Iraq Oil Report

The U.S. media blew up, and the Bush administration responded, when the 20 words from former Fed. Reserve Chair Alan Greenspan’s new book called out the oil motive for the Iraq war.

Greenspan utilized his 15 minutes on the book circuit to explain what he meant to say, an apparent attempt to take the heat off of Pres. Bush.

With the word of war with Iran (no. 2 in both oil and gas reserves) heating up, Greenspan’s explanation is all the more vivid: those who depend on oil will protect the supply.

For more, read my piece today for UPI.

“He is wrong. Oil was not and is not a motivation for our actions in Iraq,” the U.S. State Department’s coordinator for Iraq, David Satterfield, said after a speech at the Center for Strategic & International Studies the same day.

“I’m not saying that they believed it was about oil. I’m saying it is about oil and that I believe it was necessary to get Saddam out of there,” Greenspan said.

In other words, he’s not saying the Iraq war was launched because of Iraq’s oil, but Iraq’s oil was a reason — along with now discredited allegations Saddam had weapons of mass destruction and links to al-Qaida — to launch the Iraq war.

“When we went into Iraq, I said it’s all about getting rid of Saddam Hussein,” said Robert Ebel, senior adviser in the Energy Program at CSIS. “Once we got rid of Saddam Hussein, then the day after it would be about oil.”

More on Iraq Oil

Bush/Petraeus/Crocker kept repeating last week the fact that the oil pipeline from Kirkuk to Turkey was reopened after spending most of the war years under attack and out of commission, a small sign of progress. A bomb blast Tuesday morning corrected that.

Total and Chevron announced earlier this year they’ve joined forces to bid for Iraq’s oil development. Hassan Hafidh of Dow Jones Newswires reports the duo has now pitched a development study to the Iraq Oil Ministry on the huge Majnoon field, though the Ministry says it will not give them preferential treatment in bidding.

Shipments of preferred price oil are heading to Jordan now.

Fending off attacks on the oil pipelines and power infrastructure around Baghdad requires Russian helicopters on shoot-to-kill orders.

The fuel shortage is now threatening southern Iraq’s once vibrant fishing industry.

The Hunt for Hunt Oil

As I warned when Texas-based Hunt Oil first signed a production contract with the Kurdistan Regional Government, the Bush-connected CEO would be in the cross-hairs.

Janet Ritz writes for the Huffington Post:

Which leads to questions about the Bush Administration’s involvement in the deal, given that Ray L. Hunt, the head of Hunt Oil (and one of President Bush’s guests to the May, 2007 State Dinner for Queen Elizabeth II), was appointed to a two two-year terms on President Bush’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board …
Established by Eisenhower in 1956, the PFIAB was formed “as a nonpartisan body offering the President objective, expert advice on the conduct of U.S. foreign intelligence.” The question then becomes, considering the known oil affiliations within the current administration, how objective is that advice and how is information from the board being utilized by its membership?

Paul Krugman writes in The New York Times that the deal directly conflicts with official U.S. policy to prop up Baghdad, not so much Irbil.

What’s interesting about this deal is the fact that Mr. Hunt, thanks to his policy position, is presumably as well-informed about the actual state of affairs in Iraq as anyone in the business world can be. By putting his money into a deal with the Kurds, despite Baghdad’s disapproval, he’s essentially betting that the Iraqi government - which hasn’t met a single one of the major benchmarks Mr. Bush laid out in January - won’t get its act together. Indeed, he’s effectively betting against the survival of Iraq as a nation in any meaningful sense of the term.

Meanwhile, in Basra …

Sam Dagher writes an excellent three-part series for the Christian Science Monitor on the threats to safety, security and freedom in Basra. Most of Iraq’s oil is in or around Basra, and nearly all its oil exports head to the international market through there. Basra is arguably Iraq’s most important city.

Part 1: Basra Oil Fuels Fight to Control Iraq’s Economic Might

An exasperated senior official, who did not want to be identified for fear of retribution, describes the onslaught by parties and militias intent on controlling the company by forcing their loyalists into key management positions. Some are beholden to the Ministry of Oil in Baghdad, which is controlled by the United Iraqi Alliance (UIA), the dominant Shiite coalition to which Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki belongs.

“There is an invasion by parties and militias … we are a mouthwatering prize,” he says, adding that recently 8,000 people, most of them illiterate, were pushed on to the company’s payrolls.

Part 2: In The ‘Venice of the East,’ A History Of Diversity

The city’s cosmopolitan flair is evident in its people, cuisine, dance, and the music that once echoed on its streets.

The city was once full of different religious groups: Shiites, Sunnis, Christians of all sects, ancient communities like the Sabean Mandaeans, Armenians, and Jews. But most, other than the Shiites, have left.

Part 3: ‘Shiite Taliban’ Rises As British Depart Basra

The billboard in Umm al-Broom Square was meant to advertise a cellphone service. Instead, it has become a message to those who dare to resist the rising tide of fundamentalist Islam in Iraq’s second largest city.

The female model’s face is now covered with black paint. Graffiti scrawled below reads, “No! No to unveiled women.”

Politics and Security

My UPI colleague Shaun Waterman reports that Iraq’s government may want the Blackwater security forces out of Iraq, but they may not get it.

Iraqi Interior Ministry officials told reporters in Baghdad Monday they would revoke the company’s license and initiate criminal proceedings after Blackwater contractors providing security for U.S. diplomats allegedly opened fire from aircraft into a Baghdad street — killing 11 people, according to some reports.

The problem is, Blackwater does not have or need a license, and its employees are not subject to Iraqi criminal jurisdiction.

What the Iraq media is saying: the Iraq Press Roundup by UPI’s Hiba Dawood

University of Michigan’s Middle East expert Juan Cole talks to Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo about Anbar province now that the person Pres. Bush heralded as the leader of the anti-al-Qaida surge has been assassinated.

Investigative reporter Greg Palast writes Sheik Abu Risha wasn’t a leader in Anbar at all.
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A note about Monday’s post: there wasn’t one. Technology glitch. But today’s monster post should make up for it. More tomorrow.