FuryNSX said:
One question about #2........
If we attacked some tiny 3rd world country (I'm assuming you mean Afghanistan) to install a gov't that allows us to build a pipeline to get oil from a newly found reserve in a neighboring country (I'm assuming this time Iraq), how do we get the oil & pipeline through Iran.
Well, it's not Iraq. I'll explain....
I copied most of this from an earlier post, but I'll add a couple things for you, so here it goes:
After the breakup of the Soviet Union, American oil companies flooded the former Soviet Republics with offers to allow them to come in and drill for oil. They paid particular attention to those Republics in the Caspian Sea region since this area was suspected to be rich with oil. Since most of these governments were bankrupt, many of them accepted the offers which usually involved large cash advances and then a percentage of the profits.
Some time around 1994-1995, UNOCAL and Chevron both found large oil reserves. UNOCAL found huge amounts of oil in Turkmenistan (estimated worth over $1 trillion) and Chevron discovered the largest natural gas reserve known in the world in Uzbekistan.
The problem was that they had no way to get this oil/gas out of there to sell on the world market as these countries are landlocked. The only oil pipelines that existed went north through Russia, and Russia was demanding 50% of the profit in order to use their pipelines.
So UNOCAL decided they would build their own pipeline to go South to the Indian Ocean. This way they could provide this oil to all the growing Asian markets such as India, Korea, Japan, etc. There are 3 possilbe routes for this pipeline:
1) go through China
2) go through Iran
3) go through Afghanistan and then through Pakistan
#3 was chosen and I'm sure I don't have to explain why. In late 1995, UNOCAL signed a $60 billion deal with a group of companies lead by General Electric to build the pipeline.
Afghanistan had a civil war going on though, so they had to delay the construction until there was peace in nothern Afghanistan as there was no way they could build through a war zone.
So UNOCAL lobbied the Clinton Administration to intervene to make peace there. He refused and instead sent cruise missles there in 1998 (following the African embassy bombings), which completely undermined UNOCAL's goals. So they had to wait until an oil friendly administration entered the White House.
At the time, it was thought that a pipeline deal could be easily negotiated with the Taliban. In 1998, Taliban officials even travelled to Houston to meet with UNOCAL executives and they were wined and dined and expensive gifts were purchased for them. (there were articles in Houston newspapers at the time)
So Bush took office in January 2001. During Colon Powell's first trip to the Middle East & Central Asia, he stopped in Pakistan and while there, he met with the Taliban ambassador and gave him a gift of $43 million in aid. When questioned by the Pakistani press, he said this gift was to reward their excellent policies related to cracking down on opium (heroine) production. Twice more in the next few months the State Dept. gave the Taliban gifts of $40 million, totalling $123 million for the 6 month period (January to June 2001). This money was used to buy arms from Pakistan and this clearly gave them an advantage in their civil war against the Northern Alliance.
By June, the Northern Alliance was almost defeated and pushed back to within 10 miles of the border of Uzbekistan. When it appeared inevitable that they would defeat the Northern Alliance soon, negotiations for the pipeline started up again, this time lead by the State Dept. who was basically representing UNOCAL's interests. However, the Taliban sensing that UNOCAL was getting desperate for this pipeline, made outrageous monetary demands. The State Dept. was offering the Taliban full recognation by the United States and a recommedation to be accepted into the United Nations. In return, they were asking for bin Laden to be turned over and for the pipleine. They offered the Taliban some small amount like 2% of the profits from the oil and the Taliban refused. They did agree to turn over bin Laden to be tried by an international court, but the negotiations broke down because of their demands on the pipeline.
Shortly after the last meeting in July, a few newspaper articles in Pakistan and Iran quoted government officials as saying they were told the United States would take military action in the fall to remove the Taliban from power.
All that sounds good and well, but here is some more coincidences for you:
1) In 1998, UNOCAL hired a local businessman in Kanduhar to represent them in Afghanistan in their pipeline negotiations with the Taliban. He worked for them as a consultant until late in 2000. His name is Hamid Karzai, the current president of Afghanistan. Three weeks after he became president of Afghanistan (in December 2001), the oil pipeline deal was signed and they are currently constructing it.
2) Enron:
During 1995 & 1996, Enron began to have discussions with UNOCAL about getting a supply of cheap oil to run an Indian powerplant they were considering building. It would be the largest powerplant in the world and would supply power to almost half of the entire country (India). Well, apparently the discussions went well, because in 1997 they began building the Dalbor Powerplant which would become the largest power plant in the world. Enron went into huge debt. in order to build this $3+ billion plant. In India, the power industry is regulated and the Indian government sets the price of power. When the Dalbor plant was finished in 1999, it was unable to open because at current oil prices, it could not produce power cheaply enough to offer on the Indian market and make any kind of profit. So the plant remained closed and Enron continued to borrow more and more money to stay afloat while awaiting the UNOCAL pipeline that would never come.
It seems logical to reason that Enron also had put presure on the Bush Administration to intervene in Afghanistan, although I have seen no evidence of this (there is evidence that UNOCAL had lobbied for this -- UNOCAL officials made their case in a 1998 hearing in front of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and then again in 2000). Enron's survival depended on the success of this powerplant which needed a new cheap oil supply. Obviously I don't have to tell you what happened to Enron. But this is the main reason why they had their financial difficulties.