President Bush's retreat from the ambitious goals of his second term will proceed one small but fateful step further this Friday. That's when, after more than two years of stalling, the president will deliver a warm White House welcome to Ilham Aliyev, the autocratic and corrupt but friendly ruler of one of the world's emerging energy powers, Azerbaijan.
Here's why this is a tipping point: At the heart of Bush's democracy doctrine was the principle that the United States would abandon its Cold War-era practice of propping up dictators -- especially in the Muslim world -- in exchange for easy access to their energy resources and military cooperation. That bargain, we now know, played a major role in the emergence of al-Qaeda and other extremist anti-Western movements.
To his credit, the reelected Bush made a genuine stab at a different strategy last year in Azerbaijan and another Muslim country, Kazakhstan. Both resemble Iran or Iraq half a century ago. They are rapidly modernizing, politically unsettled, and about to become very, very rich from oil and gas.
With both Aliyev and Kazakhstan's Nursultan Nazarbayev planning elections last fall, Bush dispatched letters and senior envoys with a message: Hold an honest vote and you can "elevate our countries' relations to a new strategic level." The implicit converse was that, should they fail to deliver, there would be no special partnership -- no military deals, no aid, no presidential visits to Washington.
Both Aliyev and Nazarbayev made token efforts to please Bush. But both dismally failed to demonstrate that they were willing to liberalize their countries rather than using oil wealth to consolidate dictatorship. The State Department said of Aliyev's parliamentary elections, "there were major irregularities and fraud." Nazarbayev's election was worse. Since then, two of Nazarbayev's opponents have died or been murdered in suspicious circumstances. Three of Aliyev's foes are being tried this month on treason charges, and his biggest rival has been jailed.
Aliyev is nevertheless getting everything he might have hoped for from Bush. Aid is being boosted, the Pentagon is drawing up plans for extensive military cooperation -- and there is the White House visit, which the 44-year-old Azeri president has craved ever since he took over from his dad three years ago. If Nazarbayev chooses, he will be next. He has been offered not just a Washington tour but a reciprocal visit by Bush to Kazakhstan.
Why the retreat on the democracy principle? Azeri observers speculate that Bush may want Aliyev's help with Iran, which is its neighbor and contains a large Azeri ethnic minority. But administration officials tell me a more pressing reason is a rapidly intensifying campaign by Russia to restore its dominion over former Soviet republics such as Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan -- and to drive the United States out of the region.
Though nominally Bush's ally in the war on terrorism, Russian President Vladimir Putin has cynically exploited Bush's effort to promote democracy in Eurasia. His diplomats and media aggressively portray Washington's support for free media, civil society groups and elections as a cover for CIA-sponsored coups. Autocrats who stage crackdowns, such as Uzbekistan's Islam Karimov, are quickly embraced by Moscow, which counsels them to break off ties with the U.S. military. State-controlled Russian energy companies are meanwhile seeking to corner oil and gas supplies and gain control over pipelines, electricity grids and refineries throughout Eurasia. If they succeed, Russia can throttle the region's weak governments and ensure its long-term control over energy supplies to Central and Western Europe.
In late February Putin arrived in Azerbaijan at the head of a large delegation and proceeded to buy everything Aliyev would sell, including a commitment to export more oil through Russia. Earlier this month he welcomed Nazarbayev to Moscow, and scored an even bigger success. Not only did the Kazakh leader endorse Putin's plan for a Moscow-dominated "common economic space," but he also signed a deal that will double Kazakhstan's oil exports through Russia. Despite heavy U.S. lobbying, Nazarbayev has yet to firmly commit to sending oil through a rival Western pipeline, which begins in Azerbaijan and ends in the Turkish port of Ceyhan.
Putin's aggressive tactics forced the hand of the administration, which had been holding back its White House invitations in the hope of leveraging more steps toward liberalization. "We don't want to see Azerbaijan closed off by the Russians, because that will close off the energy alternative to Russia for Europe," one official said. He added: "If Azerbaijan falls under Russian influence there will be no democracy agenda there at all."
In short, the race for energy and an increasingly bare-knuckled contest with Moscow for influence over its producers have caused the downgrading of the democracy strategy. It might be argued that the sacrifice is necessary, given the large economic and security stakes. But, then, that was the logic that prevailed once before. According to Bush, history proved it wrong.
Never forget that Hitler had the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem buzzing in his ear the whole time...and the rest of the world gladly turned a blind eye until the end.
Before reading the article, I'd argue it's 25 years too late - Europe was a casualty of WWI. The continent has never regained confidence in its culture or leadership from that trainwreck - WWII and associated horrors were a postmortem tremor.
"We have exchanged the transcendental instinct of the Jews, who even under the worst possible conditions have always looked for a better peaceful world, for the suicide bomber. We have exchanged the pride of life for the fanatic obsession of death. Our death and that of our children."
Not to put to fine a point on it, but - no shit, Sherlock.
Somebody just had a wake-up call; too bad he won't be able to convince enough EUros to matter.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
04/24/2006 17:10 Comments ||
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#3
VAMark, I'd argue you're 25 years too late. Europe was a victim of Lyell, Darwin, Marx, Nietsche and Freud. Europe had the trainwreck because it had lost its confidence in its culture as a result of their work.
#4
You're all too late. When the French Revolution ended in massacres and tyranny, that's when Europe's fate was sealed.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
04/24/2006 17:45 Comments ||
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#5
I had thought about that a bit, Robert, but why was it different from the way the Protectorate ended? Britain did go on to liberalize successfgully throughout the 19th century.
Jean-Marie Le Pen, that old stalwart of far Right off-the-wallism, is cock-a-hoop after one of those grim polls portraying the French, or rather too many of them, in a less than savoury light.
What the survey found was that 35 per cent considered the extreme Right to enrich political debate in France, while a slightly smaller proportion (34 per cent) believed that end of the political spectrum was close to its own concerns. It was only a few weeks ago that similar numbers admitted to racist views, and I think we all know where, to a large degree, these sentiments come from. The popular fear and mistrust of Islam.
Such feeling is evident wherever you go in France. The reasons are obvious: unrest on suburban estates, rising crime, immigration, stubborn unemployment and, of course, the constant fear of terrorist attack. All, to one extent or another, are associated with Europes largest Muslim population (even if French republican principles prevent us from knowing the true numbers).
Reasonable people do not despise or suspect anyone because he or she adheres to one religious faith or another. But whatever view we take on the Israeli/Palestinian crisis, it has become very difficult in recent years to think of a terrorist threat that comes anywhere close to that posed by groups or individuals claiming to act in the name of Islam.
Whether hijacking jets, blowing up the Tube or Spanish suburban trains or beheading Christian schoolgirls, these terrorists and their apologists assure us that their actions are consistent with Gods will. It is sad, but hardly surprising, that we pay insufficient heed to the protestations of moderate Muslim leaders and ordinary citizens when they defend Islam as a religion of peace and tolerance.
But how things have moved on. Think back to the lowest points of IRA terrorism. Even the terrorists or their sympathisers joined in debates about civilian casualties and issues of whether, when soft targets were chosen, warnings had been given and, if so, how accurate they were.
We can take with a hefty pinch of salt the sincerity of such concerns. But the average Islamist would regard them as prissy in the extreme, since there is no longer any need to wonder, as some of us did after IRA atrocities, whether civilian deaths were really intended or a mere hazard of conflict. The object of terrorism has become one of causing as many as possible. We are all infidels and thus guilty, which must logically include Muslims unlucky enough to be around when the bomb goes off.
One of the London bombers even recorded a video making the very point that if you elect a government of which a terrorist disapproves, you must expect to be blown to pieces as a consequence.
And it is by exploiting fears aroused by such developments, and by the other matters arising from generations of immigration, that the far Right is able to prosper.
I do not necessarily have any easy answers. It seems, to me, desperately unfair that decent people who happen to be Muslims should increasingly be seen as part of a problem they did not create and for which they are not responsible.
When the French journalists Georges Malbrunot and Christian Chesnot were kidnapped in Iraq, the only credible demand ever made was that France should abandon a democratically approved law prohibiting headscarves at school. I have the deepest admiration for those Muslim girls across France who, despite their great resentment of the ban, also felt so French that they went to school anyway, determined not to be seen to be reinforcing the hostage-takers supposed motivation.
Over lunch with an MP from the ruling centre-Right UMP the other day, I heard a gloomy analysis: that if mainstream conservative politicians continue to pussyfoot around the delicate issues of the day, they will be humiliated in next years presidential and parliamentary elections.
Gloomy not because I especially care about the fate of the UMP. But because in the absence so far, despite the ascendancy of Ségolène Royal, of a truly coherent Left-of-centre alternative, the extremists and this time I am talking about politicians, who are at least cuddlier than terrorists are the likeliest beneficiaries.
Le Pen feels sufficiently emboldened just now to announce that he can win the race for the presidential elections. Since I am all too close, geographically, to the Elysée, I could joke about the tone of my neighbourhood being lowered.
But lets hope it would be a joke and no more, while remembering that in 2002, Chiracs impressive 82 per cent of the poll overlooked the inconvenient fact that five-and-a-half million French people voted for the National Front leader.
#1
It seems, to me, desperately unfair that decent people who happen to be Muslims should increasingly be seen as part of a problem they did not create and for which they are not responsible.
Sorry, but that is like saying that people who happenned to be Nazis didn't have responsability for WWII and Auschwitz. People are not responsible fopr their race but they are responsable for their ideas. If you are born into a religion then at one point it is your duty to read the f..g book and see what it advocates. Then if it advocates evil and you decide to stay don't complain when you get an infidel nuke on your head.
I have the deepest admiration for those Muslim girls across France who, despite their great resentment of the ban, also felt so French that they went to school anyway, determined not to be seen to be reinforcing the hostage-takers supposed motivation.
Their resentement? Pleaaaaaaaase. How many of these girls wore veils only due to parental pressure? And how many parents veiled their girls due to islamist pressure? One of the consequences of allowing veiled girls (like France did) or sharia courtsb (like in canada) is that the islamists can visit people and tell them "Why do you allow your daughters go unveiled/do you go to regular courts? Are you a Muslim or an apostate?". And we know the fate of apostates.
We have to make Muslims feel that our societies are all willing to shelter those who want yto leave Islam or content temselves with mere lip service.
Oh and BTW he is telling he finds admirable those Muslim girls who continued going to the school provided to them for free by the French tax payers while saying nothing about the North-African girls who conttnue to defy the Islamists by not allowing to be cowed into wearing veils. These are the girls to be admired not those who have embraced islamo-fascism's racism and misoginy.
#4
Reasonable people do not despise or suspect anyone because he or she adheres to one religious faith or another.
Really now ? How 20th century of you.
I consider myself reasonable, and I do suspect all things Islam. Maybe reasonable people allow themselves to change with the times and the facts. Wake up, Le Pen.
#5
Why can't we hold the practitioners of Islam accountable for actions taken in the name of Allan? Otherwise, we might have to blame the...Jooos, or even ourselves. And where's the percentage in *that*?
"It isn't just the CIA that has problems with former politicals getting knee-deep into this Administration's policy and leaking materials," says a current Bush Administration aide. "We're talking about a situation that we haven't been able to deal with in a manner in which we'd want. But this Mary McCarthy case may help us."
The aide is referring to the firing last week of a CIA employee working in the agency's Office of Inspector General. One of McCarthy's jobs was investigating allegations of torture by CIA employees or contractors at Iraqi prisons. The CIA fired McCarthy on evidence that she was one of the sources for Washington Post reporter Dana Priest's report on so-called "Black Site" prisons in Europe and elsewhere that housed captured al Qaeda, Taliban, and some senior Iraqi military and intelligence individuals.
Unresolved is whether McCarthy also leaked material to the left-wing organization, Human Rights Watch, which clearly was also a key source to Priest. (Note this quote in Priest's now-Pulitzer Prize winning story: "'I remember asking: What are we going to do with these people?' said a senior CIA officer. 'I kept saying, where's the help? We've got to bring in some help. We can't be jailers -- our job is to find Osama.'" Was this McCarthy?)
McCarthy's background is just becoming increasingly fleshed out, including her ties to former National Security Advisor Sandy "Sox" Berger and the Clinton White House. McCarthy was appointed Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Intelligence Programs by Berger in 1998. She replaced Rand Beers. According to former Kerry campaign staffers, Beers, who served as a senior adviser to Kerry's campaign, spoke of having continued access to CIA and national security data from former colleagues still in government.
"He said he still had friends willing to help the Kerry campaign from inside," says a former staffer. "We always assumed that guys like Beers and Berger were in touch with these people. I'm not talking about having secure material leaked to us, but our national security folks always seemed to be in the know." The former staffer said he never recalled mention of any names.
But all of this is now past tense, and the White House, as well as senior staff at the Departments of Justice, State, and Defense, are attempting to identify possible leakers among their own career staffs with access to information that might be helpful to Democrats or the press.
Of greatest concern is the Department of Justice, the nexus of many terrorism and national security cases that would involve the White House, Defense and State Departments, as well as briefings on Capitol Hill to congressional leadership. "We know we have people leaking materials. It's been an ongoing problem, but until someone has taken the first step, and the McCarthy case would appear to be the first step, it's hard to move against career staff," says a current Defense Department staffer. "We have an IG looking at all kinds of things right now. Perhaps we'll get some movement."
Pulitzer Prize winning Dana Priest is married to William Goodfellow. William Goodfellow is the Executive Director of the the Center for International Policy (CIP). Here is what Discover The Networks has to say about the Center For International Policy:
Americas Red Army
One of the most sophisticated of Fentons anti-war projects is the co-mingling of Win Without War and the Center for International Policy (CIP). Before 9/11, CIP, a Fenton Communications client, mainly acted as Fidel Castros greatest think tank ally. Much of its million-dollar budget was spent lobbying to end economic sanctions and travel restrictions against Cuba.
Now, it has another mission. Fenton has established a war room with CIP called The Iraq Policy Information Program (IPIP). Its main job is getting the anti-Bush foreign policy message out to the media and providing guests for talk shows. A featured speaker of the IPIP is former ambassador Joe Wilson, one of the Bush administrations most vocal enemies.
Like Moveon.org and Win Without War, the contact for the Iraq Policy Information Program is Fenton Communications. Win Without War also collects tax-deductible donations through CIP.
In his latest address to his followers, Osama bin-Laden warned of a long war in the fight against western interests thus admitting for the first time that his administrations initial promises of a quick and decisive conflict had been overly optimistic.
A lot of us feel this is a very promising development, observed one al-Qaeda official who spoke on the condition that he not be beheaded, but there is still cause for concern when he says things like the Crusaders are, destroying houses over the heads of our kinfolk and children, which suggests he doesnt realize that just about all the killing is Muslim on Muslim.
Its like hes living in a cave or something.
Many supporters also feel that bin-Laden continues to fall back on tired old arguments such as they hate our totalitarianism, they hate our theocracy and the lack of freedoms we enjoy.
Some supporters blame members of bin-Ladens administration, particularly the neo-Imams such as Ayman al-Zawahiri, who appears to be having trouble navigating the many complex challenges facing al-Qaeda. I dont care if youre a multinational insurance company, banking institution, or terrorist organization, observed one management consultant, you have to be prepared to deal with things like floating exchange rates, database compatibilities and random air strikes from Predator drones.
One assistant branch manager in the Berlin office pointed out that turnover in particular has been a big problem. Like many organizations, we lost a lot of good people on 9-11, he noted. Mohammed Atta? He was your go-to guy if you wanted a job done and done well. Particularly if you only needed it done once. And then there was Fayez al-Hamadi. Now there was a guy you could bring into a situation to shake things up. He was a real bomb thrower, that guy.
No, seriously, he threw bombs.
Sometimes the right hand doesnt know what trigger the left hand is pulling, noted one al-Qaeda intern working in the Oman office. We figure one of these days one of our own guys is going to get mixed up and set off a suicide vest right here in the office killing us all, ha ha. Thats a joke making the email rounds.
Bin-Laden has been having a bad time of it lately including al-Qaedas incompetent handling of the earthquake in Pakistan and the resulting plunge in his poll numbers, and reports that al-Zawahiri had waited days before bothering to personally tell bin-Laden that he had accidentally missed shooting a lawyer.
As calls for a change in leadership have mounted, bin-Laden has attempted to appease his critics by making some staff changes including the demotion of Musab al Zarqawi in Iraq.
Some have said all they are doing is rearranging the deck chairs on the USS Cole, while others believe the moves represent real change. Regardless, the general consensus is that more staff shakeups are coming.
George W. Bush has the courage to speak out for freedom.
BY NATAN SHARANSKY
There are two distinct marks of a dissident. First, dissidents are fired by ideas and stay true to them no matter the consequences. Second, they generally believe that betraying those ideas would constitute the greatest of moral failures. Give up, they say to themselves, and evil will triumph. Stand firm, and they can give hope to others and help change the world.
Political leaders make the rarest of dissidents. In a democracy, a leader's lifeline is the electorate's pulse. Failure to be in tune with public sentiment can cripple any administration and undermine any political agenda. Moreover, democratic leaders, for whom compromise is critical to effective governance, hardly ever see any issue in Manichaean terms. In their world, nearly everything is colored in shades of gray.
That is why President George W. Bush is such an exception. He is a man fired by a deep belief in the universal appeal of freedom, its transformative power, and its critical connection to international peace and stability. Even the fiercest critics of these ideas would surely admit that Mr. Bush has championed them both before and after his re-election, both when he was riding high in the polls and now that his popularity has plummeted, when criticism has come from longstanding opponents and from erstwhile supporters.
With a dogged determination that any dissident can appreciate, Mr. Bush, faced with overwhelming opposition, stands his ideological ground, motivated in large measure by what appears to be a refusal to countenance moral failure.
I myself have not been uncritical of Mr. Bush. Like my teacher, Andrei Sakharov, I agree with the president that promoting democracy is critical for international security. But I believe that too much focus has been placed on holding quick elections, while too little attention has been paid to help build free societies by protecting those freedoms--of conscience, speech, press, religion, etc.--that lie at democracy's core.
I believe that such a mistaken approach is one of the reasons why a terrorist organization such as Hamas could come to power through ostensibly democratic means in a Palestinian society long ruled by fear and intimidation.
I also believe that not enough effort has been made to turn the policy of promoting democracy into a bipartisan effort. The enemies of freedom must know that the commitment of the world's lone superpower to help expand freedom beyond its borders will not depend on the results of the next election.
Just as success in winning past global conflicts depended on forging a broad coalition that stretched across party and ideological lines, success in using the advance of democracy to win the war on terror will depend on building and maintaining a wide consensus of support.
Yet despite these criticisms, I recognize that I have the luxury of criticizing Mr. Bush's democracy agenda only because there is a democracy agenda in the first place. A policy that for years had been nothing more than the esoteric subject of occasional academic debate is now the focal point of American statecraft.
For decades, a "realism" based on a myopic perception of international stability prevailed in the policy-making debate. For a brief period during the Cold War, the realist policy of accommodating Soviet tyranny was replaced with a policy that confronted that tyranny and made democracy and human rights inside the Soviet Union a litmus test for superpower relations.
The enormous success of such a policy in bringing the Cold War to a peaceful end did not stop most policy makers from continuing to advocate an approach to international stability that was based on coddling "friendly" dictators and refusing to support the aspirations of oppressed peoples to be free.
Then came Sept. 11, 2001. It seemed as though that horrific day had made it clear that the price for supporting "friendly" dictators throughout the Middle East was the creation of the world's largest breeding ground of terrorism. A new political course had to be charted.
Today, we are in the midst of a great struggle between the forces of terror and the forces of freedom. The greatest weapon that the free world possesses in this struggle is the awesome power of its ideas.
The Bush Doctrine, based on a recognition of the dangers posed by non-democratic regimes and on committing the United States to support the advance of democracy, offers hope to many dissident voices struggling to bring democracy to their own countries. The democratic earthquake it has helped unleash, even with all the dangers its tremors entail, offers the promise of a more peaceful world.
Yet with each passing day, new voices are added to the chorus of that doctrine's opponents, and the circle of its supporters grows ever smaller.
Critics rail against every step on the new and difficult road on which the United States has embarked. Yet in pointing out the many pitfalls which have not been avoided and those which still can be, those critics would be wise to remember that the alternative road leads to the continued oppression of hundreds of millions of people and the continued festering of the pathologies that led to 9/11.
Now that President Bush is increasingly alone in pushing for freedom, I can only hope that his dissident spirit will continue to persevere. For should that spirit break, evil will indeed triumph, and the consequences for our world would be disastrous.
Mr. Sharansky spent nine years as a political prisoner in the Soviet Gulag. A former deputy prime minister of Israel, he is currently a member of the Knesset
#1
Now that President Bush is increasingly alone in pushing for freedom, I can only hope that his dissident spirit will continue to persevere. For should that spirit break, evil will indeed triumph, and the consequences for our world would be disastrous.
This from a man who knows evil up close and personal. Unlike those suffering from BDS.
Olmert regime is providing definitive an example of blind, obsessive fanaticism
the ultimate test of this agreement will be a test of blood If it becomes clear that they (the Palestinians) cannot overcome terror - this will be temporary accord and we will have no choice but abrogate it...And if there is no choice, the IDF will return to the places which it is about to leave in the upcoming months (sic).
Yossi Beilin on the Oslo Accords, Maariv 26-11-1993
Fanaticism consists in redoubling your effort when you have forgotten your aim.
George Santayana
These two excerpts - the one from the leading architect of Israel's policy of territorial withdrawal adopted since the early 90s, the other from the well-known Spanish-born American political philosopher - aptly underscore how corrupted the underlying rationale of Israeli policy (and policy-makers) has become over the last decade. Even more so, it so it highlights how utterly misguided is the proposed plan for further retreat put forward by premier-designate Ehud Olmert; and how misfounded are the tenets upon which it is based.
This proposal, euphemistically dubbed "convergence", is in fact a prescription for a unilateral withdrawal from areas of Judea and Samaria to a line not overly different from the 1967 Green Line.
As such is in fact a mega-version of the previous unilateral retreat, euphemistically known as "disengagement, which within a dizzying short period of time, has brought about all of the dangers its detractors warned of and none of the benefits its supports hoped for. Indeed, since its traumatic implementation and the transformation of thousands of productive Israelis into destitute, homeless and largely abandoned - refugees in their own land, it has led to "little" - except increased Qassam attacks, heightened motivation of the terror organizations, intensified smuggling of evermore deadly weaponry in to the evacuated (or rather, "disengaged") Gaza Strip, the ascension to power of the Hamas, the establishment of al-Qaeda cells in the "territories" and the virtual elimination of the influence of any moderate element, such as there were, among the Palestinians.
No positive consequences
Yet in spite of this appalling debacle, the penny fails to drop. It should be crystal clear from the preceding citation from Yossi Beilin that withdrawal per se was never intended to be the aim of Israeli policy, even for people of his political ilk, but rather a means for attaining an aim that of a peaceable settlement or at least, stable non-belligerency.
However, in practice, the more concessions Israel offered, the more belligerent Palestinian behavior became. Soon after the signature of the Oslo Agreement and the "Gaza and Jericho" first pull-out, terror attacks began to soar, dropping dramatically under the less concessionary Netanyahu administration, only to spiral spectacularly upward again in response to Ehud Bark's far-reaching proposal to withdraw from nearly all the "West Bank" and Gaza (and to actually compensate the Palestinians with territory inside pre-1967 frontiers, for the remainder).
Therefore there is no apparently rational reason to believe that the "convergence" initiative will generate any positive consequences for Israel politically, militarily or economically. In the past few days the Palestinians, cross the board, dismissed the "convergence" proposal as a policy that could lead to any form of stability from Hamas' Ismail Haniyeh's who declared that it was a" recipe for confrontation" (March 31st) to Fatah's Abbas who warned that it "would lead to war within a decade"(April 8th).
In view of these statements, the unilateral nature of the evacuation envisaged in the "convergence" plan appears especially imprudent.
For example, withdrawal is not contingent on the Palestinians fulfilling any demands whatsoever -- including the demilitarization of the abandoned areas or even any limitation on the kind of armaments that can be introduced in to them.
This is especially grave since not only have the Palestinian organizations made it quite clear that they intend "transforming the West Bank into a large base for the firing of Qassam rockets on the civilian population within the State of Israel"; but also "convergence" in the east - far more than "disengagement" in the south - will easily expose vital infrastructure installations and population centers to such attack.
Future does not bode well
These include major transportation routes such as the trans-Israel highway (Route 6), the eastern approaches to the Greater Tel-Aviv urban complex and the country's only international airport. The latter is especially vulnerable, since it will not require actual attacks on it to totally disrupt air traffic to and from Israel. The mere existence of a credible threat of such attacks will suffice to cripple the regular operation of Ben Gurion airport.
Given the notable lack of success in preventing Qassam attacks from within Gaza, it would appear the future does not bode well for the future of Israel's aviation links with the outside world
In this regard, it should be noted that Israel's unilateral and unreciprocated retreat is an implicit but unequivocal declaration that it foregoes any claim of sovereignty over the evacuated areas.
Thus, while "convergence" is unlikely to earn international recognition of its sovereignty inside its newly self-demarcated borders, the international community is very likely to seize eagerly on Israel's self-conceded surrender of any sovereign claims beyond them thus foregoing the right to a permanent military presence of any significance in them to ensure the protection of strategic targets within "Israel proper".
Likewise there is likely to be little economic advantage to "convergence". Current estimates of the cost of implementation put it around $ 30 billion (!) - with US aid to cover this highly unlikely. This is such an exorbitantly high figure, especially for a government pleading a lack of adequate funds to deal with pressing social ills afflicting the country, it seems outrageous that it would be seriously contemplated by any responsible leadership.
Obsessive fanaticism
Indeed, the projected costs make complete mockery of the claims put forward by proponents the "convergence/disengagement" thesis (such the avid and vocal Profs. Sofer and Schueftan of Haifa University) that its implementation would free up resources to deal with problems of social inequalities, the plight of the aged, prevention crime, the upgrading of national infrastructures and development of outlying peripheral areas in the Galilee and the Negev. (As an aside it should be noted that the combined cost of the "convergence/disengagement" project could finance the relocation and rehabilitation of a large proportion of the Palestinians in the "West Bank" and Gaza, facilitating both a considerable amelioration of their humanitarian conditions as well as an equally considerable alleviation of the demographic problem which unilateral withdrawal erroneously purports to deal will).
In the light of the dubious prospects of the "convergence" scheme the security risks it involves, the strategic vulnerability it will create, its manifest political rejection by the Palestinians, and the breathtaking economic cost it entails it seems almost inexplicable why any Israeli government would persist in pursuing such a policy if one can use the word "policy" to describe such a misconceived concoction of myopic wishful-thinking and self-destructive malice, so replete with mortal perils and so devoid of positive payoffs.
Indeed with its reckless resolve to redouble its efforts (by evermore extensive withdrawal) having totally lost sight of the aim of those efforts (attaining an end to the enmity towards Israel) the Olmert-regime seems to be providing a definitive example of blind, obsessive fanaticism.
Love him or hate him, Dershowitz always marshals his facts and always presents a clear argument.
Face it. Iran will get the bomb. It has already test-fired rockets capable of targeting the entire Middle East and much of southern Europe. And it claims to have 40,000 suicide volunteers eager to deploy terrorism even nuclear terrorism against its enemies. With a nuclear capacity, the Islamic Republic of Iran will instantly achieve the status of superpower to which Iraq aspired.
Nothing will deter Iran. Sanctions are paper protests to an oil-rich nation. Diplomacy has already failed because Russia and China are playing both sides. Sabotage, bribery even assassination of nuclear scientists may delay but will not prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear power. That leaves military threats and, ultimately, military action.
First, consider military threats. They are already coming from two sources: the US and Israel. Neither is working, for very different reasons.
The Iranians would probably give up their nuclear weapons programme if their leaders truly believed that refusal to do so would produce an Iraq-like attack an all-out invasion, regime change and occupation. Leaders, even religious leaders, fear imprisonment and death. Only the United States is capable of mounting such a sustained attack.
But the continuing war in Iraq has made it impossible for the US to mount a credible threat, because American public opinion would not accept a second war or so the Iranians believe. Moreover, Americas allies in the war against Iraq most particularly Great Britain would not support an attack on Iran.
That is precisely why the Bush administration is barking so loudly. It wants to convince the Iranian leadership that it is preparing to bite to attack, invade and destroy their regime, perhaps even with the use of tactical nuclear weapons. But its not working. It is only causing the Iranian leaders themselves to bark louder; to exaggerate their progress towards completing a nuclear weapon and to threaten terrorist retaliation by its suicide volunteers if Iran were to be attacked.
The war in Iraq is a two-edged sword when it comes to Iran. One edge demonstrates that the US is willing and able to topple dictatorial regimes which it regards as dangerous. That is the edge the Bush administration is trying to showcase. The other edge represents the failure of Iraq widespread public distrust of intelligence claims, fear of becoming bogged down in another endless war, strident opposition at home and abroad. That is the edge being seen by the Iranian leaders. The US threat is seen as hollow.
Seen hollow, in part, because of the antics of the Dhimmicrats and the MSM, who've spent the last four years trying to convince everyone that, whether it's Afghanistan or Iraq, everything we do is a failure.
That leaves the Israeli threat, which is real, but limited. Who could blame Israel for seeking to destroy the emerging nuclear capacity of an enemy nation whose leader, as recently as 14 April 2006, threatened to eliminate the Zionist regime by one storm a clear reference to a nuclear attack. His predecessor, the more moderate Hashemi Rafsanjani speculated [in 2001] that in a nuclear exchange with Israel his country might lose 15 million people, which would amount to a small sacrifice from among the one billion Muslims worldwide in exchange for the lives of five million Israeli Jews. According to the journalist who interviewed him, he seemed pleased with his formulation.
These threats of a nuclear attack are being taken seriously by Israeli leaders, even if they are neither imminent nor certain. Israelis remember apocalyptic threats from an earlier dictator that were not taken seriously. This time those threatened have the military capacity to confront the danger and are likely to do so if it becomes more likely. Even if Israelis believe there is only a 5 per cent chance that Iran would attack Israel with nuclear weapons, the risk of national annihilation would be too great for any nation and most especially one built on the ashes of the Holocaust to ignore.
The Iranian leaders understand this. They take seriously the statements made by Israeli leaders that they will never accept a nuclear Iran under its present leadership. They fully expect an attack from Israel when they come close to producing a nuclear weapon. Why then are they not deterred by the realistic prospect of an Israeli pre-emptive (or preventive) strike? For three related reasons. First, an Israeli attack would be a limited, surgical strike (or series of strikes). It would not be accompanied by a full-scale invasion, occupation and regime change. Second, it would only delay production of a nuclear bomb, because it would be incomplete. Some nuclear facilities would be missed or only damaged, because they are hardened and/or located in populated areas. The third and most important reason is that an attack by Israel would solidify the Iranian regime. It would make Iran into the victim of Zionist aggression and unify Muslims, both inside and outside of Iran, against their common enemies. I say enemies because regardless of what role the US played or did not play in an Israeli attack, the US would share the blame in the radical Islamic world.
I am not going so far as to argue that the Iranian leadership would welcome an Israeli attack, but it would quickly turn such an attack to its advantage. If matters get worse domestically for the Iranian regime if the nascent anti-Ahmadinejad democratic or secular movements were to strengthen Ahmadinejad might actually get to the point of welcoming, even provoking or faking, an attack from Israel. This is why the threat from Israel will not work as a deterrent.
So we have two threats: one from a superpower the US that can but wont bring about regime change. The other from a regional power Israel that may well attack but, if it does, will not only fail to produce regime change, but may actually strengthen the existing regime.
The Iranians will persist therefore in their efforts to secure nuclear weapons. Unless they are stopped or significantly delayed by military actions, they will become a nuclear power within a few years precisely how many is unknown and probably unknowable. Armed with nuclear weapons and ruled by religious fanatics, Iran will become the most dangerous nation in the world. There is a small but still real possibility that it could initiate a suicidal nuclear exchange with Israel. There is a far greater likelihood that it could hand over nuclear material to one of its terrorist surrogates or that some rogue elements could steal nuclear material. This would pose a direct threat to the United States and all its allies.
The world should not accept these risks if there are reasonable steps available to prevent or reduce them. The question remains: are any such steps feasible? Probably not, as long as the US remains bogged down in Iraq. History may well conclude that America and Britain fought the wrong preventive war against a country that posed no real threat, and that fighting that wrong war stopped them fighting the right preventive war against a country that did pose a danger to world peace.
Though the doctrine of preventive war is easily abused as it was in Iraq sometimes it is a necessary evil. The failure of Britain and France to wage a preventive war against Nazi Germany in the mid-1930s cost the world millions of lives. Will the same be said some day about the failure to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons?
Dersh goes awry on Iraq -- he can't, for example, tell us what we should have done instead of removing Saddam -- but he notes correctly that the longer we stay in Iraq, the more constrained we are (in some ways) with Iran. Yes, we present Iran with a nightmare in military planning by being on both sides of their country, but in the end that isn't important. The Iranians know we can strike from anywhere when we choose to do so.
The issue is a political one, in that the longer we're in Iraq, the less middle America is going to go along with a strike on Iran. We talk here at Rantburg about GWB making a move sometime in 2006 -- I'd like to think so, and reading between the lines here, you have to think Dersh wouldn't complain too loudly if we did -- but with the political situation in our country right now, it might very well precipitate an impeachment, as I could see RINOs and moderates folding. That would change only if Iran actually exploded a nuke, but the Dhimmicrats would then spin on a dime and charge Bush with being too late. It's going to be a gruesome situation for GWB, and in many ways, a much tougher decision than Iraq was.
Dersh is also correct in noting Israel's predicament: they're simply too small, and even the superb IAF isn't going to be able to knock out enough of Iran's nuclear capability to duplicate what they did with Iraq and Osirak. That means Iran, having survived the hit, becomes the big cahuna for all the crazy Islamicists out there. And I don't think Israel gets a second bite at the apple.
Perhaps Dershowitz has another essay planned on what we're supposed to do with live with a nuclear Iran.
Alan Dershowitz is a professor of law at Harvard University. His latest book, Preemption: A Knife That Cuts Both Ways, is published in the UK by WW Norton & Co.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/24/2006 00:12 ||
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#1
Given the general inferiority of world Muslim armed forces against either America-West or Russia-CHina, I strongly doubt Iran's fanatical Mullahs andor MadMoud will give up its mil nucprogs even in the name of peace. The GWOT for the Left and Amer's enemies > the defeat and control of America, among other precepts or premises. The former have no hope of attaining nation/ideo-specific "manifest destiny" against the still-expanding American hyper-power [2005 Gross Global GDP = US$700+ Trillion minima]. This is why the Failed/Angry Left came up with its 2015-2020 timeline for America to unilater accept Leftism-Socialism and Socialist World Order. AMERICA CANNOT ACCEPT RADICAL IRAN HAVING THE BOMB UNLESS IT AND OUR ALLIES IN THE ME ARE ASO WILLING TO ACCEPT IRAN-CENTRIC EMPIRE AND HEGEMONY - NO DIFFERENT THAN FOR NORTH KOREA, WHOSE EMPIRE IN ASIA IS THE SAME AS SAYING CHINESE EMPIRE. FROM REGIONAL EMPIRE WILL COME GLOBAL EMPIRE, aka OWG/NWO. Global Muslim Theocratic State = same as saying GLOBAL GOD/FAITH-BASED SOCIALISM. Always remember that FASCISM in CLINTON-SPEAK > same as DE-REGULATED/COMPETITIVE COMMUNISM-LEFTSOCIALISM. Is also why for BURTHA-ISM, i.e. publicly obscenely criticizing the alleged Left-hated, despicable un-American Bush Fascist agenda but then voting for it later. On another note, also remember that MadMoud wants his personal ideo-Apocalypse, his 12th Imam whom will induce a follow-on world-wide Apocalypse for all faiths and nations. WE ALREADY KNOW FROM NUMEROUS BLOGGERS ON THE NET THAT THE UNDERLYNG PREMISE OF THE RUSSIA-CHINA-DOMIN SHANGHAI COOP IS THE PROMOTION OF COMMUNISM [as anything but Communism]. We must attack and democratize Iran, for the same reasons America must defend its democratic Allies in Asia from Chinese plans for Asia-wide and Pacific hegemony -OUR INACTION = MIL DEFEAT WILL BE INTERPRETED AS DE FACTO WEAKNESS, WITH FOLLOW-ON, INTENSIFIED DEMANDS BY AMERICA'S ENEMIES FOR CONCESSIONS AND TERRITORIES. INEVITABLY, AMERICA'S ENEMIES WILL DEMAND THAT AMERICANS MUST NO LONGER GOVERN OR CONTROL THEIR OWN COUNTRY. A nuclearized, weaponized Iran = Iranian empire = America's democratic sovereign ME allies, from Israel to Turkey to Egypt, etal. are just so much future deadmeat, like post-Nixon SOUTH VIETNAM(S).
#3
Dershowitz is square on when Israel is at stake, on matters of law and politics; off-the-mark when Israel is not concerned; however, he does not know squat about military capabilities or operations in either case.
In a way, you could say he sees the US military as being like the Israeli military, but a little bit larger. This is a common misconception in the Mideast.
From the US military history perspective, things are very different. We almost never start a war, we get provoked by our enemies first, so that "we are in the right." Remember that Saddam, prior to Gulf War II, had been shooting at our aircraft in the northern no-fly zone for well over a year.
So first, factor in (the US goading Iran into) attacking first. If we can present them with an irresistable target at just the right time, with them thinking it is a slam dunk, and they attack, the entire situation changes. It is a popular war, even if the attack fails miserably. It was against *US*, America.
The second factor is that the only weapon of theirs we are concerned about is their missiles, if we know they don't have a nuke yet. So if we can take out their missiles in flight and on the ground, the rest of the fight can be from the air, slowly and methodically.
Very much unlike Iraq, our military goals against Iran are in some ways almost the opposite. We want to eradicate their military and Revolutionary Guard. To slaughter them. And we want to partition Iran, until just Persia is left. And we want to reduce their nuclear facilities.
We want to devastate Persia, having partitioned Iran to take away the resources they would need to rebuilt a nuclear arsenal. They would be stripped of oil and money.
We may not even want to decapitate their government. Just leave them there to enjoy the fruits of their labors, until their own people put their heads on poles.
#4
Face it Alan, outside of the courtroom you're full of Kool Aid. Get out of NY, the Hamptons, the coccoon and get around more. You're in the Echo Chamber of Stupidity and BDS and you've been had. Intellectual gang-rape seems an appropriate term.
Go have a long talk with Sharansky. Don't argue, just listen. Then sit down, thank your lucky stars that there are people who know a hell of a lot more than you do about matters, particularly military matters, and have the stones you lack to do the right thing. Then think again. Oh, while you're getting your education outside of the Ivory Tower of Babble, do STFU. See you in court after the steel rain.
1) if Americans indeed neglect to defang Iran because of politico/military reasons described above, they are actually signing their last will and testament by initiating the beginning of the Syno-Iranian (and perhaps/-Russian)Block which will devastate the US Hegemony in less than 10 years.
2) America (Bush ?) have no choice - Its now or never ! In five years Iran will distribute a few portable nukes to a few terrorist orgs and then deny any connection to them. What will follow will probably decapitate the US as a World Power.
3) It has been proven that fundamentalists (even smart ones like the Iranians)do not act rationally. Therefore the West in general and US in particular cannot assume that things will proceed in a way which would be predictable from a strategic/military analysis perspective.
4) Irrespective of Dersh's basic assumptions, someone at the Pentagon will have to think up a way of timely stopping the Nuclearization of Iran. It may even be that inaction on the US side will push Israel into striking a first blow with the hope that in the ensuing chaos the US will have to intervene and complete the job.
Posted by: Elder of Zion ||
04/24/2006 13:44 Comments ||
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#8
Dershowitz (and Mr. Steve White) are dead on, and if you hadn't noticed, Dershowitz was looking beyond US military capabilities. There's no debate that both Iraq and Iran can be taken on simultaneously. That's not where the problem lies, literally and figuratively.
he can't, for example, tell us what we should have done instead of removing Saddam
I think it was implied that he should have been left alone, although he is speaking with 20/20 hindsight. But still, knowing what you know now, would you have gone after Saddam? ...and that's what Dershowitz is saying.
Posted by: rafael ||
04/24/2006 13:55 Comments ||
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#9
EoZ, if losing American superiority in the world is your sole concern, then you've got other problem areas besides Iran.
As to #3, it is yet to be gauged whether Iranian people, those non-fundamentalists, are rational or irrational. That's the biggest key in this whole thing, and it should be used to maximum advantage if it is favourable.
Posted by: rafael ||
04/24/2006 14:04 Comments ||
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#10
Rafael,
Losing US Hegemony is only one of my concerns.
What I was trying to say was more along the lines of the possible beginning of a war between civilizations. The immediate consequences may be loss of US influence but this may later be followed by deterioration of Western liberal democratic regimes all over the globe.
In a way I believe the Iranian Nuclearization program is a symptom of the real disease (non-western fundamentalist world view).
Regarding #3, I totally agree that this (if possible) would be a much better way of defanging (if it works) with a much cleaner outcome. The only problem is you cant be sure it will work (see Iraq, they should have understood by now).
Posted by: Elder of Zion ||
04/24/2006 14:54 Comments ||
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#11
"It would make Iran into the victim of Zionist aggression and unify Muslims, both inside and outside of Iran,"
How many times have we heard this and it never comes to pass. The 'Arab Seething Masses' senario. They may whine but they can't do nuthin' about an Isreali attack.
#12
"The question remains: are any such steps feasible? Probably not, as long as the US remains bogged down in Iraq."
I'm a little skeptical of this "bogged down in Iraq" mantra we keep hearing over and over.
I don't have much in the way of facts to back up that skepticism, just a very, VERY strong gut feel that our troops are a probably a LOT more, shall we say, "available for use" than the media and the punditocracy are telling us.
Common sense tells me that establishing a large land base for American forces in the heart of the Middle East, one with ready access to all three foci of evil in the area-- Syria, Iran and Saudi Arabia-- was a major (though not much discussed) objective behind the drive to oust Saddam. And its a little hard for me to believe we're not yet in a position to use it.
Does anyone have any hard, factual information on how many of our troops in Iraq are doing things that simply cannot be interrupted, not even for an operation to decapitate the Iranian government and destroy its nuclear toys?
My hunch is, we've got ample manpower.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
04/24/2006 17:48 Comments ||
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#13
Yo think those generals that were griping about Rummy were just spreading disinformation to deceive the MMs? Stranger things have happened.
Posted by: mac ||
04/24/2006 23:24 Comments ||
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#14
If we do nothing about the M²s of Iran and they get nukes, then many thousands or millions of people will be killed and/or injured or maimed by nuclear weapons going off in the hands of nutcases, as well as probable retaliations from the US, France, et al.
If we take out the sites and the M²s, then everyone will jump up and down and hate the Big Bad US. But many thousands or millions of people will be spared a horrible death or maiming by nukes. So what is the choice again?
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
04/24/2006 23:44 Comments ||
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#15
If we take out the sites and the M²s, then everyone will jump up and down and hate the Big Bad US. But many thousands or millions of people will be spared a horrible death or maiming by nukes. So what is the choice again?
Paul,
That may be a dilemma for the usual suspects quislings but not for us!
In it, the speaker identified as Bin Laden described the situation in Iraq and Sudan's troubled Darfur region as evidence of a "Zionist-Crusader war against Islam", referring to Israel and Christian states.
He called for Islamist militants to prepare for a "long war against the Crusader plunderers in western Sudan".
"Our goal is not defending the Khartoum government but to defend Islam, its land and its people," he added.
Both sides in the Darfur conflict are predominantly Muslim and one rebel group is linked to a Sudanese Islamist group.[1]
The thing is, bin Laden is absolutely wrong about there being a "Crusader-Zionist" conspiracy. (I wish!) We are doing absolutely nothing to help African Christians and Animist fight Islam. And no wonder; helping them would weaken both the policy advanced by the present Republican administration and the policy favored by the Democratic opposition.
The Republican administration favors "The Forward Strategy of Freedom", e.i., promoting "Democracy" in the "Arab" world.
It is hard to know what the Democrats favor, since they'd rather win by default than engage in a battle of ideas, but whatever it is it will surely involve a lot of apologizing for non-existing sins and pointless diplomacy. Let's call it, with deliberate abusiveness, "The Hasty Retreat of Cowardice."
The Forward Strategy of Freedom is praised on the grounds it will earn us the love of the all-powerful, always fickle, Arab Street; that is, since we will be advancing the interest of the ordinary Muslims, they will love us for it. But if we fight against Muslims, again, in Africa, this will make it easier for the Islamist propagandists to paint the U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as a "Crusader and Zionist conspiracy."
The Hasty Retreat of Cowardice criticizes The Forward Strategy of Freedom for not being "pro-Arab"[2] (read: pro-Islam) enough. In their worldview, we must demostrate our love for Islam by defending the "great faith" at every turn, or at least being an "honest broker" in conflicts where Islam is involved.[3] We must push the Israelis to make concessions, the Phillipinos to initiate a dialogue with their Islamic terrorists, etc.
Both The Forward Strategy of Freedom and The Hasty Retreat of Cowardice are premised on the urgent need to change "the hearts and minds" of Muslims. They want the enemy to love us. This is allegedly morally better than killing the enemy and destroying its will to fight because fewer people would die, it will lead to a more permanent peace, and whatever other utopian fantasies I have forgotten. But even granting such a thing is likely, let alone possible, we are forgetting the hidden cost of such policies: we are abandoning victims of naked aggression to their fates. The bodies of dead Africans, the cries of raped women and enslaved children speak against the moral superiority of the utopian policies.
Notes:
[1]The blacks under aggression in Darfur are indeed Muslims. To which I say; let them kill each other. That should be the price for following the teachings of the warlord Mohammad. On the other hand, the peoples under aggression in southeast Sudan are not Muslim. We should help them. (It is quite telling "the International Community" did not pay attention to the Sudanese civil war until the victims of aggression were Muslim.)
[2]Why is the racial term "Arab" favored to the detriment of the proper, religious term, "Muslim?" To protect Islam's image and tar critics of Islam as racists, of course.
[3]Intervening in the Yugoslavian civil war on behalf of Muslims earned us the contempt of Muslims and has lead to the creation of a de facto Islamist State in Europe. Those are the wages of utopian idealism.
Yergin does cover all the same ground though I suspect from a somewhat different perspective! We will see. My "century of war" is winging its way to me on $75 bbl i.e. petrol @ 100p litre.
Now, peak oil is of course the reason given by folk to suggest that the current high prices are here to stay and not what they actually are which is this - perhaps the "mother of all commodity cycles" (sorry, couldnt resist). Heres how it happened and what I think will happen next
1. OPEC underinvested as their domestic budgets spiraled and oil prices collapsed though the 1990's. Spending could not be cut as the bankrupt undemocratic govts of OPEC have to stuff their populations mouths with gold to keep them quiet which incidentally is the major reason for their catosptrophic failure to develop non-oil economies hence perpetuating the "oil curse"
2. As globalisation rolled out, the information revolution alongside, and in particular as China decided to join the anglo-saxon global economy and lift themselves out of poverty, a massive demand surge unparrallelled in the history of oil demand has led to tight markets with the global shock absorber of OPEC spare capacity (the real OPEC "secret deal with the west" - higher prices in return for price stabilisation) left at all time lows.
3. At the same time the very same forces of globalisation and in particular the end of the foreclosure of Muslim societies by satellite TV, mobile phones, internet etc. have led to the clash of civlisations as threatened Muslim powers lash out in all directions and play to fundamentalism. The resulting fear of supply interruption that would not have much affected oil markets in normal times now causes massive rises due to the lack off spare capacity.
4. Due to the new low interest rate / low yield environment of the global economy, the rise of return hungry hedge funds and the deep and liquid oil market (easy(er) to risk manage) speculative funds have been placed in commodity markets on a historically unparralelled scale. The CBOT commitments of Traders report shows these flows have recently been at a historical record maximum net long for non-commerial investors (non oil industry ie. speculative)
5. Supply has not been able to respond at its usual pace in previous price spikes because
a. OPEC's share of reserves is rising and western oil companies are locked out with domestic monopolies, almost totally politically controlled, given the sole rights. It is these same companies that failed to invest causing the spike in the first place! Only now are modest (given their massive reserves and the pitifully low cost and great ease of extracting them) production expansions underway in OPEC
b. non-OPEC supply is rising now but was slow as western oil companies refused to raise their planning hurdle rates. This has now happened with BP looking at $40 LT with probably a real "internal" hurdle rate of $30/bbl. non-OPEC new production opportunities are also increassingly limited as reserves fall and environmental pressures are applied.
6. In this tight supply high price environment enriched govts are beginning to think they can p*ss around like silly schoolboy bullies (Russia and Iran) and play a bit of mob politics (that will of course cause their peoples untold economic damage regardless of what other effects they elicit).
Leading us to today. So what next?
Well. These high prices are being borne by the world economy in large part because
a. the developed western economies are only half as oil dependent (as a % of GDP) as in 1970 - less metal bashing (sob)
b. the developing world has such massive momentum from its huge pool of cheap labour that higher oil prices, although a significant proportion of costs, can easily be absorbed as we see in China
c. globalisation is perhaps the greatest leap forward in humanities welath creation potential since the industrial revolution. Its simply unstoppable!! (with perhaps a few recession son the way along the medium/long term steep uptrend - not perfect Goel LOL)
So crazy high prices (3 times the cost of the most expensive current production!!) may well continue. But this means that conventional oil will increasingly be displaced as new fuels and new energy sources are developed because they are now cheaper than oil. In time, perhaps less time than anyone can imagine, without OPEC action, this could spell the end of the oil age.
And that is why what WILL happen is that OPEC will collapse the market, kill the threat to oil as the power source of the world and return to business as usual. They HAVE to. Saudi has at least 100 years of production. What will it be worth if the oil age ends?
But there is such momentum away from OPEC oil already that a painful and long collapse may well be required. $10 barrels anyone? For a number of years?
As I say, the "mother of all commodity cycles"
And thats why the myth of peak oil lies at the bottom of all this. Because the only reason this wont happen is if there isnt masses of cheap oil still left.
#1
Flying out of Austin a few months back, I sat next to a senior geologist. He figured mother earth was still in the oil producing business. He also said there was plenty remaining, the challenge was getting at it.
#2
Nah, the problem is risk. The wellhead cost of oil in the major Middle East oilfields is $1.50/b and the industry worries that is the real floor price of oil. Developing oilfields that have much higher costs sets them up to lose enormous amounts of money, even though as the author points out the higher costs may be less than a third of the current price.
However, he is dead wrong about higher oil prices encouraging 'alternative fuels'. Higher prices will encourage production of oil from alternative sources. The reasons are the enormous inertia in how energy is consumed and basic economics.
#5
Time to establish the $10 bbl tariff for any price below $25 a barrel, let's have foreign suppliers start paying off our debts. God knows we've paid enough of theirs over the years.
#6
phil_b: Nah, the problem is risk. The wellhead cost of oil in the major Middle East oilfields is $1.50/b and the industry worries that is the real floor price of oil.
I agree. The ultimate problem with people who talk about alternatives to oil as an energy source is that there aren't any, cost-wise. Oil is the preferred energy source for several reasons - it is cheap to produce, packed with energy and easy to transport. Given its other characteristics, as long as oil is cheap to produce, it will remain the preferred energy source. The world doesn't have an addiction to oil - it has an addiction to cheap energy. And it's pointless for Americans to migrate to machinery that use more expensive (to produce and to buy) energy sources, because oil prices would simply fall to accomodate the drop in demand due to our self-imposed abstinence - benefitting our economic competitors at our expense. Think of these cockamamie schemes as an American subsidy to foreign oil consumers.
Let the market work its will - as oil prices spike, countries that use oil for power generation will switch to more economical sources, like nuclear or coal power. People will start switching over to more fuel-efficient cars. Living closer to work will come into vogue again, as monthly gasoline bills start approaching $400 a month. Bottom line is that it's silly to get too worried about gas prices - if they go up, we will simply use less of it. Life will go on. And not resemble anything like a scene out of Road Warrior.
Do you worry? You look like you do. Worrying is the way the responsible citizen of an advanced society demonstrates his virtue: He feels good by feeling bad.
But what to worry about? Iranian nukes? Nah, that's just some racket cooked up by the Christian fundamentalist Bush and his Zionist buddies to give Halliburton a pretext to take over the Persian carpet industry. Worrying about nukes is so '80s. "They make me want to throw up. . . . They make me feel sick to my stomach," wrote the British novelist Martin Amis, who couldn't stop thinking about them 20 years ago. In the intro to a collection of short stories, he worried about the Big One and outlined his own plan for coping with a nuclear winter wonderland:
"Suppose I survive," he fretted. "Suppose my eyes aren't pouring down my face, suppose I am untouched by the hurricane of secondary missiles that all mortar, metal and glass has abruptly become: Suppose all this. I shall be obliged (and it's the last thing I feel like doing) to retrace that long mile home, through the firestorm, the remains of the thousands-miles-an-hour winds, the warped atoms, the groveling dead. Then -- God willing, if I still have the strength, and, of course, if they are still alive -- I must find my wife and children and I must kill them."
But the Big One never fell. And instead of killing his wife Martin Amis had to make do with divorcing her. Back then it was just crazies like Reagan and Thatcher who had nukes, so you can understand why everyone was terrified. But now Kim Jong-Il and the ayatollahs have them, so we're all sophisticated and relaxed about it, like the French hearing that their president's acquired a couple more mistresses. Martin Amis hasn't thrown up a word about the subject in years. To the best of my knowledge, he has no plans to kill the present Mrs. Amis.
So what should we worry about? How about -- stop me if you've heard this one before -- "climate change"? That's the subject of Al Gore's new movie, ''An Inconvenient Truth.'' Like the trailer says: "If you love your planet -- if you love your children -- you have to see this movie." Even if you were planning to kill your children because you don't want them to live in a nuclear wasteland, see this movie. The mullahs won't get a chance to nuke us because, thanks to rising sea levels, Tehran will be under water. The editor of the New Yorker, David Remnick, says the Earth will "likely be an uninhabitable planet." The archbishop of Canterbury, in a desperate attempt to cut the Anglican Communion a slice of the Gaia-worship self-flagellation action, demands government "coercion" on everything from reduced speed limits to ending cheap air travel "if we want the global economy not to collapse and millions, billions of people to die."
Environmentalism doesn't need the support of the church, it's a church in itself -- and furthermore, one explicitly at odds with Christianity: God sent His son to Earth as a man, not as a three-toed tree sloth or an Antarctic krill. An environmentalist can believe man is no more than a co-equal planet dweller with millions of other species, and that he's taking up more than his fair share and needs to reduce both his profile and his numbers. But that's profoundly hostile to Christianity.
Oh, and here's my favorite -- Dr. Sue Blackmore looking on the bright side in Britain's Guardian:
"In all probability billions of people are going to die in the next few decades. Our poor, abused planet cannot take much more. . . . If we decide to put the planet first, then we ourselves are the pathogen. So we should let as many people die as possible, so that other species may live, and accept the destruction of civilization and of everything we have achieved.
"Finally, we might decide that civilization itself is worth preserving. In that case we have to work out what to save and which people would be needed in a drastically reduced population -- weighing the value of scientists and musicians against that of politicians, for example."
Hmm. On the one hand, Dr. Sue Blackmore and the bloke from Coldplay. On the other, Dick Cheney. I think we can all agree which people would be "needed" -- Al Gore, the guy from the New Yorker, perhaps Scarlett Johansson in a fur-trimmed bikini paddling a dugout canoe through a waterlogged Manhattan foraging for floating curly endives from once-fashionable eateries.
Here's an inconvenient truth for "An Inconvenient Truth": Remember what they used to call "climate change"? "Global warming." And what did they call it before that? "Global cooling." That was the big worry in the '70s: the forthcoming ice age. Back then, Lowell Ponte had a huge best seller called The Cooling: Has the new ice age already begun? Can we survive?
The answer to the first question was: Yes, it had begun. From 1940 to 1970, there was very slight global cooling. That's why the doom-mongers decided the big bucks were in the new-ice-age blockbusters.
And yet, amazingly, we've survived. Why? Because in 1970 the planet stopped its very slight global cooling and began to undergo very slight global warming. So in the '80s, the doom-mongers cast off their thermal underwear, climbed into the leopardskin thongs, slathered themselves in sun cream and wired their publishers to change all references to "cooling" to "warming" for the paperback edition. That's why, if you notice, the global-warming crowd begin their scare statistics with "since 1970," an unlikely Year Zero which would not otherwise merit the significance the eco-crowd invest in it.
But then in 1998 the planet stopped its very slight global warming and began to resume very slight global cooling. And this time the doom-mongers said, "Look, do we really want to rewrite the bumper stickers every 30 years? Let's just call it 'climate change.' That pretty much covers it."
Why did the Earth cool between 1940 and 1970?
Beats me. Hitler? Hiroshima? Maybe we need to nuke someone every couple of decades.
Meanwhile, Blackmore won't have to worry about whether to cull Jacques Chirac in order to save Sting. Given the plummeting birthrates in Europe, Russia, Japan, etc., a large chunk of the world has evidently decided to take preemptive action on climate change and opt for self-extinction. Pace the New Yorker, much of the planet will be uninhabited long before it's uninhabitable. The Belgian climate specialist will be on the endangered species list with the spotted owl. Blue-state eco-bores will be finding the international sustainable-development conferences a lot lonelier.
As for the merits of scientists and artists over politicians, those parts of the world still breeding are notable for their antipathy to music, haven't done much in the way of science for over a millennium, and politics-wise incline mostly to mullahs, nuclear or otherwise. Scrap Scarlett Johansson's fur-trimmed bikini and stick her in a waterlogged burqa.
....and the answer is more government, more taxes, more regulation, more public funded grants for more studies.
People get tooth decay....
....and the answer is more government, more taxes, more regulation, more public funded grants for more studies.
People get hurt by criminals....
....and the answer is more government, more taxes, more regulation, more public funded grants for more studies.
Some places get polluted....
....and the answer is more government, more taxes, more regulation, more public funded grants for more studies.
A couple of decades of "climate change", in any direction?
....and the answer is more government, more taxes, more regulation, more public funded grants for more studies.
When the response to every "crisis", real or perceived, is to advance the causes of regulation and socialism, one wonders what the actual objective might be.
As the bear said to the hunter in the old joke, "You're not really out here hunting, are you?"
Posted by: no mo uro ||
04/24/2006 6:56 Comments ||
Top||
#3
My favourite quote on the subject is from the Chief Scientific Advisor (on climate change) to the UK Government, King, "By the end of the century, Antartica will be the only habitable continent."
#5
And instead of killing his wife Martin Amis had to make do with divorcing her.
ROFLMAO!
Seriously, there's been life on this ball of rock for over 3 billion years. It's been much hotter in the past than it is now. Life will go on. We will go on.
Other than adding 3 oz. of pure acetone to your full tank of gas, which some people swear will give you 25% better fuel efficiency, and others swear will destroy your car, what can be done to make gasoline more affordable?
Simple: Suspend the federal gasoline tax. Instead of paying $3 a gallon at the tank, you will only be paying $2.40, which beats a jab with a pointed stick.
But why has no one in the federal government ever even suggested such a thing? Not as long-term tax relief, but just as a short-term easing.
It seems reasonable. The federal government is more than willing to absorb the increase in its tax revenue when the price of gasoline goes up. So why not at least fix a ceiling to the federal tax, so the public doesn't get doubly-gouged when the price of gas is exhorbitant?
The American economy runs on gasoline and diesel fuel. For the relative pittance of only hundreds of millions of dollars that tax brings in over the few weeks of a fuel price spike, all of that transportation brings to the government tens of billions of tax revenue from an economy less weakened by high fuel prices.
I find it hard to think of a better, purer election issue than to temporarily suspend the gas tax. It is almost like offering to buy voters a glass of beer--an old American tradition.
#1
KRISTOL on FOX AND FRIENDS argued that private companies only earn an average of 25 cents or less per gallon of gas, which according to him was low by any corporate standard. The AMer audience was reminded by the panel that Euros are already paying US$4-6.00 per gallon, while Japan and Asia pay much more. The rest is payout to foreign suppliers + US Gov-specific subsidation of inflows from Amer and foreign companies in order to keep US domestic prices low. When Dems complain about high gas prices for consumers, what they are indurectly arguing for is higher US-specific Government payout/subsidation, i.e. Socialism, NOT the free market.
#2
what can be done to make gasoline more affordable?
A) Harness up the usual suspects.
Moose,
Blew up a low mileage 327 small block when I was a kid doing experiments with fuels: acetone, lacquer thinner and more..yes i went haywire overboard and ran it hard. Do it at your own risk.
Basically from the factory your average engine is "detuned" for a reason, that be longevity.
If you "hot rod" an engine mecanically, it will go faster but it will also work harder too. You *will* drive it harder and it won't last as long, that is unless you drive it like a little old lady.
fuel additives can work also, but untested or unapproved fuel additives can detrimentally effect the main lubricant.. oil [blow by the rings etc]
nitro is a fuel additive! :)
My brother in law used to blow up engines in his nitro street cars all the time.
ON TOPIC: what can be done to make gasoline more affordable?
A) drive like a little old lady, it saves gas but kills the innocent.
#3
RD: I gather the acetone principal is *not* to raise the fuel rating. The theory is that gasoline has inefficient vaporization, and that a tiny amount of acetone breaks the surface tension, thus allowing more complete combustion.
The max limit is 3oz per 10 gallons, less than 1% of your fuel. Any more than that and it *will* raise your fuel rating, and ironically, your fuel efficiency will go down.
Some attribute the increased efficiency to acetone working as a solvent on engine deposits, but that is an unlikely theory, given the observational results.
The best advice I saw from the pro-acetone crowd was to only use the trick during peak gas prices, then go back to gas only when the price falls.
#4
Oil is no more expensive than milk, which we produce here and don't need to ship across oceans in supertankers or continents in thousand mile long pipelines. So the level of oil prices is not the primary problem.
The volatility of oil prices due to the world's reliance on low cost oil from the politically volatile regions of the world. (I think a case can be made that oil itself makes a region volatile.) We have a more than adequate supply of oil in the U. S. All we have to do is keep the price above $50 per barrel, adjusted for inflation. An oil import fee that achieves this goal will stimulate domestic production that will have less price volatility than imported oil.
It will send fewer dollars to the Saudis and Hugo.
It will stimulate conservation.
It will eventually (decades) allow us to let the Arabs go back to being camel jockeys.
Raise import fees on oil and use the proceeds to reduce income taxex.
#5
NS - use it to reduce taxes OR ... use it to promote capital investment in alternative sources here?
Without some significant buffering, most companies would be reluctant to put in the risk capital needed for exploiting some of those domestic oil sources, I suspect.
I have great faith in the market and very little faith in the government. There is lots of capital sloshing around. If there is an opportunity for market rate profit, capital will flow. If there is not enough capital flowing, raise the import fee. All the buffering required is a floor on price so that investors can be confident of a return.
#8
Not sure the market will react the way you predict it will, is all.
Only one way to find out. I'm still not sure what kind of buffering you have in mind. I just get suspicious of governement picking winners instead of getting out of the way of private parties.
#9
Your approach is like a sledge hammer - it takes a "command economy" approach by setting an artificial value for oil.
A more targeted approach would be something along the lines of a 5-10 year tax deduction for capital investments in oil sand exploitation, i.e. if the intent is to offset the risk of investing in these techologies, offset it directly rather than manipulate the oil value itself.
Better yet, ALSO give a tax break to successful new technologies that bypass oil entirely.
#10
I agree that my proposal could be construed as a command economy type move, but we are subsidizing foreign oil through immense DoD command type expenditures now.
Your more targeted approach would become a permanent subsidy of a particular industry like the entire Department of Agriculture.
My goal is not just to induce investment and domestic supply. It is to reduce demand for foreign oil, whether by conservation, substitution or investment. I don't really have a preference which.
For example, I am currently replacing the furnace (#2 fuel oil) and a/c (elec) in my home. Straight replacement would probably be $6,000 and annual fuel of $3,500. Cost for a repalacement of an air-air heat pump with back-up propane furnace is about $10,000, with about $2,500 per year in fuel cost. If I install a geothermal heatpump the cost is $17,000 with annual fuel expense of maybe $1,500. The economics drive consumers not to go geothermal, even though it is the proper energy decision because they don't see the return quickly enough. If fuels contained their full cost (all that DoD expenditure) there would be a quicker payback. That's the kind of decision that targeted approaches miss.
#11
NS, there are two main problems with your approach.
1. It locks in windfall profits to existing producers.
2. No one knows what the right price is to get sufficient new supply. Is it $40?, $50?, $60?
More generally it doesn't address the real problem, which is to encourage new supply from sources that would not otherwise be developed because of cost and risk.
I'd argue that risk is a much bigger factor than cost, since essentially unlimited quantities of gasoline can be produced from coal for less than $40/b equivalent.
They way around these problems is for the government to invite tenders for supply over 20 years from new domestic sources only, where the bidder sets the price. There may well be problems deciding what is a new source, but its an 'at the margins' problem and can be managed.
This approach not only removes the price risk, it has the very consierable benefit of giving long term visibility to supply.
There are essentially 2 ourcomes.
One is oil prices stay high and the US gets security of supply and the government makes a lot of money.
The other is oil prices crash, and the economy gets cheap oil and security of supply, but the government picks up a big bill.
#13
Free markets are not the solution because the oil market is controlled by cartels of governmental monopolies. Even in the freewheeling days of the Trexas Oil Patch, it was a series of boom, cuthroat competition, and bust until the Texas Railroad Commission stepped in to regulate the market.
No sane capitalists are goining to invest hundred of billions $ on oil substitutes in the $30-40/barrel range when Middle Eastern enemies can load crude onto tankers for $4/barrel. The source of the problem are hostile foreign governments manipulating markets and the greatest part of the solution will have to come the US government distorting the market. That means taking away the risk from alternative producers that they will be wiped out when oil drops to $20.
One way is for the feds to make long term contracts to buy synfuels (mostly coal, shale and tarsands), at a reasonable profit to producers. The production then can be sold by the gov at market prices. An alternative is to tax oil and gas imports high enough that that synfuels production becomes attractive. Either way, like in food production, the tax payer will have to take on more of the investment risk.
Besides an electric economy based on standardized nuclear reactors (another topic), I prefer a combination of long term synfuels contracts and sliding scale oil import taxes to shift the economics to domestic production. In the long run, it will ensure lower energy prices less susceptible to foreign manipulation. Also the wealth will be kept within the country and away form those to try to kill us.
Posted by: ed ||
04/24/2006 19:59 Comments ||
Top||
#14
1. It locks in windfall profits to existing producers.
So what? Now the Sauds and MM get the windfall profit and use it to kill us. Existing domestic producers are most likely to reinvest the profits in other domestic sources of energy, so I don't really have a problem
2. No one knows what the right price is to get sufficient new supply. Is it $40?, $50?, $60?
I'd argue that risk is a much bigger factor than cost, since essentially unlimited quantities of gasoline can be produced from coal for less than $40/b equivalent.
Those statements seem contradictory to me. Somehow we can find the right price, even if by trial and error.
They way around these problems is for the government to invite tenders for supply over 20 years from new domestic sources only, where the bidder sets the price. There may well be problems deciding what is a new source, but its an 'at the margins' problem and can be managed.
That's how the Department of Agriculture builds mountains of cheese.
#17
NS, if you invite bids for supply, the market sets the price. Its akin to a futures market where suppliers enter into a contract to supply amount x, at time y, and price z. Most business transactions are like this for the very simple reason businesses need forward visibility for planning and budgeting purposes.
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Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
