> The US faces real problems in its
> geopolitical control of the Middle East and real popular resistance to its
> occupation of Saudi Arabia
I'm glad Greg is here to talk about this, and Barkley too. I agree with you about US/Indian collusion, but I think the Indian bomb is meant to be shaken over Chinese heads; the US discounted the obvious price they paid for turning India into its anti-China proxy, ie, the 'outing' of the Pakistani bomb; but the fact remains that there is now an Islamic bomb, too.
Oil prices are too low for everybody; the 'correct' price is $20 bbl, which gives enough revenue to the hgih absorbers like Iraq to keep their civil populations quiet, enough revenue to the oil corps, and enough to keep the NOPEC producers in the game. Low oil prices have preceded Mid East wars and price hikes there times since 1970. I don't see why the same thing won't happen again, and this time we shall be lucky to avoid nuclear, let alone biochem exchanges; and the subsequent price hike will be the long-feared begining of the end of oil.
BTW, I was intrigued to see the strength of Yeltsin's anti-US statement today. Russia and Iraq: watch that alliance happen; how else can Yeltsin pull his chestnuts from the fire except by hiking oil prices, and how else to do that excrept in concert with the anti-US mid-east states?
Mark