Friday, April 25, 2003
A few headlines before I head out to the weekend (via salon.com):
- "Clerics call for Islamic state in Iraq" Which begs the question, what happens if the Iraqis democratically elect a theocratic government?
- "U.S. to consider North Korea sanctions" That situation threatens to escalate into an Asian nuclear arms race.
More reading, from Mother Jones, "The Thirty-Year Itch." Mar/Apr 2003.
"U.S. strategists aren't worried primarily about America's own oil supplies; for decades, the United States has worked to diversify its sources of oil, with Venezuela, Nigeria, Mexico, and other countries growing in importance. But for Western Europe and Japan, as well as the developing industrial powers of eastern Asia, the Gulf is all-important. Whoever controls it will maintain crucial global leverage for decades to come.
Today, notes (the U.S. Energy Information Administration's (EIA), G. Daniel) Butler, two-thirds of Gulf oil goes to Western industrial nations."
Which I read to mean the war IS about oil -- but for power not (just) for profit
</Aurelius> <!--5:07 PM-->Some reading for later "National Strategy to Combat Weapons of Mass Destruction." December 2002 from the White House. Probably best complemented by "The National Security Strategy of the United States of America." Some thick reading.
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