January 15, 2002

8:53 AM

Oil pipeline? What oil pipeline?It appears we have been snookered. We fought this war for Unocal, and now they don't want the place! (Or perhaps the motivations for current events are more complex than convenient slogans -- or less complex than elaborate conspiracy theories.)
posted by dhartung (28 comments total)

(I now see that Den Beste did this yesterday.) The sad thing is that an oil pipeline is almost exactly what Afghanistan needs right now -- $100M/yr goes a long way when your cops draw a $1400 salary. But those transfer fees would be years off in any event, and it's going to take years until the nation is considered stable enough for investment at that level. By that time, who knows who'll be in charge of either Afghanistan or the US, and what their interests will be; and whether the route still makes sense, with Russian oil reaching the US via Sakhalinsk, and Central Asian oil making its way to the Black Sea via the Caspian Basin. Meanwhile, the overall price of oil has dropped since the mid-90s and venture capital has dried up with the recession.

So if we didn't actually fight it for oil, what did we fight it for?
posted by dhartung at 9:03 AM on January 15, 2002

maybe the people concerned with the damage the taliban were doing snookered the oil barons into thinking they should fight....that would be nice, wouldn't it?
posted by th3ph17 at 9:14 AM on January 15, 2002

Not to buy into the premise that the war is being fought for Big Oil, but executives at Unocal and other companies salivating over an Afghan pipeline have every reason in the world to downplay their interest. The last thing in the world they would do is emphasize the value of a pipeline before negotiating with the Afghan government over the rights to build it.
posted by rcade at 9:21 AM on January 15, 2002

Dear dhartung: however oil may have figued into the equation (after all, we fought to keep Kuwait safe for our oil), there seems to have been another reason we went to Afghanistan. The Taliban allowed Bin Laden and crew to open some 14 training camps that managed to kill many Americans and to plan for many other terror attacks. I suggest that that might well have been a good reason to send our forces there.
If it were onbly for oil, we would have had a very active peace movement early on...trust the youth of this country to figure things out.
posted by Postroad at 9:29 AM on January 15, 2002

rcade - dead on. Smart negotiation tactic: devalue your intended purchase before making first offer.
posted by yesster at 9:38 AM on January 15, 2002

Right.

It's obvious to even the most casual observer that energy companies have no influence whatsoever within the current administration.

So what did we fight for? Someone strike up a ol' Sousa march, while I tell ya'll about this here good ol' U. $. of A and why we're a-waving flags and a-buyin' Fords and a-arrestin' darkies and a-fightin fer...

Afghanistan was just riddled with "terrorists", by God. Hadn't you heard? Of course, so are hundreds of other countries, including the United States. I keep waiting for B-52 strikes on Mississippi to "get the Ku Klux Klan runnin'", but I guess that's a little lower down on Bush's list of targets. Some might say there's more oil money to be made in Afghanistan than in Mississippi, but that's just those liberal cynics talking, don't ya know.

Oh, and don't forget about all those people killed. Those bastard Al-Quackos DID ram some jets into the WTC...you might have heard about that...thousands killed, don't ya know. Of course, the United States has killed thousands (if not more) ordinary Iraqui citizens over the past few years (but that's completely unrelated to any oil interests, goddamnit), and who knows how many Afghani citizens lately, but it's not "terrorism"...it's...it's...look, you should refer to it as something like "Operation Just Cause" when we prevent a child from receiving antibiotics or blow a family to a crimson pulp, ok?. And hey, friendly governments down in good ol' South America and the Middle East where we have business interests may kill a few of their own dissident citizens now and again (ok, so Amnesty International says "thousands"...the idiots...), but it's not "terrorism" when our own friends do it. Get it?

Look. I can see that in fact you're NOT getting it. Here. Let me spell it out for you. Killing people is different depending on who does the killing. There. Was that so hard?

See, Union Carbide killed 4,000 plus Indian citizens in a single day a few years ago with a pesky little chemical leak (and sure, the Republican administration at that time didn't use a gunslinger drawl to call for the head of Union Carbide "dead or alive", but that wasn't "terrrorism", it was "business", ok?) Of course, the tobacco industry in this country kills thousands every year (good "business", I tell you), but has anyone seen reservations made for Joe Camel et al down at Guantanamo Bay?

Are you dense? Maybe you haven't got the right mindset for this kind of reasoning. Read some history for a better feel. The United States killing off the native population of North America wasn't genocide. It was "westward expansion" and a damned smart business move. Now do you get it?

And the "war against terrorism" is just that, ok? The key is not to think too deeply. Your best bet is to just believe what Unocal and Enron and Firestone and Philip Morris (and those working for them in the administration) tell you. You'll sleep better if you do. Why would they lie?

So no more talk about Unocal and the other altruistic people who work so hard to bring us energy as a public service. No doubt Unocal executives worldwide are excitedly planning campaigns to conserve gasoline because it will make our country more secure and healthy. No doubt they are willing to sacrifice profits for international security. No doubt their actions in Afghanistan have been primarily motivated by concern for the Afghani people.
posted by fold_and_mutilate at 11:19 AM on January 15, 2002

Is there a weaker rhetorical gimmick than line after line of snide sarcasm?
posted by rcade at 11:36 AM on January 15, 2002

fold_and_mutilate: did that have anything whatsoever to do with the link that dhartung posted?
posted by vimes at 11:39 AM on January 15, 2002

(Or perhaps the motivations for current events are more complex than convenient slogans -- or less complex than elaborate conspiracy theories.)

Or perhaps these companies, with all their business expertise, are capable of thinking past the short term.
posted by skyline at 11:42 AM on January 15, 2002

Are you dense? Maybe you haven't got the right mindset for this kind of reasoning. Read some history for a better feel. The United States killing off the native population of North America wasn't genocide. It was "westward expansion" and a damned smart business move. Now do you get it?


When I lived in Missoula, there was a guy who stood on street corners downtown screaming sarcastic challenges at some unseen foe. Some of what he said actually could of had some value ... but mostly he was just seen as a headcase.

So fold_and_mutilate, who are you hollering at and exactly what are you trying to accomplish in this thread? I'm really curious.
posted by Wulfgar! at 12:14 PM on January 15, 2002

rcade-
"Is there a weaker rhetorical gimmick than line after line of snide sarcasm?"

Why yes. Discounting an entire example on the basis of its format.
posted by das_2099 at 12:17 PM on January 15, 2002

I ain't stepping in that pile, that's for sure.
posted by dhartung at 12:41 PM on January 15, 2002

das_2099: If you're trying to speak up on behalf of Fold's colossally lame response, in which he manages deftly to avoid recognizing that dhartung's one of us MetaFilter liberal com-symps who would normally be sympathetic to his rhetoric, try a little harder. There's no way you could do a worse job arguing his position than he did.
posted by rcade at 12:45 PM on January 15, 2002

The sad thing is that an oil pipeline is almost exactly what Afghanistan needs right now -- $100M/yr goes a long way when your cops draw a $1400 salary.

indenturing yourself to petrochemical corps is rarely the right choice for a developing economy. just ask louisiana or india (1 of 1000s of events every bit as horrible as 9.11).

$100M/yr to unocal et al is the cost of a newspaper to you and me, meanwhile all the economic and environmental risks fall on the companies' hapless hosts--i.e. the "business-friendly interim (read: oilman-approved) Government" and the afghan people. (besides the payout is subject to countless loopholes -- both those existing and those to be manufactured with a few political contributions.)

i'll take any bets that as soon as the bottom line calls, the pipeline will come -- be that tomorrow or 2005. it's not that we fought al queda to open afghanistan to unocal. more like now that the country has been bent over by the American Way, it's inevitable that the petrochemical helmsman will be fluffed and ready for the money shot eventually.
posted by danOstuporStar at 12:50 PM on January 15, 2002

There probably won't be any pipelines in Afghanistan for at least generation. Why? - no way to garaunty security. Remember last fall - one bullet hole caused a massive leak in the Alaska pipeline. What are the odds that something like that won't happen in Afghanistan?

Folks who think who think that the oil companies are evil usually think that way because they (the oil companies) worship profits - what would the return on investment be for a pipeline that get shot at thousands of times a year?

The Taliban seemed like they could gaurantee security - that was their original appeal to the Afghan population, and why the oil companies were willing to negotiate with them.

No one can gaurantee security there now, and any pipelines built will most likely go the more effectively oppressive states near by.
posted by Jos Bleau at 3:03 PM on January 15, 2002

Pardon me, “The oil companies that gave up on Afghanistan under Taliban rule will have to wait some time before they can make money there.”

Yeah, they really tossed in the cards on this whole deal. Waiting awhile is the same as not having it all!

And: “American officials still believe a Western-backed pipeline across Afghanistan makes sense in the long run. "The pipeline is one of those things out there in the future," argues a State Department official.”

Yes this closes it — They’ve totally given up on an Afghan pipeline. Time to rethink my worldview.

P.S.: People who think everything on and after 9.11 was orchestrated by the CIA/Mossad/Illuminati are conspiracy theorists. People who think the US planned a military action in Afghanistan last Spring to take place in the Fall of ‘01 (which the White House may not have seriously considered following through on) and that about 20 homicidal maniacs gave them a hell of an excuse to do so are not.
posted by raaka at 3:21 PM on January 15, 2002

Reading the article still makes me think that the pipeline is still...well...in the pipeline.
posted by lagado at 3:35 PM on January 15, 2002

maybe they're waiting for the right catalyst :)
posted by kliuless at 3:44 PM on January 15, 2002

Lagado, odds are there will be talk about building a pipeline in Afghansitan 20 years from now, too. Talk is free - and 300 hundred mile long targets that can leak 20,000 gallons of oil a day per bullet hole are very expensive.
posted by Jos Bleau at 3:56 PM on January 15, 2002

which the White House may not have seriously considered following through on

raaka, of those who've ever expressed the suspicions you have, that's the most generous statement I've heard.

In actuality, my view is that the US did plan to step up its covert support for the Northern Alliance, simply because they had run out of any strands by which they might tie off a working relationship with the Taliban, who had (by the time of the Bamiyan and Kabul museum cultural atrocities earned the disgust of even the notoriously open-minded UN; and our relationship with Pakistan had grown icy, even as we had quiet contacts with India, Russia, and Iran (the Northern Alliance's main benefactors) that pointed to improved comity even prior to 9/11. That didn't make war inevitable, but it did point the way toward a diplomatic confrontation and further isolation: one of the few (very poor) options left would have been a naval arms blockade, and it probably isn't entirely coincidental that Britain had a mainly naval task force in the region.

The thing is, war is often like that.
posted by dhartung at 11:24 PM on January 15, 2002

dan, why would the US start a covert war in Afghanistan? What would be the reasons?

I guess I'm not asking so much for a lecture; more for the reasons you believe would fuel those actions.

“of those who've ever expressed the suspicions you have, that's the most generous statement I've heard.”

I guess we’re reading different articles.
posted by raaka at 12:29 AM on January 16, 2002

it is always interesting to read fold_and_mutilate's posts. but, inevitably the content is ignored by the majority of other posters. i found this comment interesting and informative, as usual.
sarcasm is a fine method of expressing ideas that one finds abhorent. it has the effect of distancing you from the subject you are discussing, so that you do not feel sullied by it.
being pecked with primary school-teacher like homilies from other contributors only adds to the amusement factor.
posted by asok at 8:21 AM on January 16, 2002

fold_and_mutilate effectively killed this thread with his diatribe, asok. very amusing.
posted by danOstuporStar at 9:01 AM on January 16, 2002

not from where i am standing.
it seems to be alive and well enough for you to post in.
at least he isn't giving the usual 'that's so banal' non comment, or the 'x is kissing y's ass' nay-saying that is becoming prevalent.

i was just thinking, i use j. otto seibold 'highly professional mr. lunch fold and mail stationary'. perhaps fold_and_mutilate got the idea for his name there. that thought brings a smile to my face.
posted by asok at 9:28 AM on January 16, 2002

at least he isn't giving the usual 'that's so banal' non comment, or the 'x is kissing y's ass' nay-saying that is becoming prevalent.
As opposed to the usual 'x is saying important things, but w, y, and z are too immature/stupid to appreciate it' nay-saying, eh?
posted by darukaru at 9:53 AM on January 16, 2002

when the mayor says "I ain't stepping in that pile, that's for sure" the thread is effectively dead despite peons such as myself continuing to monitor it and occasionally post. this is disappointing to me since dhartung is one of my (and many others) favorite posters (sincerely, one has to have something to gain in order to be kissing ass)

i'm not exactly sure why, but i kinda thought fold got his name from william s burroughs / brion gysin's cut-up technique
posted by danOstuporStar at 9:57 AM on January 16, 2002

By the way, important envelopes/forms and computer cards traditionally had 'do not fold, bend, spindle, or mutilate' printed on them.
posted by darukaru at 9:58 AM on January 16, 2002

of course yr rite, darukaru. im disappointed in myself as a philatelist geek for having missed that.
posted by danOstuporStar at 10:12 AM on January 16, 2002