LEBANON’S PLEDGE TO REBUILD DESTROYED PALESTINIAN CAMP: PAGE 8

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JULY 2008

ENERGY SELF-SUFFICIENCY NOT MILITARY ESCORTS FOR OIL

The US gas garrison

GIORGIO DE CHIRICO – ‘The return of Ulysses’ (1968)

European style: nobody loves it

Imagine a man on trial for his life. The jury brings in a verdict of not guilty, so the judge immediately invites counsel for the prosecution to complete his closing speech, and then the accused is found guilty and sentenced to death. The Irish rejected the Lisbon Treaty on 12 June by a large majority. The treaty cannot come into force unless it is adopted by all 27 member states of the European Union, but most European leaders immediately announced that the ratification process would continue, yet promised to “respect the will” of the Irish people (see page six). Europe is used to attacks on the sovereign power of the people by their overlords. That is now its style, even if it likes to be seen as the kingdom of democracy on earth. The Irish rejected a “simplified” treaty so big the prime minister, Brian Cowen, confessed he had not managed to read it cover to cover. A member of the European parliament said the Irish reminded him of a “people’s democracy”. Another remarked: “It’s no accident that dictators love a referendum” (1) and the president of the European parliament, Hans-Gert Pööttering, concluded: “The Irish no vote cannot be the last word” (2). So there will be a second referendum on the Lisbon Treaty and possibly a third. Voting in Dublin will continue until the result is a yes, because that is what the other states want, those states where the electorate has not been consulted at all. Blame the Irish! Ungrateful, selfish, working-class militants, incapable of the generosity and unselfishness shown by their rulers. Except when they vote them in and give them a mandate to carry out “bold reforms”. No need for a second ballot then. The Irish are thoroughly European in that respect. Something has gone wrong. The European style has been exported and sold on the strength of claims to peace, prosperity, justice and equality. It has produced charming posters with blue skies, loving mothers and happy babies; it has an army of journalists and artists campaigning for it; Europe is being created

by symposiums and meetings. But nobody waves its flag. Its identity seems to be so insubstantial that all it can think of to put on its banknotes is the cost of living. It talks about peace but prepares to join the US forces in dubious wars. It talks about progress but deregulates employment. It talks about culture but produces a television without frontiers directive that will result mainly in more advertising slots. It talks about ecology and safe food but lifts an 11-year ban on imports of US chickens washed in chlorine (3). It talks about freedom but adopts a shameful directive under which foreigners without the right papers may be held in detention centres for 18 months before being expelled, including minors and even unaccompanied minors. Keeping Europe’s promise called for harmonisation at the highest level: freedom, employment law, progressive taxation, independence. Instead, the gains achieved by the most advanced states have been diminished in the name of unification and we are left with extended detention, free trade and Atlanticism. This has produced the beginnings of a social Europe, the Europe that says no. Noting that in Ireland a majority of women, people under 29, and workers firmly rejected the proposed text, a columnist in The Economist observed that: “A 19th-century-style electoral roll, restricted to older, male property-owners, would have produced a handsome yes for Lisbon” (4). But what kind of Europe can we hope to construct if we go back to the property qualification?

SERGE HALIMI

TRANSLATED BY BARBARA WILSON

(1) Jean-Louis Bourlanges on “France Culture”, 22 June 2008, and Alain Lamassoure in Le Figaro, 16 June 2008. (2) Le Monde, 17 June 2008. (3) Joséé Manuel Barroso, president of the European Commission, explained that “it would be deemed incompatible with international trade regulations to bar these imports”. (4) The Economist , London, 21 June 2008.

INSIDE THIS ISSUE

Sarkozy’s bewildering foreign policy keeps observers guessing page 2

France withdraws slowly but surely from its African footholds page 5

What next after Lisbon? page 6

Colombian rebel leader’s mysterious laptop legacy page 10

The multinationals plundering Africa’s natural resources page 12

Tunisian miners fight for fair pay and conditions page 14

Stadiums pitched at the elitepage 15

Gaza journalist’s award-winning humanitarian reportage page 16

The Carter Doctrine,established 28 years ago,put the US military in service of assuring the nation’s regular supplies of imported oil.This has near-bankrupted the US and corrupted the military,yet left the US insecure in energy sources and globally loathed.The time has come to demote petroleum and stand down the troops

BY MICHAEL T KLARE

American policymakers have long viewed the protection of overseas oil supplies as an essential matter of “national security”, requiring the threat of – and sometimes the use of – military force. This is now an unquestioned part of US foreign policy. On this basis, the first Bush administration fought a war against Iraq in 1990-1991 and the second Bush administration invaded Iraq in 2003. With global oil prices soaring and oil reserves expected to dwindle in the years ahead, military force is sure to be seen by whatever new administration enters Washington in January 2009 as the ultimate guarantor of US well-being in the oil heartlands of the planet. But with the costs of militarised oil operations, in both blood and dollars, rising precipitously, isn’t it time to challenge such “wisdom”? Isn’t it time to ask whether the US military has anything reasonable to do with American energy security, and whether a reliance on military force, when it comes to energy policy, is practical, affordable or justifiable? The association between “energy security” (as it’s now termed) and “national security” was established long ago. President Franklin D Roosevelt first forged this association way back in 1945, when he pledged to protect the Saudi Arabian royal family in return for privileged US access to Saudi oil. The relationship was given formal expression in 1980, when President Jimmy Carter told Congress that maintaining the uninterrupted flow of Persian Gulf oil was a “vital interest” of the US, and attempts by hostile nations to cut that flow would be countered “by any means necessary, including military force”. To implement this “doctrine”, Carter ordered the creation of a Rapid Deployment Joint Task Force, specifically earmarked for combat operations in the Persian Gulf area. President Ronald Reagan later turned that force into a fullscale regional combat organisation, the US Central Command, or Centcom. Every president since Reagan has added to Centcom’s responsibilities, endowing it with additional bases, fleets, air squadrons and other assets. As the country has, more recently, come to rely on oil from the Caspian Sea basin and Africa, US military capabilities are being beefed up in those areas as well. As a result, the US military has come to serve as a global oil protection service, guarding pipelines, refineries and loading facilities in the

Michael T Klare is professor of peace and world security studies at Hampshire College and author of several books on energy politics including Blood and Oil,Henry Holt,New York,2005 and most recently Rising Powers, Shrinking Planet:The New Geopolitics of Energy,Henry Holt,2008

Middle East and elsewhere. According to one estimate, provided by the conservative National Defence Council Foundation, the “protection” of Persian Gulf oil alone costs the US Treasury $138bn per year – up from $49bn just before the invasion of Iraq. For Democrats and Republicans alike, spending such sums to protect foreign oil supplies is now accepted as common wisdom, not worthy of serious discussion or debate. A typical example of this attitude can be found in an Independent Task Force Report on the “National Security Consequences of US Oil Dependency” released by the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) in October 2006. Chaired by former secretary of defence, James R Schlesinger, and former CIA director, John Deutch, the CFR report concluded that the US military must continue to serve as a global oil protection service for the foreseeable future. “At least for the next two decades, the Persian Gulf will be vital to US interests in reliable oil supplies,” it noted. Accordingly, “the United States should expect and support a strong military posture that permits suitably rapid deployment to the region, if necessary”. Similarly, the report adds: “US naval protection of the sea-lanes that transport oil is of paramount importance.” These views, widely shared, then and now, by senior figures in both major parties, dominate – or, more accurately, blanket – US strategic thinking. And yet the actual utility of military force as a means for ensuring energy security has yet to be demonstrated. Keep in mind that, despite the deployment of up to 160,000 US troops in Iraq and the expenditure of hundreds of billions of dollars, Iraq is a country in chaos and the department of defence (DoD) has been notoriously unable to prevent the recurring sabotage of oil pipelines and refineries by various insurgent groups and militias, not to mention the systematic looting of government supplies by senior oil officials supposedly loyal to the US-backed central government and often guarded (at great personal risk) by US soldiers. Five years after the US invasion, Iraq is only producing about 2.5m barrels of oil per day – about the same amount as in the worst days of Saddam Hussein back in 2001. Moreover, the New York Timesreports that “at least one-third, and possibly much more, of the fuel from Iraq's largest refinery is [being] diverted to the black market, according to American military officials” (1). Is this really conducive to US energy security? The same disappointing results have been noted

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