Monday, February 13, 2012

Oil & War

Via Bazz

5 Minute Forecast

Today we’re going to try to pull back the veil a little and see what’s driving the U.S. to war, again.

“The dispute over Iran’s nuclear program,” declares a blistering editorial in the Tehran Times, the self-anointed voice of the Islamic Revolution, “is nothing more than a convenient excuse for the U.S. to use threats to protect the ‘reserve currency’ status of the dollar.”

“Recall that Saddam [Hussein] announced Iraq would no longer accept dollars for oil purchases in November 2000 and the U.S.-Anglo invasion occurred in March 2003,” the paper goes on. “Similarly, Iran opened its oil bourse in 2008, so it is a credit to Iranian negotiating ability that the ‘crisis’ has not come to a head long before now.”

If the paper’s thesis is correct, then matters will likely come to a head in the next five weeks.

On March 20, Iran’s oil exchange will start trading in currencies other than the U.S. dollar.

“If Iran switches to the nondollar terms for its oil payments,” says an analysis in the U.K. Telegraph, “there could be a new oil price that would be denominated in euro, yen or even the yuan or rupee.”

That would set a precedent for oil trading in currencies other than the dollar for the first time in nearly 40 years — ever since Saudi Arabia’s King Faisal promised President Nixon he’d accept only U.S. dollars for oil.

Is that a pretext for war? We don’t know.

But the Saddam precedent is there. Ditto for the now-departed Col. Gaddafi in Libya, who proposed a “gold dinar” — a single currency for African and Muslim countries.

We do know this much: The number of scenarios that could bring a “New War” to life is multiplying by the day. It’s still on outlier, but less so than it was even a few weeks ago.

For the most part, we don’t pay much attention to the foreign policy set. But one thing’s certain: If a new war does break out, regardless what justifications are gussied up for the American public, it will have a direct impact on your life. Not the least of which will come in the way of higher energy prices... including gasoline

3 comments:

  1. Exactly right.It's all about the Dollar.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Ummm...Iraq, Saddam, oil sanctions, the UN, oil for food scam....

    Yeah it was Iraq not using Dollars for oil calculations.

    ReplyDelete