{"id":125220,"date":"2014-06-19T15:15:46","date_gmt":"2014-06-19T15:15:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/?p=125220"},"modified":"2014-06-19T15:15:46","modified_gmt":"2014-06-19T15:15:46","slug":"us-uk-war-oil-detonated-new-iraq","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/war-terrorism\/us-uk-war-oil-detonated-new-iraq\/","title":{"rendered":"Has the US-UK War for Oil Detonated the \u201cNew Iraq\u201d?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Felicity Arbuthnot<\/em><\/p>\n<p>What a black, tragic irony. Just two months ago, on the 11th anniversary of the (illegal) invasion of Iraq, the <em>Guardian <\/em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/environment\/earth-insight\/2014\/mar\/20\/iraq-war-oil-resources-energy-peak-scarcity-economy\">reminded<\/a> that the mass slaughter, the incineration of swathes of towns, cities and the use of US-UK weapons of mass destruction was not about Iraq\u2019s weapons of mass destruction, but about oil (a fact long established for any one with even minimal gray matter.)<\/p>\n<p>Today flames are rising from Iraq\u2019s largest oil refinery at Baiji, 130 miles north of Baghdad, the result of mortar attacks by the varying forces sweeping towards the capitol city.<\/p>\n<p>The <em>Guardian<\/em> outlined the invasion\u2019s \u201creal goal, as Greg Muttitt documented in his book <a title=\"\" href=\"http:\/\/www.powells.com\/partner\/36683\/biblio\/1595588051%20?p_isbn\" rel=\"powells\"><em>Fuel on the Fire<\/em><\/a>, citing declassified Foreign Office files \u2026 was stabilising global energy supplies (especially) ensuring the free flow of Iraqi oil to world markets\u201d with advantage to US and UK companies. \u201cThe most important strategic interest lay in expanding global energy supplies, through foreign investment, in some of the world\u2019s largest oil reserves \u2014 in particular Iraq.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The documents showed that the US and UK sought to privatise Iraq\u2019s oil production and carve it up amongst favored investors.<\/p>\n<p>Further, according to the <em>Independent<\/em>, in March 2003, just before Britain went to war, Shell denounced reports that it had held talks with Downing Street about Iraqi oil as \u201chighly inaccurate\u201d. BP denied that it had any \u201cstrategic interest\u201d in Iraq, while Tony Blair described \u201cthe oil conspiracy theory\u201d as \u201cthe most absurd.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>As ever, it seems Tony Blair had tossed truth under a bus. In October and November 2002, documents came to light showing that then, just months before the invasion, Baroness Symons, then the Trade Minister, told BP that the Government believed British energy firms should be given a share of Iraq\u2019s enormous oil and gas reserves as a reward for Tony Blair\u2019s military commitment to US plans for regime change.<\/p>\n<p>Further, Lady Symons agreed to lobby the Bush administration on BP\u2019s behalf because the oil giant feared it was being \u201clocked out\u201d of deals that Washington was quietly striking with US, French and Russian governments and their energy firms.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/dissidentvoice.org\/2014\/06\/has-the-us-uk-war-for-oil-detonated-the-new-iraq\/\" target=\"_blank\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Felicity Arbuthnot What a black, tragic irony. Just two months ago, on the 11th anniversary of the (illegal) invasion of Iraq, the Guardian reminded that the mass slaughter, the incineration of swathes of towns, cities and the use of US-UK weapons of mass destruction was not about Iraq\u2019s weapons of mass destruction, but about oil [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[487,1615,1616,16],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-125220","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-breaking-news","7":"category-uk-news","8":"category-usa-news","9":"category-war-terrorism"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125220","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=125220"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125220\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=125220"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=125220"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=125220"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}