It's Not a War for Oil

www.washingtonpost.com Friday, January 24, 2003; Page A27 By Thomas W. Lippman

The failure of the Bush administration to articulate a compelling rationale for a potential war with Iraq is having a pernicious global side effect: It is fostering the belief that such a conflict would be a "war for oil" and therefore an exercise in imperialism, not an exercise in security.

This view is widely held in the Arab world, where commentators argue that the United States must be expecting instability in Saudi Arabia to compound the instability in Venezuela, and is therefore looking elsewhere for ensured oil supplies. It showed up in the signs and shouts of the antiwar demonstrators who came to Washington last weekend: "No blood for oil!" "We don't want your oil war."

The oil-industry connections of President Bush and Vice President Cheney reinforce the presumed oil rationale. Some proponents of the oil theory also cite the "Carter doctrine," in which President Jimmy Carter proclaimed that the United States would protect its access to Persian Gulf oil by "any means necessary, including military force." The Carter doctrine, however, was inspired by the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and was directed against "outside" forces, namely Moscow; it was not about the governance of the Persian Gulf countries themselves.

Even a perfunctory acquaintance with the realities of the global oil market would indicate that the "oil war" theory does not stand up to analysis. As an imagined rationale it doesn't square with the facts; and in the unlikely event that it actually does factor into the administration's thinking, it is a specious argument that cannot justify sending American forces into combat.

First, if the United States felt compelled to increase its access to oil from Iraq, it could do so by getting the U.N. Security Council to lift the economic sanctions that restrict Iraqi output -- no bloodshed necessary. Iraq's oil would flow freely into the global market, contracts already signed with Russian and European companies would increase Iraqi production and, as a beneficial side effect, prices would decline as supplies increased.

Then assume the worst in Saudi Arabia: Militant anti-American extremists seize control of the government. Such rulers might refuse to sell oil directly to the American customers, but it's highly unlikely they would refuse to sell oil to anyone, because the country's other sources of income are negligible. Because the worldwide oil flow -- about 67 million barrels a day -- is fungible in a global market, the effect of such a move by Saudi Arabia against the United States would be minimal. To the extent that the Saudis shifted oil sales to customers in Europe or Asia, those customers would stop buying oil from wherever they get it now, and the United States could shift its Saudi purchases to those other suppliers.

It might be necessary to modify refinery runs to account for variations in oil quality, and shipping costs might increase with distance, but the overall impact would be tolerable.

Moreover, the record shows that even countries whose rulers are hostile to us are willing to sell us oil because they need the money. Saddam Hussein's Iraq itself sells oil to American consumers under the "oil for food" program. If the United States buys no oil from Iran or from Moammar Gaddafi's Libya, it is because we cut them off -- not because they cut us off. Libya would welcome the return of a petroleum relationship with the United States.

Finally, an American takeover of Iraq would not, in the long run, give the United States guaranteed access to Iraqi oil. A democratic Iraq might well decide that its future prosperity would be best served by a supply relationship with, say, China, now an importer of oil with rapidly growing demand. The days when industrialized countries acquired ownership of oil in producing countries are decades in the past. Conversely, a fragmented Iraq, breaking up along ethnic lines, might produce less oil than currently, rather than more.

As the U.S. military buildup around Iraq's perimeter accelerates, the Bush administration is obliged to make a persuasive case for war. It should also make clear what its motives are not.

Thomas W. Lippman, an adjunct scholar at the Middle East Institute, is writing a book on U.S.-Saudi Arabian relations.