[lbo-talk] Would Gore have invaded Iraq?

Doug Henwood dhenwood at panix.com
Sun Apr 11 09:05:28 PDT 2004


kelley at pulpculture.org wrote:


>Also, a lot of people dismissed the idea that this was about oil.
>Given Clarke's revelations, this doesn't seem like such an absurd
>idea any more.

What's it mean that the war was "about" oil? Was the U.S. oil industry actively lobbying for the invasion of Iraq? I don't think there's any evidence of that. What would be the material gain from controlling Iraqi oil, except direct benefits for the companies involved? How would it benefit U.S. capital as a whole? The oil industry likes high prices but that hurts almost all other industrial sectors and economic growth and stability overall. It may have been "about" oil in some sense, but was it out of rational calculation or grandiose fantasies of riches and glory?

Doug



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