Michael T. Klare makes plain how the past 60 years of American foreign policy in the Middle East is linked to Middle Eastern oil. The American military longed for permanent bases in the Middle East that were larger and less secretive than the ones used in Israel. The first Gulf War permitted the "temporary" basing of American forces in Saudi Arabia, which proved to be very provocative to Islamic radicals and lit the fuse for their attacks on the American diplomatic and military presence in the Gulf states, Africa and finally attacks on US financial and military headquarters in New York City and Washington, D.C. The second Gulf War was an attempt to push aside an unlikable Iraqi leader to make way for a number of permanent US military bases in Iraq that would guarantee continued US access to Iraqi and Middle Eastern oil.
Michael T. Klare is right to focus on the political relationships that have shaped American access to valuable resources that lie outside our borders. Resources that today are in decline and will be come increasingly scarce and more valuable to control. The American military, despite six years of war in Iraq, is prepared to militarily attack any country that dares to stand in the way of American access to these resources. And as long as the US has the energy and the war machine and political inclination to do so there will be future resource wars in the coming decades. Watch out when the current US economic stimulus program fails to produce acceptable results. War will be the answer. It always is.
