The Iraq War - Was it really about oil? - OG Myth-Weavers

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The Iraq War - Was it really about oil?

 
The Iraq War - Was it really about oil?

The Iraq War - Was it really about oil?
A common topic in the early 2000's that still shapes the political discourse today, a common question posited has always been; was the Iraq War about oil? My opinion is, well, probably not. Other than not getting the oil, which is predominately going to France, China, and Russia, [1][2] it wouldn't have even made logical sense to get the oil. Opening up foreign trade with an opposing oil company would have only hurt American companies, and if they somehow had obtained the oil, oil is only valuable because it's rare, just like gold, and more oil on the market means lower prices for oil companies. It's a lot like suggesting American manufacturing companies were behind the outsourcing to China; not only is there a lack of evidence, but it would actually hurt their own self-interests, so why would they even do it? There's not a single shred of evidence to actually suggest the invasion was motivated by a desire to obtain oil, other than people's words that the other side was thinking about it.

When something could have been done and people chose not to do it, it's usually good evidence they didn't want to do those things. The most powerful military in the world and the region just decided, without any external pressures, to allow it to go to other countries. They had all the ability to get the oil, and then decided "Nah, after taking over the world and leading them to think we needed to invade Iraq, let's not do the thing we spent trillions of dollars to do." A bank robber doesn't stop mid bank robbery when being called out; he keeps going until someone stops him. It's still possible some people are guilty of thought crimes, but even if they are evil, they likely wouldn't have wanted oil from Iraq. So, what about the other conspiracy theories associated with the war?

Well WMD's were actually found in 2006, Pakistan made the Taliban and then hid Osama Bin Laden over 6 years after the soviet-Afghanistan war with Russia was over, meaning we uh, did not create them. The Nigerian uranium forgeries were by the Italian government, and was one small part of the justification for the rest of the war which largely focused around humanitarian purposes and the other WMD's.

Nearly 500,000 or more people died before the Americans ever showed up, and some 200,000 are believed to have died after. But contrary to uh, some belief the Americans did not go back in time and cause Saddam to start massacring his own people, prior to their invasion. It isn't reasonable to say that America or the other two dozen+ countries involved in the war were responsible for the massive death toll given that A- they didn't commit the massacres themselves and B- Saddam was in the process of trying to annihilate the entire Kurdish population as well as millions others long before the U.S. or the allied coalition got involved. It makes about as much sense to blame emergency services for deaths after a hurricane or American troops for the death of the Jews by the Germans, it wasn't done by them and the mass murders were taking place long before we even got involved. As for "well, why wen're you involved in this other war?!" the short answer is we likely were, and the long answer is that we can't donate to every charity we want to. I.E. we aren't monsters just because we donated to cancer charities instead of AID's. Over 90% of Iraq's military equipment came from Chinese, Russian and French origin, somewhat strangely the three countries benefiting the most from the Iraq oil.


Now, many of you might be thinking "why did people believe these things for over 15 years if a 10 minute google search could have revealed they were false?". Well, that's a very good question. A lot of comes from the "listen-and-believe" mentality where you just basically believe whatever it is someone says without question, and then don't ever question it. It's a pretty effective strategy that's worked for politicians for decades.

But what do you think, Mythweavers?

Quote:
A common topic in the early 2000's that still shapes the political discourse today, a common question posited has always been; was the Iraq War about oil?
Has anyone seriously said this recently?

I'm not entirely sure people said it seriously at the time.

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Originally Posted by Solo View Post
Has anyone seriously said this recently?

I'm not entirely sure people said it seriously at the time.
The conspiracies about the Iraq war still color the political sphere today, with many claiming the wars were unjustified and corrupt because of this and many people still repeating the same age-old political jargain. Even though it wasn't technically connected to Afghanistan or Syria, many more are influenced in the rest of middle east policy because of this conspiracy theory, so it still has relevance today.

Ah, I see: many people are saying it. Many people. Tremendous people. The best people.

The only person I've heard making this insinuation lately is Trump when he suggested we take Iraq's oil.

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Originally Posted by Solo View Post
Ah, I see: many people are saying it. Many people. Tremendous people. The best people.
Do you *really* need evidence that people believed and said this? xP

Alright, well, can do. The more obvious something is, the easier it is to prove. This was said by both major political candidates, Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders, and by Barack Obama, who uh, actually got elected president. Major political pundits like Bill Mahr, Jon Stewart and numerous other claimed this was the case, and that effected the opinion's of millions. In addition to numerous people in other countries believing this as well.

"Majorities in seven of the nine nations surveyed believe that controlling Mideast oil supplies is an important reason why the U.S. is conducting the war on terrorism. This view is not only widespread in Jordan (71%), Morocco (63%) and Pakistan (54%), but also in Turkey (64%), Germany (60%) and France (58%)." [Pew Research Center]

At one point, nearly half of all democrats believed Bush knew about the 9/11 attacks, and 44% of Americans believed Bushed deliberately mislead the American people about WMD's. These are pretty sizeable chunks, but I suppose they could maybe not "seriously believe" this, and are just using it as a vehicle to attack their political opponents. In which case, the argument still needs to be shot down. Here's the Guardian having it influence their opinions on Syria, the Washington post the rest of the entire world, and numerous other's like CNN claiming the war was over oil. [1][2][3][4]


So, who believes this? Half the major news outlets, many of the major political candidates and even almost half of all of America and dozens of other countries. But maybe nobody took this *seriously*, as warcrimes are not serious charges after all.

Note that that Pew Research Center poll referenced controlling, not importing.
Also note that a failure to do a thing does not indicate the absence of an attempt to do a thing.

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Originally Posted by Tedronai View Post
Note that that Pew Research Center poll referenced controlling, not importing.
Also note that a failure to do a thing does not indicate the absence of an attempt to do a thing.
Right, they had all the power they needed to do it with no-one to challenge them and then chose not to do it. I mean what you do when no-one can stop you kind of reveals your character.

And if the argument is that they secretly wanted the oil, what about the fact that more oil on the market usually results in an oil glut and a drop in oil prices? Oil is only valuable because it's rare; if you have more oil on the market, it goes down in price. There wouldn't have been much economic benefit to selling the Iraq oil even if we could somehow obtain it, but rather maintaining an embargo for decades like we do with Russia, Korea and so on. Had bush maintained an Embargo you could maybe argue that it was for the benefit of his own American oil companies, but instead he invaded which ended up ending the embargo eventually and opening up foreign trade with the rest of the world which, hurt American oil companies. Seems like he did the exact opposite.

Clearly, the US has succeeded in all its objectives in Iraq. Their power is incomparable and wholly unchallenged.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Tedronai View Post
Clearly, the US has succeeded in all its objectives in Iraq. Their power is incomparable and wholly unchallenged.
Who could stop them from getting the oil if they wanted to? ISIS? Saddam's insurgents?

They're already in control of the oil wells and it's being shipped to other countries than the U.S., and U.S. companies aren't making profits off of it. Again if they wanted the oil, they could take it. Or do you really believe that someone is holding them back, and if so, who?

Again, obviously, if the U.S. wanted it, they could have it. There's no-one to stop them.




 

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