XPost: az.general   
   From: michelle@michelle.org   
      
   ARAB NEWS   
      
   The Middle East's Leading English Language Daily   
      
   Thursday, 15, February, 2007 (27, Muharram, 1428)   
      
   The Global Shell & Pea Game   
      
   Tanya Cariina Hsu‹   
      
   Shocking in its passivity, the world is quietly watching to see what the   
   United States will do about Iran. No one is willing to take affirmative   
   action, draw the line, and say no; the US takes this as tacit approval   
   to go full steam ahead in moving to its next step toward its conquest of   
   the Middle East and its energy resources, in order to control the   
   world¹s economic supply. The war has never been about weapons of mass   
   destruction, terrorism, or bringing democracy to a people who would   
   greet the ³liberators² with flowers. Prior to the ³New Pearl Harbor² of   
   Sept. 11, 2001, the US already had attack plans drawn up and ready for a   
   bombing campaign in Afghanistan. The neoconservatives were merely the   
   Bush cheerleading team, touting the wars freely across the media, in   
   personal readiness of the increased military spending to come their way   
   via massive defense contract commissions, especially linked to the   
   seemingly ever-threatened Israel.   
      
   In 2001, the US was the Taleban¹s second largest donor; it gave $124.2   
   million up until May. Ostensibly for agricultural aid and humanitarian   
   assistance, such largesse was a seduction of the Taleban into allowing   
   American UNOCAL to build a pipeline from the energy rich Caspian Sea   
   through Afghanistan and out to the warm waters of the Gulf and Indian   
   Ocean. The Taleban rejected the offer. In August 2001, Christina Rocca   
   of the US State Department warned the Taleban, ³Accept our offer of a   
   carpet of gold, or we bury you under a carpet of bombs.² The Taleban   
   instead signed a deal to build with Bridas, an Argentinean company. The   
   following month, on Sept. 11, the Pentagon and Twin Towers were attacked   
   and the US indeed bombed Afghanistan in October. Hamid Karzai, former   
   UNOCAL consultant and translator for the Taleban, was installed as head   
   of the country, the previous pipeline contract with Argentina was   
   nullified, and the US was fully in charge.   
      
   In 2000, Saddam Hussein had announced his own death sentence: He was   
   switching the currency for oil in Iraq from petrodollars to petroeuros.   
   Within a week of coming into office, Dick Cheney¹s secret ³Energy Task   
   Force² was examining Iraqi oil field and pipeline maps, and their   
   priority No. 1, announced in May of 2001 stated, ³Middle East oil   
   producers will remain central to world security. The Gulf will be a   
   primary focus of US international energy policy.² That¹s diplomatic   
   speak for foreign national military policy and interest. Once having   
   switched to euros, Saddam Hussein had cut the US out of his market, the   
   second largest reserves in the world. Suddenly his WMDs were ³imminent²   
   and America had to stop the potential mushroom cloud. In 2003, the US   
   attacked the threatening and now armed-and-dangerous Saddam Hussein.   
   They did find Saddam¹s chemical weapons: A few baking soda boxes in one   
   of his refrigerators.   
      
   A year before the bombing of Iraq, the State Department demanded that   
   Iraq ³should be open to international oil companies², meaning the USA.   
   The new Iraqi government voided all previous oil agreements with other   
   nations and switched petroeuros back to petrodollars. This month the new   
   Iraqi hydrocarbon law goes into effect whereby the ³international   
   companies² such as Exxon Mobil, Chevron, Conoco-Phillips and Royal Dutch   
   Shell, under Production Sharing Agreements (PSAs), receive up to 75   
   percent of Iraq¹s oil profits indefinitely until the companies decide   
   they¹ve been paid enough reimbursement for any initial rebuilding   
   investments. After that, they will receive an unheard-of in the Middle   
   East 20 percent of profits, twice the industry standard. Mission   
   accomplished.   
      
   Six weeks ago, after a year of speculation, Iran changed its oil bourse   
   from petrodollars to petroeuros. US rhetoric against the leadership of   
   Iran was therefore ratcheted up in latter 2006. First, Ahmadinejad¹s   
   call to erase the Zionist political entity from the pages of time was   
   translated in to ³wipe Israel off the map², alarming the world to a   
   specter of a new holocaust. Second, Iran¹s nuclear weaponry intentions   
   were disclosed ‹ a new imminent threat ‹ but the American taxpayers   
   weren¹t buying that one so easily this time. Thus, the new story of   
   Iranian supplies to insurgents in Iraq is told at bedtime (less than one   
   percent of attacks on US troops in Iraq are by Shiites).   
      
   It¹s a new spin on the US Iran-Contra era: In 1980, the US sold arms   
   from anywhere, friend or foe, to both Iraq and Iran just as long as they   
   would fight each other out. It did not matter whether they were Shiite   
   or Sunni ‹ they were all Muslims and who knew the difference? When it   
   appeared that Iran was winning the Iran-Iraq war in 1987, the US   
   increased its funding to Saddam and supplied him with the intelligence   
   he needed to attack Iran¹s navy.   
      
   The US is selling the intended ³non-war² on Iran as a religious   
   necessity, Iraq versus Iran, Sunni versus Shiite. Don¹t believe it. Dick   
   Cheney, Condoleezza Rice and William Gates have all visited the region   
   to alert Gulf governments to the threat from the Shiites in Iran. They   
   sold the threat of Saddam Hussein¹s attack on the Kingdom in 1990 by   
   showing satellite images doctored to reveal amassing troops on the Saudi   
   border.   
      
   Leaders in the Middle East may want to believe that this is now all   
   about a growing Shiite crescent threat. A natural emotional reaction   
   given historical animosity. The US wants the Sunni leaders to believe   
   that it¹s about Islamic divisions, knowing fully it may appeal to their   
   sentiments. Moreover, America will supply whatever it can muster to   
   convince Sunni leaders of precisely such a concern, evidencing whatever   
   it can to prove such a threat, as it did in 1990. And so it goes again:   
   Iran-Iraq all over. Let the Sunnis and Shiites fight it out whilst we   
   carry on with securing that oil.   
      
   US Air Force carriers are now in the Gulf. Extra Patriot missiles are in   
   place, minesweepers sent out, and President Bush has ordered oil   
   reserves to be stockpiled. War games took place in Alabama a year ago   
   (STRATCOM Conplan 8022) theorizing a dirty-bomb attack, and a   
   consequential nuclear aerial response by the US against an un-named   
   Asian country. Reasons have been produced ‹ Iranian arms killing Sunnis   
   in Iraq, which as any illegal arms dealer can attest show nothing but   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)