Set America Free Notes&Comments

“No two countries have reached out to each other so eagerly and moved so swiftly to bridge the huge distance of geography and history as Saudi Arabia and China have [...] If 9/11 events forced Riyadh to explore new relationships, China?s phenomenal growth and its ever-growing appetite for energy is driving it to hunt for old and new sources of oil.” Khaleej Times

Of course, with the economic relations comes political support. China isn’t particularly concerned about those pesky little human rights issues the US has been pestering the Saudis about, like religious freedom, women’s rights, etc etc etc

The New York Times quotes Gal Luft on the issue:

“With the Chinese there are no strings attached,” said Gal Luft, co-director of the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security. “They don’t talk to you about democracy or reform. They give money, the Saudis give oil and there are no hidden agendas. The Saudis find those kinds of relationships more appealing.”

For more background, read The Sino-Saudi Connection.

Kudos to Senator Cantwell for becoming a co-sponsor of S.2025, The Vehicle and Fuel Choices for American Security Act.
Is your Senator on board yet?

..at the Renewable Fuel Association’s conference, joined by Set America Free’s Jim Woolsey, Rep. Jack Kingston, who is leading the charge on the Fuel Choices for American Security Act in the House, and Sen. Salazar, an outspoken advocate of the companion legislation in the Senate. Stay tuned!

Senator Sam Brownback and Set America Free Coalition chair Anne Korin will be speaking at Southern New Hampshire University.

If you’ve been following Set America Free you’ve heard the following several times already. A big excerpt from today’s New York Times editorial:

“When President Bush welcomes the Chinese president, Hu Jintao, to the White House today, the American complaint will be that China’s appetite for oil affects its stance on Iran, Sudan and other trouble spots.

“In other words, China is acting just like everyone else: subjugating its foreign policy to its energy concerns. The United States does it, too ? witness its long-running alliance with Saudi Arabia. Still, the size of China’s population ? 1.3 billion people ? puts things into an alarming context. China recently overtook Japan as the world’s second-biggest consumer of oil. Its real gross domestic product is growing at 8 to 10 percent a year, and its need for energy is projected to increase by about 150 percent by 2020. China’s move from bicycles to cars has accelerated its oil consumption; by 2010, China is expected to have 90 times the number of cars it had in 1990, and it will probably have more cars than America by 2030.

“That leaves the world with two options. The first is to manage energy resources better. The other is to look for another planet. Simply continuing the current trends isn’t viable, especially with the growing needs of India, with its one billion people and a growing economy of its own.

“The United States doesn’t have the right to tell a third of humanity to go back to their bicycles because the party’s over. Clearly, Mr. Bush and Mr. Hu must tackle energy in a real and meaningful way. That can be done only if the United States both helps China find alternative energy sources and shows that America is doing the same thing itself.

“The best possible course would be for China to leapfrog an oil-based economy and head toward sustainable alternative fuels, just as other countries are jumping past the construction of land lines for telephone service and going straight to wireless systems.”

“If we can get to the moon, virtually from scratch and in just eight years, we can become independent of the mullahs, ayatollahs, sheiks, imams and whackos like the president of Iran and assorted other world criminals who hate us and want to destroy us. This will call for strong leadership from President Bush and future presidents, regardless of party.

“Various congressional investigations and reporting have revealed that the United States is subsidizing its own destruction because some of the biggest oil-producing states underwrite terrorism [...]

“Americans have always responded to major threats and challenges. Properly framed, they could be made to understand this threat as the greatest challenge the nation has ever faced. To become energy independent and no longer rely on foreign oil would be like depriving Dracula of his blood supply: he would shrivel up and die.” Read the whole thing.

With over a tenth of the world’s oil reserves in their hands, and a location which gives them the ability to disrupt energy traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, the mullahs controlling Iran don’t appear to be particulary moved by the oratorial efforts to stop them from developing a nuclear program. It seems that world leaders have forgotten their Mother Goose, particularly the part about “sticks and stones”.

Iran has bought itself a third of humanity and a veto on the U.N. Security Council by signing big energy deals with China and India, so the chance of sanctions passing is so small as to be laughable.

Some illustrations of who the world is dealing with:

A regime that during the Iran-Iraq war utilized thousands of children as human mine clearers:

“In the past,” wrote the semi-official Iranian daily Ettelaat as the war raged on, “we had child-volunteers: 14-, 15-, and 16-year-olds. They went into the minefields. Their eyes saw nothing. Their ears heard nothing. And then, a few moments later, one saw clouds of dust. When the dust had settled again, there was nothing more to be seen of them. Somewhere, widely scattered in the landscape, there lay scraps of burnt flesh and pieces of bone.” Such scenes would henceforth be avoided, Ettelaat assured its readers. “Before entering the minefields, the children [now] wrap themselves in blankets and they roll on the ground, so that their body parts stay together after the explosion of the mines and one can carry them to the graves.” (Strongly recommend reading the whole article.)

A regime that has announced it has 40,000 suicide bombers ready and waiting for activation.

Iranian dissident Amir Taheri writes:
“Last Monday, just before he announced that Iran had gatecrashed “the nuclear club,” President Ahmadinejad disappeared for several hours. He was having a khalvat (tete-a-tete) with the Hidden Imam, the 12th and last of the imams of Shiism who went into “grand occultation” in 941. Last year, after another khalvat, Ahmadinejad announced his intention to stand for president. Now, he boasts that the Imam gave him the presidency to provoke a “clash of civilizations” in which the Muslim world, led by Iran, takes on the “infidel” West, led by the U.S., and defeats it in a prolonged contest that sounds like a low intensity, asymmetrical war [...]
“Ahmadinejad has also reactivated Iran’s network of Shia organisations in Bahrain, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Yemen, while resuming contact with Sunni fundamentalist groups in Turkey, Egypt, Algeria and Morocco. From childhood, Shia boys are told to cultivate two qualities. The first is entezar, the capacity patiently to wait for the Imam to return. The second is taajil, the actions needed to hasten the return. For the Imam’s return will coincide with an apocalyptic battle between the forces of evil and righteousness, with evil ultimately routed. If the infidel loses its nuclear advantage, it could be worn down in a long, low-intensity war at the end of which surrender to Islam would appear the least bad of options. And that could be a signal for the Imam to reappear.”

The Age reports: “The Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics estimates Australia’s oil consumption will leap by 66 per cent over the next 25 years, cutting oil self-sufficiency to just 50 per cent by 2029, compared with about 78 per cent now…the bureau warned that net oil importers such as Australia would be forced to rely on the Middle East and North Africa for supplies, regions pocked with geopolitical uncertainties.”

In a much touted experiment initiated a few years ago, the World Bank financed part of a big project to build an oil pipeline from Chad to Cameroon. In order to try and ensure that massive revenue influx from the pipeline would be used to aleviate poverty in Chad and Cameroon rather than be funneled into the pockets and warchests of those countries’ deeply corrupt and human rights abusing governments, the WB required as a condition for participation serious oversight measures over the use of pipeline revenue. Alas, the experiment appears to have failed. Last December Chad passed a law, roundly condemned by the WB, allowing the regime to tap into the oil revenue as it wishes (Chad was recently ranked the most corrupt country in the world, so we’ll leave these wishes up to your imagination.)
The WB decided to show some teeth, and froze oil profits in an escrow account until Chad reverses itself and agrees to honor its contractual obligations regarding the use of funds.
Now, Chad’s regime has responded with oil blackmail demanding $100M from the account or else it will stop oil production. In a skittish oil market skirting $70, it will take significant strength of will on the part of the WB to withstand the threat. Stay tuned.

The International Energy Agency notes that “Bad weather, mechanical problems, start-up delays and strikes have affected Argentina, Brazil, Ecuador, Bolivia, Peru, Canada, India, Vietnam, Sudan, Chad and Yemen” which means that non-OPEC supply is not rebounding as expected. That means dependence on OPEC is growing.