NP? oil politics

[Doug Millison]

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=11860
"[...] But both bin Laden and Bush are well aware that the conflict also
represents a struggle for control over the greater Persian Gulf region --
the location of about two-thirds of the world's known petroleum reserves.
[...] This relationship has provided both parties with multiple benefits.
The United States has enjoyed favored access to Saudi Arabia's immense oil
reserves and earned many billions of dollars from the sale of advanced
weapons and other high-tech systems to the Saudi government. The Saudi
monarchy, for its part, has accumulated immense wealth from the sale of oil
and enjoyed relative immunity from foreign or domestic attack. [...] At no
point, however, has the United States considered reducing its dependence on
Middle Eastern oil or in altering its relationship with Saudi Arabia.
Indeed, the national energy policy released by the Bush administration last
spring called for a steady increase in U.S. petroleum imports from Saudi
Arabia and the other Gulf suppliers. For this reason, the report notes,
"The Gulf will be a primary focus of U.S. international energy policy."
[...] Although Osama bin Laden is not directly concerned with the flow of
oil from the Gulf and the Caspian Sea area, his determination to drive the
United States out of the area and replace existing governments with
militant Islamic regimes represents a direct threat to American oil
interests in the region. Thus, in fighting Al Qaeda, the United States has
two sets of objectives: first, to capture and punish those responsible for
the Sept. 11 attacks, and to prevent further acts of terrorism; and second,
to consolidate American power in the Persian Gulf and Caspian Sea area and
to ensure the continued flow of oil. And while the second set may get far
less public attention than the first, this does not mean that it is any
less important. [...]"
Michael T. Klare is a professor of peace and world security studies at
Hampshire College in Amherst, Mass., and the author of "Resource Wars: The
New Landscape of Global Conflict" (Metropolitan Books, 2001)