US wants effective control of Middle East oil:
Chomsky
By Khalid Hasan found at Daily
Times, Pakistan - Jul 30, 2007
He writes in his new book Interventions that control is understood to be an
instrument of global dominance. Iranian influence in what the US calls the Shia
“crescent” challenges US control. By an accident of geography, the world’s
major oil resources are in largely Shia areas of the Middle East: southern Iraq,
adjacent regions of Saudi Arabia and Iran, with some of the major reserves of
natural gas as well. Washington’s worst nightmare would be a loose Shia
alliance controlling most of the world’s oil and independent of the United
States.
Chomsky believes that such a bloc, if it emerges, might even
join the Asian Energy Security Grid and the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO),
based in China. Iran, which already had observer status, is to be admitted as a
member of the SCO. He writes, “To Washington, Tehran’s principal offense has
been its defiance, going back to the overthrow of the Shah in 1979 and the
hostage crisis at the US embassy.” Under Bush, there has been a rejection of
Iranian diplomatic efforts in favour of increasing threats of direct attack on
Iran. However, despite the sabre-rattling, the US is unlikely to attack Iran
because of strong world opposition and 75 percent Americans in favour diplomacy
over military threats against Iran. The US military and intelligence community
is also opposed to an attack.
Chomsky points out that Iran cannot defend itself against US attack, but it can
respond by inciting even more havoc in Iraq. He quotes British military
historian Corelli Barnett who has said, “An attack on Iran would effectively
launch World War III.”
Chomsky writes that the Bush administration has left disasters almost everywhere
it has turned. In desperation to salvage something, the administration might
undertake the risk of even greater disasters. Meanwhile, Washington may be
seeking to destabilise Iran from within. The ethnic mix in Iran is complex; much
of the population is not Persian. Iran’s oil is concentrated in a region that
is largely Arab, not Persian. The US finds it necessary to demonise the Iranian
leadership. In the West, any wild statement of Iran President Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad immediately gets circulated in headlines, “dubiously
translated.” Ahmadinejad has no control over foreign policy, which is in the
hands of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The US media tend to ignore
Khamenei’s statements, especially if they are conciliatory.
According to Chomsky, the US invasion of Iraq virtually instructed Iran to
develop a nuclear deterrent. The message of the Iraq invasion by the US was that
it will attack at will, as long as the target is defenceless.
Iran today is ringed by US military forces in Afghanistan, Iraq, Turkey and the
Persian Gulf and close by are nuclear-armed Pakistan and particularly Israel.
Iranian efforts to negotiate outstanding issues were rebuffed by Washington, and
an EU-Iranian agreement was apparently undermined by Washington’s refusal to
withdraw threats of attack.
