Tuesday, October 21, 2003
There was an interesting item on last night's Newsnight about a possible method to at least calm tensions in Iraq, through the use of what's being called 'the Alaskan solution' with regard to Iraq's oil. This basically means that every Iraqi would get a share of the profits made from the sale of Iraqs oil.
At the moment Iraq is considered to have the world's second largest deposits of oil, and a large quantity of it's land has never been surveyed. Have a look at this report where it's the second item, about a quarter of the way down. There are probable problems with the plan, though the guy on Newsnight who complained mildly that it would encourage the Iraqi people into a culture of 'expecting something for nothing', I don't think that's a serious concern and let's wait a decade or so then see if that's happening yeah? I think that something has to be put in to this scheme without waiting for the oil money to be generated for it to start, ie: The Allies will have to put in the cash for the first round of oil money to the Iraqi people, even though there isn't any real amounts of oil being produced. It's only reasonable as we've spent much more than the money needed bombing the crap out of the country for the last decade or so. Take the amount suggested by Phillip Merrill, $10 a head, so about $230 mill. It costs the US $1 billion a week to maintain their troops. So we could see it as a downpayment on the troops safety and a start, at last, towards trying to build goodwill between the Allies and the Iraqis. When the Iraqi people see a financial benefit from ensuring the oil runs smoothly we might see sabotage, or the support for sabotage drop.
And of course, if the Iraqi people can be seen to be benefiting from their oil in the form of cold, hard cash, that might stop people like me from suggesting that this war was all about Bush and his cronies being able to seize a valuable source of oil for their personal profit...
At the moment Iraq is considered to have the world's second largest deposits of oil, and a large quantity of it's land has never been surveyed. Have a look at this report where it's the second item, about a quarter of the way down. There are probable problems with the plan, though the guy on Newsnight who complained mildly that it would encourage the Iraqi people into a culture of 'expecting something for nothing', I don't think that's a serious concern and let's wait a decade or so then see if that's happening yeah? I think that something has to be put in to this scheme without waiting for the oil money to be generated for it to start, ie: The Allies will have to put in the cash for the first round of oil money to the Iraqi people, even though there isn't any real amounts of oil being produced. It's only reasonable as we've spent much more than the money needed bombing the crap out of the country for the last decade or so. Take the amount suggested by Phillip Merrill, $10 a head, so about $230 mill. It costs the US $1 billion a week to maintain their troops. So we could see it as a downpayment on the troops safety and a start, at last, towards trying to build goodwill between the Allies and the Iraqis. When the Iraqi people see a financial benefit from ensuring the oil runs smoothly we might see sabotage, or the support for sabotage drop.
And of course, if the Iraqi people can be seen to be benefiting from their oil in the form of cold, hard cash, that might stop people like me from suggesting that this war was all about Bush and his cronies being able to seize a valuable source of oil for their personal profit...
