Oil Is Key

Oil, if you haven't noticed, is crucial to the logistics of attacking Iraq. The Sunday Herald reports today that, in order for it "not to carry out its threatened veto of a second UN resolution to allow the US to intervene in Iraq," France is demanding to have a cut of the Iraqi oil riches once the US "liberates" that nation.

Meanwhile, Faisal Islam and Nick Paton Walsh of the Observer report that Iraq has recently "doubled its exports of oil to America, helping US refineries cope with a debilitating strike in Venezuela." They write,

After the loss of 1.5 million barrels per day of Venezuelan production in December the oil price rocketed, and the scarcity of reserves threatened to do permanent damage to the US oil refinery and transport infrastructure. To keep the pipelines flowing, President Bush stopped adding to the 700m barrel strategic reserve...

The trade, though bizarre given current Pentagon plans to launch around 300 cruise missiles a day on Iraq, is legal under the terms of UN's oil for food programme.

But for opponents of war, it shows the unspoken aim of military action in Iraq, which has the world's second largest proven reserves - some 112 billion barrels, and at least another 100bn of unproven reserves, according to the US Department of Energy. Iraqi oil is comparatively simple to extract - less than $1 per barrel, compared with $6 a barrel in Russia. Soon, US and British forces could be securing the source of that oil as a priority in the war strategy. The Iraqi fields south of Basra produce prized 'sweet crudes' that are simpler to refine.

And, finally, since Hussein has threatened to light ablaze the Iraqi oil fields once a US invasion begins, John Donnelly of the Boston Globe reports that the "Bush administration has compiled a classified strategic plan to protect Iraq's oil fields during a war and then manage that oil for months or years afterward, including funneling proceeds into humanitarian relief and rebuilding the country, according to US officials who have worked on the blueprints."