The itself into Bush administration has dug a big black hole in Iraq. The Bushites expected an easy conquest, with little internal Iraqi resistance, a cheap economic reconstruction and a quick establishment of a puppet client state. Instead they got a strong and persistent resistance costing them about one billion dollars a week, general chaos and continued killings of American soldiers, with no relief in sight.

Of course, anybody with a functioning critical mind knows that OIL had to be the main cause for the attack on Iraq. But the government had to sell the conquest to the public. In the background of the fears and revenge impulses engendered by the 9-11 horror show it was easy to use the Big Lie technique: so Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and was behind the 9-11 attacks and the Americans wanted to bring democracy to Iraq.

While not buying into these lies, large sections of dissenting Americans seem to be falling into another illusion that of believing the Bushites are completely mad, stupid religious fanatics. While not discounting their incompetence (after all, they couldn’t even plant a weapon of mass destruction ) or the influence of any irrational religious beliefs, I think this interpretation is off-the-mark and quite overblown.

What supports my thesis is the fact that the entire American ruling class basically supported the invasion. The criticisms found in the media as well as the Democratic party leadership were quite minor: seldom if never questioning the motives or exposing the lies, avoiding the "O" word like the plague, wanting to get an UN cover, going along with the inspections’ charade, etc. Sure, they were uneasy about the brazen lies and the costs. But deep down they accepted it. They really believe that is "our" oil under their sand. They complain about the failures of the conquest not about its goal. The illegality or immorality of the conquest is never addressed. Indeed, all the Democratic Party presidential candidates (with exception of the pariahs, Kucinich and Sharpton) pose as Bush Lite with respect to foreign policy and offer no real criticism of the conquest and the occupation. They support American imperialism and its goal of controlling mid-eastern oil.

However, if one examines the Oil situation in more depth one realizes that the invasion was not a crazy, stupid venture of the right wing. On the contrary it was a very logical and reasonable act on the part of the ruling class completely compatible with all the various factions within the ruling class.

There are many dimensions of the oil question. The superficial view focuses just upon oil profits. However, it is far more than just the profits that American oil companies will reap after they take over control over Iraqi oil (the second largest reserves in the world). In fact, it may be that such profits will be dwarfed by the costs of repairing the Iraqi economy sufficiently so as to allow a puppet government to rule effectively without a large and costly American military presence.

The deeper motives are the following: Firstly, the European, Japanese and Chinese are dependent upon mid-east Oil and if the Americans control a big chunk of their supply then they have a tremendous lever in competition with these rivals. Secondly, the US will be able to prevent the oil cartel OPEC, which currently presides over the marketing of most mid-eastern oil, from dominating price setting and hence profits. And thirdly, a very important long term factor is that the world’s oil is running out and he who controls the most lasts the longest.

Just how does corporate America plan to control Iraq’s oil? The Bush administration actually grants Iraq the right to own its oil. But just because Iraq in theory owns its oil doesn’t mean it controls it. One controls Iraq’s oil by owning the extraction machinery and its supply of replacement parts, by owning the means of transporting the oil to the refineries, by owning the refineries, by buying off the local politicians, by owning a big share of the economy including the media, by training and supplying the local military and police with the latest hi-technology and by having permanent military bases in the country ( there is a plan for 8 of them, as of now) as a last resort. That is how the US plans on controlling Iraqi oil. And it’s all called "democracy"! In this light one can see how much of a scam the desire among the Democratic party spokespeople to create a UN cover for the conquest and pass it off as evidence of their so-called opposition to Bush. Since the goal is not to democratize Iraq but to control its oil, to allow the UN in would be tantamount to giving France, Germany, Russia, China and Japan part of the loot.

Next I would like to elaborate upon the alleged running out of oil. The oil depletion threat is very seldom dealt with. The true extent of its severity might help explain the irrationality and desperation many observers perceive in Bush’s foreign policy.

In an article entitled "The Bottom of the Barrel" appearing in the British daily, the Guardian, of December 3 (also available in ZNet at www.zmag.org) George Monbiot begins:

"Oil is running out, but no one wants to talk about it... Every generation has its taboo, and ours is this: that the resource upon which our lives have been built is running out. We don’t talk about it because we cannot imagine it. This is a civilization in denial." Oil itself won’t disappear, but extracting what remains is becoming ever more difficult and expensive. The discovery of new resources peaked in the 1960s. Every year we use four times as much oil as we find. All the big strikes appear to have been made long ago...No one with expertise in the field is in any doubt that the global production of oil will peak before long. The only question is how long."

Estimates for the start of the descent range from next year to 20 some years from now. In any case, the reader can easily imagine what disasters this portends to the world’s economic system. Furthermore, there are no energy alternatives within the system to make up the slack, as Monbiot convincingly argues; neither natural gas nor the expensive and lethal nuclear energy. Concludes Monbiot, "We seem, in other words, to be in trouble. Either we lay hands on every available source of fossil fuel, in which case we fry the planet and civilization collapse, or we run out, and civilization collapses."

Of course, harnessing of solar energy is the answer. But a system so addicted to oil dependency, so addicted to and bankrupted by militarism, a system built on producing for profit and not use, a system so incapable of overall planning can not possibly have the means and will to develop solar energy.

In an article in ZNet of August 6 Canadian reporter Stephen James Kerr offers the following interesting perspective:

"This is the secret ticking time bomb under the feet of Dick Cheney and George W Bush. The US has 3% of world energy resources, but uses 28% of those resources, and the USA is no longer geographically situated to exploit them. Oil is capitalism’s crack cocaine, and the Bush gang is waging a turf war to keep it coming. With this understanding of oil production trends, the seemingly insane actions of the Bush White House reveal a consistent, if desperate internal logic - the US ruling class embarks upon its strategy of global Empire out of desperation at its incredibly weak underlying position. American capitalists feel compelled to rule oil producing nations like Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Iran as direct colonies in order to stave off their own collapse."

I think this would be a useful perspective to consider: that the American capitalist system is not the awesomely powerful evil monster that it seems to be, but rather it is as weak and desperate, not only from oil addiction but also from declining economic power and an over extension of empire. It is headed towards an implosion. The yet-to-be-answered question is how it will collapse and how much it will destroy in the process. In any case, it is up to us to build a movement to reconstruct society upon a democratic system of sharing and cooperation so that, in particular, solar energy can be successfully harnessed.

Jack Ceder is Emeritus Professor of Mathematics at UCSB; a certified facilitator of Holotropic Breathwork and Reiki Master; active member of Solidarity, the IWW and Death Penalty Focus.

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