Quite right, Cheney and his oil company friends decided two years before the invasion of Iraq, our purpose of invasion and regime change:
"So,
we come to the report’s central dilemma: the American people continue to demand plentiful and cheap energy without sacrifice or inconvenience."
"This Independent Task Force Report outlines some of the hard choices that should be considered and
recommends specific policy approaches to secure the energy future of the United States. These choices will affect other U.S. policy objectives: U.S. policy toward the Middle East...."
"U.S. strategic energy policy must prioritize and coordinate domestic and foreign policy choices and objectives, where possible."
"This executive summary and the full report address the following questions. What are the potential effects of the critical energy situation for the United States? How did this critical energy situation arise?
What are the U.S. policy options to deal with the energy situation? What should the United States do now?"
"it is clear that energy disruptions could have a potentially enormous impact on the U.S. and the world economy, and would affect U.S. national security and foreign policy in dramatic ways."
"An accident on the Alaska pipeline that brings the bulk of North Slope crude oil to market would have the
same impact as a revolution cutting off supplies from a major Middle East oil producer."
"And with spare capacity scarce and Middle East tensions high, chances are greater than at any point in the last two decades of an oil supply disruption that would even more severely test the nation’s security and prosperity."
"What are the U.S. policy options to deal with the energy situation?"
"
the United States could develop a comprehensive and balanced energy security policy with near-term actions and long-term initiatives addressing both the supply side and demand side including diversification of energy supply resources, which would enable the United States to escape from a pattern of recurring energy crises."
"More flexible environmental regulation and opening of more federal lands to drilling might slow but cannot stop this process."
"For the most part,
U.S. international oil policy has relied on maintenance of free access to Middle East Gulf oil and free access for Gulf exports to world markets."
"These Gulf allies are finding their domestic and foreign policy interests increasingly at odds with U.S. strategic considerations,
especially as Arab-Israeli tensions flare. They have become less inclined to lower oil prices in exchange for security of markets, and evidence suggests that investment is not being made in a timely enough manner to increase production capacity in line with growing global needs. A trend toward anti-Americanism could affect regional leaders’ ability to cooperate with the United States in the energy area."
"The August 1990 Iraqi invasion of Kuwait witnessed a major test of global energy security."
" Bitter perceptions in the Arab world that the United States has not been evenhanded in brokering peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians have exacerbated these pressures on Saudi Arabia and other Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries
and given political leverage to Iraq’s Saddam Hussein to lobby for support among the Arab world’s populations."
"A reopening of these areas to foreign investment could make a critical difference in providing surplus supplies to markets in the coming decade."
"To
guarantee that mechanisms are in place for warding off and, if necessary, for managing disruptions to energy supply."
"The Gulf nations have one major asset—their oil and gas reserves. "
"
It is also in the strategic interest of the United States to assure that appropriate national and international mechanisms are in place to prevent disruptions in energy supplies where possible, and to manage efficiently and equitably any disruption that might occur."
"Providing
adequate safeguards, both at home and
abroad, against energy supply disruptions and against manipulation of markets by any party, state or private."
"Over the past year, Iraq has effectively become a swing producer, turning its taps on and off when it has felt such action was in its strategic interest to do so."
"Still, the IEA must be assured of efficient joint decision-making in the event of a supply disruption under tight market conditions.
This includes any possibility that Saddam Hussein may remove Iraqi oil from the market for an extended period of time..."
"The administration needs to ensure that recent events do not derail this past success."
"Iraq remains a destabilizing influence to U.S. allies in the Middle East, as well as to regional and global order, and to the flow of oil to international markets from the Middle East. Saddam Hussein has also demonstrated a willingness to threaten to use the oil weapon and to use his own export program to manipulate oil markets."
"The United States should conduct an immediate policy review toward Iraq, including military, energy, economic, and political/diplomatic assessments."
"Once an arms-control program is in place,
the United States could consider reducing restrictions on oil investments inside Iraq. Like it or not, Iraqi reserves represent a major asset that can quickly add capacity to world oil markets and inject a more competitive tenor to oil trade."
"Another problem with easing restrictions on the Iraqi oil industry to allow greater investment is that GCC allies of
the United States will not like to see Iraq gain larger market share in international oil markets."
"Middle East Gulf crude oil currently makes up around 25 percent of world oil supply, but could rise to 30–40 percent during the next decade as the region’s key producers pursue higher investments to capture expanding demand for oil in Asia and the developing world. If political factors were to block the development of new oil fields in the Gulf, the ramifications for world oil markets could be quite severe."
"While there is no question that this investment is vitally important to U.S. interests, there is strong opposition to any such reopening among key segments of the Saudi and Kuwaiti populations."
"More oil could likely be brought into the market place in the coming years if oil-field development could be enhanced by participation of U.S. companies in countries where such investments are currently banned"
STRATEGIC ENERGY POLICY CHALLENGES