The Study Group

The popular media discussion about the Iraq Study Group Report centers around the authors' statement of the obvious that things aren't going well in Iraq and the pragmatic suggestion that the U.S. should actually talk to Iran and Syria, instead of relying on threats and bullying to accomplish something.

Whenever the media make much ado about nothing, my suspicion radar goes up as to what they are NOT telling us. Curiousity, thus, compelled me to read through the Report, which says nothing terribly exciting or controversial. The Report accepts the fundamental premises upon which the war was and is still justified, i.e. to combat terrorism, dedicating its pages to quibbling with symptoms rather than causes. Yet another example of how our controllers bookend the debate to ensure nothing meaningful is assessed.

What I found most interesting, however, are the following recommendations for the oil industry:

Recommendation 62:

As soon as possible, the U.S. government should provide technical assistance to the Iraqi government to prepare a draft oil law that defines the rights of regional and local governments and creates a fiscal and legal framework for investment. Legal clarity is essential to attract investment.

Recommendation 63:
The United States should encourage investment in Iraq's oil sector by the international community and by international energy companies.

The United States should assist Iraqi leaders to recognize the national oil industry as a commercial enterprise, in order to enhance efficiency, transparency and accountability.

The remarkable thing about these conclusions is that Iraq had already opened its oil fields to the international community before the United States started its war of aggression. There were several exploration deals with China, which the Colonial Provisional Authority promptly rescinded upon arrival.

Perhaps Iraq's crime for which it has been obscenely and shamefully punished for the last three years was not failing to open its oil industry to the international community, but opening it to members of the international community that the United States did not approve. After all, government is the shadow of big business.

So long as the Iraq Study Group fails to challenge Chevron and Exxon Mobil's use of the American military to monopolize the world's energy resources, it is meaningless. Empire is empire and nothing in the Report will change that.

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For more on this topic, check out http://www.alternet.org/story/45190/.