February 14, 2005

The Politics of War

By DAVID CHEGE

Those of us who stand opposed to the perennial reemergence of “war as diplomacy by other means” must afford ourselves the advantage of stepping back to examine the context in which this current conflict exists.  February 15, 2003 marked the advent of another superpower to contend with American military and economic hegemony – global public opinion.  However, despite its great moral certitude, its knowledge of the political and economic dimensions of the Iraq conflict is not on such sure footing.

One word is taboo in all mainstream analysis of the invasion: oil.  Where all other rationales have been discarded, it stands as the sole justification.  Sixty-six percent of the world’s oil reserves are located in the Middle East; Iraq’s 110 billion barrels gives it about 10% of the world total.  Control and access to these resources will be the decisive factor in global politics for the foreseeable future.  As production rates peak in other countries, forming a global plateau of economic activity, every industrialized nation will turn to the Middle East to sustain oil fueled economic growth.

Exponential economic growth has placed the world economies on a collision course with nature and with each other over the world’s most vital resource.  It is expected that within 20 years China’s industrial development will require oil consumption on par with America’s whopping 20 million barrels per day (25% of world consumption).  The supply to accommodate both does not exist – not in the Middle East, not anywhere.  The United States is attempting to address that eventuality by situating its army in the heart of the world’s oil producing region to determine who will, and just as importantly, who won’t have the oil that modern industry requires.

It has done this in blatant contradiction to the will of its people and allies, sound economic policy, and the dictates of military logic.  This is not imperialism by choice, neither is it the behavior of a ruling power in its ascendancy.  This a case of an exhausted paradigm desperately trying to assert its supremacy over an increasingly independent world in the only arena it believes itself unbeatable.  America’s trade deficit, budget deficit, and federal debt require the subordination of the rest of the world to shoulder the burden of our profligate consumerism, and that subordination requires control of oil production.

The end of World War II found the US relatively unscathed, possessing the industrial mobilization of the war era, the largest creditor nation in the world, at the head of an international alliance that would govern the world outside the Soviet sphere of influence.  It could securely enjoy the benefits of its status and project its military might to defend the interests of its economic elite: namely, access to markets, labor and resources.  Of a multitude of conflicts, only two required the full power of its army, Korea and Vietnam.  Both were similar in context and intent, with left leaning nationalism as the threat in both scenarios.

Neither could be considered successful, yet neither undermined the base of world power that centered on the United States.  These wars were localized conflicts to determine the boundaries of US influence.  It was a case of satellite economies breaking the bonds of servitude.  Neither possessed an intrinsic value that another, more pliant member of the world order could not provide.  American economic hegemony proceeded along with the loss of North Korea, and it proceeded along without Vietnam.

Markets to acquire labor or to dump commodities are anywhere and everywhere.  Resources are not, and if the resource in question is oil, there is only one viable option.  As oil becomes progressively more scarce, the Middle East will have the power to make or break economies, including ours in the long term.  America has spent the economic and political capital that made it the world’s reigning superpower in the wake of WWII, and it has only one card left to play: its military.  No single engagement outside of the past century’s world wars will result in such a drastic realignment of the global balance of power as the war that began in Iraq.

Vietnam has a second significance that makes it of special interest.  It was one of the focal points of a national movement that challenged the prevailing interests and empowered people to seek their own form of political involvement.  New forms of organization, outreach and interaction were developed that have a role to play in combating the current invasion.  New arguments against tyranny were put forth that still inspire people to change the world, beginning with themselves.  It was in many ways the beginning of the movement that now confronts American imperialism.

Though it has lain dormant for decades, the invasion of Iraq has reawakened a global consciousness that opposes war and injustice.  However that consciousness must be refined.  The moral impetus of the movement must be complimented with an understanding that by consuming such a disproportionate amount of the world’s oil we are driving it towards disaster.  Economic competition is yielding to naked military aggression over the fundamental energy input that is the pre-requisite for all modern amenities.

This war is not about markets; it’s not about profits.  It’s about the survival of an ideal: that we as Americans can sit atop the world and enjoy automobiles for leisure driving and disposable plastic consumer crap, while denying them to the rest of the developing world.  They too are reaching for that American Dream, but it will take more than hard work and diligence.  It takes oil - lots of it, more than there is on the whole planet - and we are not sharing.  Resource constraints and oil depletion mean it’s a small world after all, and this war will determine who runs it and for whom.  A systemic restructuring of the global economy is being forced on us by an environment we’ve taken for granted, and we can’t adequately react to the war it’s causing without acting on the cause of the war.

NOTE: All statistics regarding oil production and consumption were taken from www.dieoff.org, your one stop shopping location for resource depletion info.