"News that's not known, or not known enough."
Helen & Harry Highwater's cranky weblog of news and opinion.
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"News that's not known, or not known enough." Helen & Harry Highwater's cranky weblog of news and opinion. |
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After the fighting in Basra + more US lies
This April 4, 2008 Iraq Oil Report indicates some of the recent developments following upon the "Six-Day War" in Basra that ended with a cease-fire brokered by an Iranian General
So what does it all mean? Regarding Iraq’s oil and gas laws, all will depend on how much control the foreign companies ultimately obtain. As the info. below indicates, some of Iraq’s oil wealth has and is being squandered by the US government. Related to the US attacking Iran, it would mean that given the cease-fire the al-Sadr Mahdi Army has NOT been removed as a potential threat to US supply lines [from Kuwait], which was probably another reason why the US and al-Maliki attacked the Mahdi Army (and they still are). However, as noted the Iraqi government does have control of the Umm Qasr port This supply line situation DOES bring up a reason for Iran to see the al-Sadr resistance people as useful rather than a problem as has probably been the case up to now since Iran has all along offered support to al-Maliki/the Iraqi puppet government. In addition, the Badr Corps members, former Iraqi exiles trained in Iran, are a part of the Iraqi government "collaborator" forces. Thus, Iran has been siding with the "collaborator" forces up to now. That they would have suddenly started supplying arms to al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army seems very unlikely In fact, the instability created would ruin some of the agreements that the Iranian and Iraqi governments have made, e.g. Iran plans to link its electrical grid with Iraq, to send Iranian firms to help upgrade the level of municipal services to Baghdad, to construct power plants in Iraq, and to send refined oil products back to Iraq if the pipelines sending Iraqi oil to Iran are built. Related to Iran-Iraq relations, Juan Cole in his April 7, 2008 posting indicates that if the Mahdi Army does have better weapons, it is NOT because Iran supplied them but because they have siphoned off enough gasoline and kerosene to buy them from the international arms black market [no doubt the reason for the smuggling law]. As for there being Iranian fighters in Iraq, as The Times of London reports US Gen. David Petraeus will say to Congress, Cole says that there have been Iranian pilgrims going to the sacred Shiite shrines, but the pilgrims have been recalled home and the pilgrimages halted. Cole adds that "a handful may have gotten caught up in the fighting," but for Iran to send Iranian troops or agents into Basra to undermine Iraqi government forces "on behalf of the Sadr Movement just strikes me as daft. It flies in the face of everything else we know about the relationship of these groups with Iran." He also indicates that "the Iranian leadership benefits from a united Iraqi Shiite community" and I’m sure also a united stable Iraq. Related to Pelosi’s statement, this UPI article says that "Iraq’s oil sales brought in $41 billion in 2007 and through March 5, 2008 $10.1 billion ..." [NOTE: Since the war started on March 20, 2003, there are also the 2003, 2004, 2005, and the 2006 Iraqi oil revenues.] In fact, "all of Iraq’s revenues are deposited into the Development Fund for Iraq (DFI)." In addition, "aside from funds deposited in the Central Bank of Iraq to cover the budget, all of Iraq’s revenues, seized assets and the leftover from the former Oil-for-Food program are in the DFI, held at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York." "They are invested in US treasuries." "They are lent back to the US government at a very good interest rate." As far as I understood the article, the US is doling out the Iraqi’s OWN MONEY to pay US firms for shoddy reconstruction and corrupt practices while the US government itself gets cheap loans from the Iraqi fund [never to be paid back?]. I guess that DOES mean that Pelosi is ignorant or lying
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