Alan Greenspan claims Iraq war was really for oil
Was the war about oil or terrorism?
TL-AMERICA’s elder statesman of finance, Alan Greenspan, has shaken the White House by declaring that the prime motive for the war in Iraq was oil.
In his long-awaited memoir, to be published tomorrow, Greenspan, a Republican whose 18-year tenure as head of the US Federal Reserve was widely admired, will also deliver a stinging critique of President George W Bush’s economic policies.
However, it is his view on the motive for the 2003 Iraq invasion that is likely to provoke the most controversy. “I am saddened that it is politically inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows: the Iraq war is largely about oil,” he says.
Britain and America have always insisted the war had nothing to do with oil. Bush said the aim was to disarm Iraq of weapons of mass destruction and end Saddam’s support for terrorism.
UPDATE
Greenspan clarifies (??) Iraq war, oil link
Greenspan, who wrote in his memoir that “the Iraq War is largely about oil,” said in a Washington Post interview that while securing global oil supplies was “not the administration’s motive,” he had presented the White House before the 2003 invasion with the case for why removing the then-Iraqi leader was important for the global economy.
So, was it about oil or not?
FYI
MoveOn.org moves from ‘betray us’ to ‘betrayal of trust’ ad
(CNN) — Five days after setting off a political firestorm with an ad in The New York Times attacking the top U.S. commander in Iraq, MoveOn.org has set its sights on President Bush.
The liberal advocacy group announced Friday it is rolling out a new national television ad campaign next week accusing Bush of “a betrayal of trust.”
“Before the surge, George Bush had 130,000 troops stuck in Iraq,” states the ad’s narrator. “Americans had elected a new Congress to bring them home. Instead, Bush sent 30,000 more troops.”
“Now he’s making a big deal about, you guessed it … pulling out 30,000,” the narrator adds. “So, next year, there will still be 130,000 troops stuck in Iraq.”
READ MORE
FYI
McCain: Bush Was Unrealistic About War
epublican presidential candidate John McCain said Saturday that voters are frustrated with the war in Iraq because of the Bush administration’s unrealistic projections early in the conflict.
The Arizona senator told reporters he was pleased with Gen. David Petraeus’ testimony before Congress this past week because it “did not present this totally rosy scenario. That’s why Americans are frustrated today.”
He blamed “different administration officials” for that. “It’s all the president’s responsibility,” McCain said, but those reporting to him were also responsible.
Earlier in the day, McCain was critical of former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, saying his failings “frustrated and saddened” the American people.
READ MORE
Before we went to war, there were some who said we would go to war because of the move by Saddam to sell oil in euros instead of dollars.
Before he started, they thought he was foolish for using the euro just to spite the U.S. After the euro rose from 83 cents to $1.05, they were congratulating him. Although it ended up costing him his life, Iran and Venezuela, who had only joined Saddam in talking about switching away from the dollar, have both now done so with Iran doing it much more than Venezuela which sells us about 12% or so of our oil imports.
Iran recently demanded Japan stop buying their oil with dollars and use the yen. It has divested itself of almost all dollar reserves and is better prepared for a declining dollar than most OPEC nations.
Thus, while the war wasn’t about oil, if these people who said we would go to war with Iraq, it is about the sale of oil. It wasn’t the interruption of supplies of oil but how it was sold and the impact it had on the dollar.
Quote:
For OPEC, backing the euro would be a self-fulfilling prophesy. They could then at some later date move to some other currency, perhaps back to the dollar, and again make huge profits.
But of course it is not a purely economic decision.
So far only one OPEC country has dared switch to the euro: Iraq, in November 20002, 3. There is little doubt that this was a deliberate attempt by Saddam to strike back at the US, but in economic terms it has also turned out to have been a huge success: at the time of Iraq’s conversion the euro was worth around 83 US cents but it is now worth over $1.05. There may however be other consequences to this decision.
One other OPEC country has been talking publicly about possible conversion to the euro since 1999: Iran2,4, a country which has since been included in the George W. Bush’s ‘axis of evil’.
A third OPEC country which has recently fallen out with the US government is Venezuela and it too has been showing disloyalty to the dollar. Under Hugo Chavez’s rule, Venezuela has established barter deals for trading its oil with 12 Latin American countries as well as Cuba.
http://www.feasta.org/documents/papers/oil1.htm
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This old article demonstrates what was already common knowledge a few years ago.
I believe there is more than one reason we attacked Iraq. Dr. Paul Craig Roberts had a list of reasons. Here’s the most politically sensitive reason and I’ll provide two links, one a picture, the second a very thoughtful article which all should read.
http://tinyurl.com/2nm4o3
http://tinyurl.com/2fl9hu
Here’s another thought provoking article that addresses Greenspan’s comments:
“It’s Not About Oil, Stupid, but Flattening Arab and Muslim Countries”
http://tinyurl.com/yvmahd
All one has to do is open one’s eyes – the truth is there for everyone to see. This article ties in directly to my point:
“AIPAC’s Overt and Covert Ops”
http://tinyurl.com/2npxnl
While the thoght there were many reasons for attacking Iraq, including Israeli reasons, oil was not in the top ten. Nor were oil profits.
Keep in mind that OPEC can set the price even if Iraq gets up to full production and keep oil prices high. The high prices aren’t for oil company’s benefits but for the benefit of the countries that hold 80% of the worlds oil reserves. 80% of oil reserves are held by State owned oil companies or nations that regulate what oil companies can produce.
The oil companies are going to make huge profits (unless they are in Venezuela) as long as the nations that control the oil want huge flows of money coming into their government coffers. They provide the “profit incentives” to companies to pump oil in their nations but the real goal is billions for governments with their own agendas.
However, that high price also means more dollars are needed by the world to buy oil and the more dollars they need, the higher the demand and thus value for the dollar. Now that Iran and Venezuela have moved away from the dollar, it is dropping in need for oil purchases. Last month’s demand Japan buy oil in Yen and stop using dollars will further erode demand and value.
Also, it is why we didn’t become “oil independent” here. If we stopped needing huge oil imports, they would have little reason to price oil in dollars. They could and probably would have sold oil in any currency offered. Thus, to keep the bulk of demand coming to the U.S., we also kept the bulk of sales in dollars and thus it made sense to use the dollar for all oil sales. Again, Iran knows exactly what they are doing by moving oil sales to other currencies and the impact it has on the dollar.
It isn’t about oil. It is about trying to save a currency that was collapsing when we made the deal to protect OPEC nations that would sell oil in dollars over 30 years ago. The dollar was saved but, look at what the price of saving it has been. Also, it could turn out it wasn’t saved but only delayed in collapsing if the “doom and gloomers” are correct.
However, I believe it will be delayed again. I believe central banks around the world will do everything they can to keep it from collapsing. It may cause high inflation to do so, but they will try. Many believe central banks are going to flood the world with “liquidity” and cause more inflation. Whatever happens, many Americans will make millions from it and millions will lose wealth, too. It will all depend on what they do and how well people react to it with their investments, savings, debt, etc.
One goal was to create another “Dubai” where prosperity would attract Muslims to productive output and defuse the ability of radical Islam to recruit people who were poor and had nothing to lose.
The reasons and goals weren’t the problem. The problem is an undermanned military, poor assessment of the opposition (Iran, Syria, al-Qaeda, etc.) and our huge deficit spending that limits funding of the military.
For those who find fault with how much we have spent, there are just as many who state we didn’t spend nearly enough to adequately fight the opposition in Iraq. And, to do so would have meant either more loans (which are becoming more and more difficult) or more reductions of spending on social programs, government agencies, grants, subsidies, government contracts, government employment, etc. and that wasn’t popular either.
Nor, do we want to “flatten” all countries that are Muslim. We are deeply in bed with some. For example we depend hugely on Dubai which is 95% Muslim for shipping military supplies, repair of military ships, liberty for service personnel, etc. and Saudi Arabi as an ally against Iran and keeping the sale of oil in dollars.
Also, remember that almost all central banking has ties that go to the Rothschilds and people who descended from them or their appointees to banking positions around Europe and the U.S. and thus, they have ties to Israel and have longed tried to help Israel. Whether you like that relationship, I believe it exists and that means that since central banks also provide a lot of the advice governments around the world receive, they may also encourage protection of Israel.
Maybe some who are more familiar with the history of central banks can expound on that relationship with Jews and thus, Israel and a desire to protect it by some nations. It is an ally and many believe a needed ally in the Middle-East to help fight radical Islam. Maybe that is why it was created after WW II to begin with. It may have been a “plan” to create a “base of operations” in the heart of the Middle-East, near Egypt, Syria, Iran, etc. that could be used by other nations for political and military reasons. If that is the case, keeping it viable would still be a goal even today.
What is all the Israeli aggression they refer to? How many times have terrorists hit Israel? What have the Israeli done that wasn’t “Defensive” or “retaliatory?”
While they aren’t “innocent” anymore than any nation is that has its own agenda that runs counter to neighboring nation’s agendas, they also aren’t to blame for 90% of the problems going on in that region.
They took land that was “undesirable” and shunned by Arabs, irrigated it and mad it productive. Their productivity became a sore spot and jealousy and greed and a desire to possess what they have created drove the motives behind much of the attacks made on Israel over the decades.
The bulk of the blame has to go to the nations that refused to accept what was created and authorized after WW II. If that creation of Israel had forced Arab nations to surrender productive land that they were actually depending on, it would be one thing. But, to return land to Israel that was once theirs to begin with and which was not being made productive, is another.
Yes, maybe it was not the best plan but, after five or six decades it is “established” policy and an “established” nation and Arab nations need to recognize that and some do. It is primarily the Arab nations controlled by radicals that is causing the problems and those same radicals would attack any other nation they thought needed attacking.
Terrorism and war is how they get what they need rather than through productive use of resources and people. Using the “faults” of Israel to blame the problems in the Middle-east on them or us, doesn’t make much sense when you have nations that still use war and terrorism for their acquisition of what they think they “deserve” and aren’t willing to earn though productive use of resources and people.
No, Israel isn’t “innocent” and neither are we or any other nation. But, the worst players in this mess also aren’t Israel and the U.S. but the nations that are led by terrorists and radicals.
Jan Paul,
I think this is the issue:
There are many leaders who assume that if it’s in Israel’s best interest it’s automatically in ours. Think of it this way:
What if we behaved toward France the way we behave toward Israel. We would have a neocon insurrection, don’t you think?
Now, I’m NOT saying that Israel shouldn’t defend itself nor am I saying that sometimes their interests don’t diverge with ours. It’s just the automatic obeyal of what Israel wants that leaves me scratching my head.
Caroline,
It’s all about the Euro!
Laughing.
Terrorists … Arabs … Islamists … the new boogey men. Pick one.
What I really, really found amazing was Secretary of Defense Robert Gates reaction to Greenspan’s comments.
‘Well, Saddam had WMD back in 1991. That was part of the reason for invading in 2003. And, you know, Saddam had made war with SEVERAL OF HIS NEIGHBORS. So, Greenspan is just wrong. We had good reasons to invade Iraq.’
What a weak tool.
Yeah, Saddam had some WMD back in 1991. Far more than we thought. Doesn’t relate to oil as a reason for invading in 2003. Nor, was the 1991 WMD NOT destroyed in 1992 … very dishonest of Gates.
And, wowie! Saddam had wars with “several” of his neighbors!!!
How many wars did he have with his six neighbors?
Did he invade Jordan? Syria? Saudi Arabia? Turkey?
Should we even count the Iran-Iraq war as being Saddam’s fault? After all, Reagan and Rumsfeld gave him the guns and WMD used in that war. They also opened an embassy during the war in Baghdad.
So … what was the point Gates was trying to make? We invaded in 2003 because of what happened in 1989? 1991?
Damn! There’s some decisive leadership!
I would think, HOPE, that the current Secretary of Defense could at least have command of some facts that are more compelling reasons for invading a sovereign oil producing country than his lame bullshit.
Greenspan hit it out of the ball park. Oil was a major variable in the pre-invasion equation.
MD
Saying that Sadaam had WMD’s in 1991 is also forgetting that there were years of inspections were tons of such weapons were destroyed. Apparently, the inspections were very successful since there weren’t any left to speak of.
I had thought that Gates would be an improvement over Rumsfeld. Apparently I was wrong there. He’s beginning to sound just like him.
Don’t forget Caroline that part of the cease-fire agreement was that all destruction of WMD had to be done under U.N. supervision and that didn’t happen for most of what Saddam claimed had been destroyed. If you recall, that was one of the reasons the U.N. authorized the use of force. They didn’t believe the WMD had been destroyed because it wasn’t observed as required.
That doesn’t mean it wasn’t destroyed but does mean Saddam was very stupid if he did destroy it without supervision of the U.N. as required. So, why not comply and take away the suspicion. I believe he wanted to create the impression to the Kurds, at least, he still could wipe them out with WMD if they rebelled again. I don’t think he thought it was that big a mistake if he did in fact, destroy the WMD without supervision.
Also, Bill, regarding Israel. Remember that the people who set this all up decades ago are still the people or their successors, who advise our government and other governments on what is best for the world. They are the Council on Foreign Relations, Central Banks and advisers to governments, the U.N. and other organizations. They are the “experts” many in government listen to. They are the people who donate large sums to campaigns and the parties.
Whether they are self-serving, believe they have the best interests of Europe, the U.S. and the world in mind, or see a “one world” economic system, they have a lot of influence.
And Mad Dog, it isn’t about the euro. It is about the “demand” needed to keep the dollar propped up. As you know some in the Fed and our government are starting to become very concerned about the dollar and have been concerned for years. However, until recently that concern was small. Now with countries moving away from the dollar, the concern is rising because without demand for the dollar, it loses value very rapidly.
They do believe they can keep it from collapsing but may not be able to stop further slow declines. An unexpected event such as
if Russia were to switch out of the dollar for oil sales could cause a serious decline in value.
It doesn’t have to be the euro. As you know, Mad Dog Iran is demanding Japan buy, using the yen and they are saying they will comply. Any use of currency other than the dollar will serve to weaken it if it decreases demand for it according to the monetary experts.
However, central banks, including those in Europe that regulate the euro, will work to minimize any problems. The Fed. Reserve bank in New York claims “The New York Fed offers banking and financial services to over 200 foreign central banks, foreign governments, and international official institutions.”
http://www.ny.frb.org/aboutthefed/whatwedo.html
So, who knows what miracles they can pull out of their hat to save the dollar. They have done it for over 30 years since the time it was last collapsing and all the doom and gloomers predicted its demise then. Don’t count on it happening until it does happen.
But, don’t count out the “dollar” as being one reason among many that makes Iran a war target, too. Maybe no one reason was enough for Iraq nor will it be for Iran.
Caroline
Here is a report on Iraq’s WMD by Executive Chairman of UNMOVIC, Dr. Hans Blix, who opposed the war but whose statements to the UN about inspections, played an important role in the UN authorizing the use of force.
http://tinyurl.com/aztcn
Note the requirements of the cease fire he mentions, the games Saddam played the evidence that made them suspicious, etc. (such as the newer bunker with illegal WMD in it). Saddam brought the war on himself by not following UN instructions.
Here is an example of what those who would like to see the U.S. fall, are saying.
Quote:
US dollar hegemony: the soft underbelly of empire
(and what can be done to use it!)
By Rohini Hensman rohinihensman yahoo.co.uk
and Marinella Correggia mari.cor libero.it (Boycott Bush contact for Italy)
Introduction
What we intend to argue below is that if the US’s ability to undertake imperial conquests like that of Iraq depends on its obvious military supremacy, this in turn is ultimately based on the use of the US dollar as the world’s reserve currency. It is the dominance of the dollar that underpins US financial dominance as a whole as well as the apparently limitless spending power that allows it to keep hundreds of thousands of troops stationed all over the world. Destroy US dollar hegemony, and “Empire” will collapse.
David Ludden’s article ‘America’s Invisible Empire’ [1] sums up the problem of the world’s most recent empire with remarkable clarity
http://www.boycottbush.org/dollar_en.php
===========================
This view is common and talked about in foreign media outlets more than here. Listen to foreign news over a period of time and listen to what they say about our currency’s future. Not that they will be right but, they do believe it will continue to fall because of Iran and loss of faith in it and declining interest in loaning us money.
Here is another article on what some believe is going on with the dollar and oil.
Quote:
Mainstream economists seem to agree that best-case, the dollar will continue a stately decline, but in a world where the United States has lost so much respect, where we continue to flood the world with dollars and borrow to finance our consumer habit, we could find that one of those sharp, depression-inducing discontinuities occurs–like, say, a run on the dollar.
We are continuing to import 60 percent of the 20.6 million barrels of oil we use daily. And though the size and stability of our economy is likely to insure a demand for the dollar at some level, oil that anyone can buy for hard currency may be getting scarcer. Governments have begun to do deals aimed at taking oil off the market for their own account–deals like the ones China has done with Angola, Brazil, Iran, Nigeria, Venezuela and Sudan. South Korea has just announced it will follow suit.
If our military cannot secure oil by force, and if oil is destined to cost us more and more of a declining currency to buy what is available, then “brand USA” is in trouble. When Bush leaves office, this country will have to begin the difficult task of reversing some very bad trends in the military, fiscal, monetary and energy areas. The pollution of his legacy transcends mere politics.
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20070625/miller
==========================
And Iran isn’t alone in their move from the dollar
quote:
Venezuela, Oil Producers Buy Euro as Dollar, Oil Fall
Energia.gr
Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez is directing a growing share of the country’s oil profits into euros as the dollar and crude prices fall.
The dollar, down 9.5 percent against the euro this year, may face more pressure in 2007 because Venezuela and oil producers from the United Arab Emirates to Indonesia plan to funnel more money into the single European currency.
“The U.S. dollar has suffered a long process of deterioration,” Domingo Maza Zavala, one of seven board members at the central bank of Venezuela, said in a Dec. 14 interview. “The diversification strategy started this year.”
…Bank Indonesia is boosting euro holdings, said Senior Deputy Governor Miranda S Goeltom in a Dec. 13 interview in Jakarta.
…OPEC members and Russia increased the percentage of their foreign-exchange deposits held in euros to 22 percent in the second quarter from 20 percent, the BIS said.
(19 Dec 2006
=======================
Just a trend and trends can change and hopefully this one will change before it impacts American workers much harder than it already has.
Jan Paul,
Bush wanted the war and Bush got the war. Who know what Sadaam wanted. The Blix document pretty much wants time to make sure. Can you imagine if Bush had just let the inspectors do their job in Iraq for a year? Bush would have come off looking smart instead of turning himself into an international laughingstock and our country along with it. He’s created a leadership vacuum in the world and we don’t know who is going to fill that vacuum. Iran? Venezuela? Brazil? China? Europe. No one denies that Iraq has cost us power, prestige, blood and treasure. All for naught.
Greenspan: At what point is it a senior government official’s patriotic responsibility to resign in protest at bad policy, even if it isn’t in that official’s issue area?
McCain: That quote is reason yet why Senator McCain would be a bad choice for president: He can’t differentiate between bad policy and badly presented policy.
.
Did anyone else notice that the various comments and criticisms are all from Republican’ts?
Does anyone still believe the Republican’ts deserve a role in leading America?
If so, why?
Davey
I like the sound of “Republican” has a nice ring to it.
Caroline, I agree except that, we have no idea of what the people who influence many governments were saying was the “wise” choice. Remember they don’t care if he looked good or bad, only that they got what they wanted.
Whether it was an attempt to stop the decline in the dollar due to oil sales (notice how one of the first things they did was to switch it back to dollars) or to get a base in the middle east or hope to create a prosperous nation that would be an “example” that proved there were alternatives to terrorism or WMD, it didn’t go as planned.
Even switching the sale of oil back didn’t work because now Iran was shown how effective a weapon that is and has switched, Venezuela too. Russia is talking about demanding payment in roubles or moving to the euro for sales to the European nations.
More and more nations are coming to view a move away from the dollar as necessary. However, they want to do it slowly because it would collapse the value of the dollars they hold.
Jan
As Mad Dog has pointed out we have a lot of “under utilized resources” right here. We’ve got a lot of “geniuses at the assembly line” so to speak. the problem is we have a bunch of ASS HATS AND NUMBER CRUNCHERS GETTING IN THE WAY!!!!!!!!!!
In other words WE DON’T NEED NO STINKIN RESERVE CURRENCY!!!!!
Unfortunately, getting from here to there where we don’t means a depression or very long recession. They are trying to avoid that. We depend on some things we don’t even have here or don’t have in enough quantities. Also, there may be other things like oil where we use imports to keep the demand for the dollar high enough foreign nations will willingly loan us the money we need for deficit spending.
Again remember that much of this has to do with our needing a lot of loans, a lot of trade, a lot of bargaining chips with other governments to maintain our “empire,” even if it is only an “economic empire.”
Everything is connected in one way or another to the dollar currently because we need loans and resources we can buy with dollars for as few dollars as possible to keep inflation down.
Now that we are becoming less and less of an economic and consumer force in the world and much less if we have a recession, things could get very ugly in order to get where you want us to be. Millions of Americans will lose their jobs, their homes, their investments (including workers with 401K’s and IRA’s that are based in the dollar.
So, be careful what you wish for. We may get it sooner than we expect or can prepare for. A slow decline may be workable but not a rapid one.
Greenspan is trying to sell a book that nobody would buy or advertise.Now he has free advertisement and a whole lot of buyers just to see the words”the war is about oil”. Brilliant!!!!
What you wont see is his prior knowledge of the sub prime crunch and how he ignored it.
mike nailed it!
Alan Greenspan, April 2005 speech:
“Innovation has brought about a multitude of new products, such as subprime loans and niche credit programs for immigrants. Such developments are representative of the market responses that have driven the financial services industry throughout the history of our country … With these advances in technology, lenders have taken advantage of credit-scoring models and other techniques for efficiently extending credit to a broader spectrum of consumers. … Where once more-marginal applicants would simply have been denied credit, lenders are now able to quite efficiently judge the risk posed by individual applicants and to price that risk appropriately. These improvements have led to rapid growth in subprime mortgage lending; indeed, today subprime mortgages account for roughly 10 percent of the number of all mortgages outstanding, up from just 1 or 2 percent in the early 1990s.”
http://www.federalreserve.gov/BoardDocs/speeches/2005/20050408/default.htm
Willy,
Your views on reserve currencies are funny.
Seriously, they are laughable.
I like Willy.
It has a nice ring to it.
No Reserve Wines.
Davey a.k.a. HONG KONG FOOEY
Yeah I probably went overboard with that statement. (# 21) And I hope the world doesn’t “dump the dollar”. I guess my point was that we may have a chicken/egg argument here: Is America strong because of the reserve currency status of the Dollar or do we have a strong currency as a result of a strong economy? I choose the latter. Freedom and free enterprise is what got us here, not the bankers or multinational corporations.
Willy,
No economy ever became strong because it had reserve currency status.
Period.
End of story.
Seriously, trust me on this, OK?
Davey
It was a rhetorical question. (we agree on this)
No more reserve whines