern oil today and, even more so, in the years ahead. Putting aside Iraq, about 55 percent of all the world's proven oil reserves are in Middle Eastern countries. Saudi Arabia alone has 25 percent of the world's oil reserves, and Kuwait has about 9 percent of the total. According to the International Energy Agency's newly released World Energy Outlook, during the next 30 years world demand for oil is likely to increase by 60 percent. The oil needed to meet that increased demand will come from several countries, according to the IEA, "particularly those in the Middle East."
Opponents of a possible war with Iraq say such oil will be used to fuel cars, especially gas-guzzling SUVs owned by Americans. But oil is also the lifeblood of modern industry. For example, 25 percent of all oil used in the United States goes to manufacturing operations, particularly in the plastics and pharmaceutical sectors.
Oil resources located in the Middle East are vital not just to the prosperity of rich countries, but for the prospects of growth in developing nations. According to the IEA, future increases in demand for oil will come largely not from the world's rich countries, but from fast-growing developing countries, especially China.
This trend highlights a link between oil access and world peace. According to the IEA, China over the next 30 years will become a "strategic buyer" in international energy markets. If those markets are periodically thrown into turmoil because of supply disruptions in the Middle East, China might decide to take control of the oil reserves thought to be under the South China Sea. That would bring it into serious conflict with such neighbors as Vietnam and Indonesia, and ultimately with the United States.
The United States and other rich countries should of course reinforce their efforts to conserve oil and develop new forms of energy. But let's be realistic: for years to come, assured access to Middle Eastern oil reserves will be central to the economic health of rich and developing countries, and therefore the prospects for global stability and peace.
Saddam Hussein believes he should own Kuwait and its oil resources; he may also believe he should have the right to dictate how much oil other countries in the Persian Gulf, and especially Saudi Arabia, should place on the world market. Were he to get that control, at best he would raise oil prices to monopoly levels well above those maintained at present by the Organization for Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC). Much of the world would be thrown into recession, and countries might turn to nationalist measures to make their way in the new, harsher world order.
Thoughtful analysts have suggested that Saddam can be deterred from attempting again to invade Kuwait and dominate the Persian Gulf, but that strategy is doomed to failure over the long term. Consider the logic if Saddam and his sons get weapons of mass destruction and missiles to deliver them. They would believe they could invade Kuwait, and then threaten to use those terrible weapons if anyone tried to reverse that gain. To counter that gambit, the United States would have to maintain forces on the ground in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia sufficiently large to deny Iraq the ability to take Kuwait in the first place. But such a large U.S. military presence in Saudi Arabia would fuel anti-Americanism and terrorism that Saddam himself could exploit. A strategy of deterrence over time may entail greater risks for America and its friends than does the current strategy of confrontation.
It is essential that Saddam's regime be foiled in its attempts to acquire weapons of mass destruction, for those weapons give Saddam a realistic chance of capturing control of the world's petroleum resources. That would be a disaster not just for world prosperity and development, but also for international peace. It must be prevented by any means necessary.
This article originally appeared in the March 2 News and Observer.
