For All the Oil in Iraq

Thirty-six years ago, Saddam Hussein rose to power in Iraq. From his lofty perch, he nationalized the Iraqi oil fields and kicked all of the oil companies out of the country.

Since that time, Iraq has gone to war with Iran (that lasted about 10 years). He tried to invade Kuwait and was repelled by US forces. And then on September 11, 2001, the United States was attacked by Al-Qaeda terrorists at the behest of Osama bin Laden (who was holed up in Afghanistan), and a few years later we declared war on Iraq. The US has been at "war" with Iraq for over five years, even though, Saddam Hussein was captured and hanged less than a year into the conflict.

Well, the New York Times reports that Exxon Mobil, Shell, Total and BP — the original partners in the Iraq Petroleum Company — along with Chevron and a number of smaller oil companies, are in talks with Iraq’s Oil Ministry for no-bid contracts to service Iraq’s largest fields. Only 4,000 US troop deaths into the War in Iraq and the greedy US oil companies are slithering into the Iraq for what they've been waiting for these long five years. The deals, expected to be announced on June 30, will lay the foundation for the first commercial work for the major companies in Iraq since the American invasion, and open a new and potentially lucrative country for their operations.

There was suspicion among many in the Arab world and among parts of the American public that the United States had gone to war in Iraq precisely to secure the oil wealth these contracts seek to extract. The Bush administration has said that the war was necessary to combat terrorism. It is not clear what role the United States played in awarding the contracts; there are still American advisers to Iraq’s Oil Ministry.

Read the entire New York Times article on how US oil companies are chomping at the bit to do business in Iraq here.

plez sez: cajones... mucho gusto cajones

i guess someone has to refurbish the crumbling iraqi oil field infrastructure. someone has to get them on the right footing. it may as well be companies from the country that liberated iraq, right?

and dick cheney and those americans who advise the iraqi oil ministry had nothing to do with the awarding of no-bid contracts to the biggest and greediest oil companies in the us!

do you think this will increase the supply of crude oil enough to drop the price of gasoline back to $2 a gallon? me neither!