[Nettime-bold] Bush Travels!

["Ivo Skoric" <ivo@reporters.net>]

Possibly slightly ashamed by being heckled in mainstream press for not 
traveling abroad, George Bush arrived to Spain. Good choice. Spain is 
both member of NATO and UN Security Council. It seems that there is 
less opposition in Spain to their government supporting Bush’s war 
against Iraq, than let’s say in Italy. And there he can also train his 
Spanish, with additional benefit of getting understood in two more 
Spanish speaking UN Security Council members that are likely to support 
his war (Chile and Mexico).

This, however, has no influence on the vote of Angola, Guinea, 
Cameroon, Bulgaria, Syria and Pakistan. Of course, he is very determined, 
headstrong person (audacious, as he had been called by The New York 
Times...), so, it is not completely misplaced to speculate that he may 
travel to all those countries and personally try to persuade local leaders 
into supporting his position. This is better than abandoning UN Security 
Council and starting a war on his own.

France, Germany and Russia can also dispatch highest level visits to 
those nine countries, trying to sway their opinion against the war. I think 
that the diplomatic drama is more acceptable than human tragedy that 
can result from inconsiderate bombing of Iraq. And it also gives the 
public a benefit of understanding what is really going on. Because this 
war is not about Saddam Hussein, weapons of mass destruction, and 
terrorism.

It is about creation of new post-cold-war power alliances and delineating 
their spheres of influence. The U.S. Big Oil is hungry for Iraqi oil 
reserves. But the U.S. kept Iraq under sanctions for a decade, so Iraqis 
signed their reserves to French Big Oil and to Russian Big Oil. Now, the 
U.S. Big Oil is angry, and would like to take those assets by force. 
Naturally, French Big Oil and Russian Big Oil are against the war that is 
designed to hurt their interests.

This conflict needs to be settled through arbitration, not war. There is no 
moral justification in killing Iraqi people over the conflict between the 
U.S. and French/Russian Big Oil. The U.S. Big Oil profits from the result 
of the war, anyway, not from the war itself. Except for oil drilling 
equipment manufacturers (Cheney’s Haliburton) and the U.S. defense 
industry, there is nobody else who would make any profit from the war.

Therefore, the world is presented with the unique opportunity to settle 
this dispute peacefully. The U.S. Big Oil can achieve share of Iraqi oil 
reserves faster and with less expenses that way. There is Cheney and the 
defense lobby, that may still be pro-war in the U.S., but as this debate 
progresses there may be discovered that even the majority among the 
U.S. ruling elite would be perfectly content by achieving their goals with 
Iraq peacefully.

On the other hand, just about every country has its Big Oil. Oil is the 
most important strategic asset of today’s industrialized world. It is also 
the most significant pollutant of environment. And the world is running 
out of it. In this century humans must come up with something else to 
run their industry on, because there will be no oil left in the next century. 
As dinosaurs became extinct at one point, their remains (oil) will become 
extinct at one point, too.

Instead of developing new technologies, Big Oil reacts immaturely and 
desperately, fighting over outdated, poisonous, and evaporating 
resources. This holds true for practically ANY country, not only ‘great 
powers’ like the U.S., France, and Russia. Big Oil is always the last 
resource to get privatized in the post-communist Eastern European 
‘emerging markets’. Croatia’s government practically sold their 
underwear to foreign investors, but they still keep ownership over their 
Big Oil, INA, their *precious*.

Where there is oil, there is conflict. Big Oil is always and everywhere 
involved in back-room shadowy deals, environmentally disastrous 
policies, wars, anti-labor measures, and just about everything else that’s 
evil and unclean. Croatia’s Big Oil purchased oil fields in Western Siberia 
in November 1999 (White Nights) that increased their reserves for 75%. 
They also received a grant from the US Trade & Development Agency in 
December 2001. 

In January 2002 they decided to block passage of Slovenian Big Oil to 
Bosnia through Croatia, trying to secure Bosnian market solely for 
themselves. Slovenia is now suing Croatia at WTO for that. Bosnia 
responded more aggressively - banning entry to Croatian Big Oil except 
for one border crossing. Slovenia now ships oil to Bosnia by-passing 
Croatia - over Hungary and Serbia. This eventually just resulted in a loss 
of revenue for Croatia’s Big Oil. Interestingly, Croatia justified its 
decision on environmentalist grounds.

Now they established Adria Project Society. Its new ‘environmentally 
friendly’ idea is to provide U.S. access to Russian oil via the existing 
pipelines that end up at Croatian coast. U.S. supertankers will receive the 
oil at the oil terminal in Omisalj at the island of Krk in the bay of Kvarner, 
at the North end of the tranquil Adriatic sea. The U.S. Big Oil will pay 
about $50 million a year for that service to Croatian Big Oil. Croatian 
government is apparently not swayed by the potential disaster that can 
create for the environment and the income from tourism.

Croatia earns about $4 billion a year in tourism revenue, and about 40% 
of that is earned in the region where the oil-terminal is. In case of an 
accident of the Exxon-Valdez proportions, Croatia risks 32 times greater 
yearly loss, than the yearly earnings from this project will be. But tourism 
creates just indirect income for the government - through taxation - Adria 
Project Society puts cash directly in their pockets - hence the incentive. 
Of course, this decision, shows that Croatia’s Big Oil harbors the same 
disregard for environment as their U.S. counterpart does.

Adriatic Sea is a small, closed-end sea. The stream on Croatian (Eastern) 
side goes from South (open-end) to North. Eventual oil spill would end 
up stranded on the coast of Kvarner bay, and Norther at the top of 
Adriatic sea between Trieste and Venice for about as long as it would be 
needed for human efforts to clean it up. Venice, being literally build on 
the sea level of calm Northern Adriatic, might be damaged forever. The 
risks of that project far outflank the benefits. But Croatia’s Big Oil is 
proceeding with the project anyway.

Big Oil will always put its own selfish bottom line before anything else - 
be that environment, economy, or very human life. And Big Oil has the 
monetary muscle to get its will done. On a regional scale like in the 
example of the Balkans, or on the global scale like in the example of Iraq. 
That’s the sad ending of the story of the human race.
Ivo 

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