Washington Journal C-Span: Afghanistan Pipeline mentioned, but quickly dropped.

[whathehell]

Two reporters, Scott Wilson from WaPo and Trudy Rubin from Philadelphia Inquirer were discussing Obama's surge in Afghanistan yesterday morning.

Someone called in and mentioned something for which no one seemed prepared. The caller mentioned the plans for the oil pipeline to be built across Afghanistan.

Trudy (I don't know her politics)gave a small, but decidedly cynical "cat out of the bag" smile and Wilson, eyes cast down, quickly mumbled something like "Yes, there are 'energy interests' but the discussion was mainly about Security"...The subject then dropped like a stone.

I tried like mad to call back but couldn't get through, so I wrote an email noting the moment, and writing of the apparent "gag" from both Obama and the M$M regarding those "energy interests" asking them if they just MIGHT be afraid if this unpopular war would become even LESS so if people knew the "pipeline" connection.

I know this has been discussed here before, but I'm afraid I've missed most of it.

The prospect of more "blood for oil" sickens me...I thought we'd be done with that after Bush

If you'd like to weigh in, I'd like to hear more about it.

[rucky]

1. How else can you explain why we're in Afghanistan...

and not Yemen, Indonesia & Somalia?

[pampango]

2. Let Turkmenistan, Pakistan and India fight the war then. The pipeline would connect Turkmenistan oil

with Pakistan and, eventually, India that want the oil. Let the three of them fight for it and fund its construction.

At least in Iraq, Bush could believe (in his Cheney-influenced mind) that Iraqi oil would end up under US control (as delusional as that seems today). With the Afghan pipeline the US would have no control and no oil. (American companies might think they would be the ones to build it, Iraq has shown though that just because you spend billions of dollars and lose thousands of lives, you aren't guaranteed squat.) Iraq has chosen mostly non-American companies to service their oil fields; Afghanistan might well do the same with a pipeline (even if we "win" the war which is not in the cards), if it were ever built.

Personally I wouldn't invest 5 cents in a pipeline across a country like Afghanistan. Given how inviting and easy to destroy a target it would be, its life expectancy would hardly be worth the $5 billion it would cost.

[mmonk]

3. I've weighed in.

Click the link in my sig line. This, IMO, is just continuing the policy of US domination of Central Asia and the natural gas and oil traversing through it where Aghanistan is called the "bridge". An alternative plan by-passing Afghanistan has been proposed by Iran. Therefore, Afghanistan is the key to keeping out any say so or control by both Iran and Russia. That is what it is about. Not about 9/11 and/or revenge.

[whathehell]

4. Thanks. Will do.

[mmonk]

7. While there is an awareness of the TAPI pipeline project,

many here in the US are unaware of the IPI pipeline alternative. With all the donor companies and countries involved concerning the TAPI project and considering the alternative, leaving Afghanistan anytime soon is a pipe dream (pardon the pun).

[Stables2010]

5. callers were heavy on that topic and the poppy field exports yesterday

C-span calls are always the most entertaining

[mmonk]

8. I wish I had seen it.

[Robb]

6. Our troops are there, because the war is being fought there.

But it's not the war we're imagining.

If you want to read an absolutely chilling and compelling analysis from an economic perspective, read this:

"Pipelineistan's Ultimate Opera" by Pepe Escobar
Excerpt:

...At the most basic level, it's a matter of the West yet again trying, in the energy sphere, to bypass Russia. For this to happen, however -- and it wouldn't hurt if you opened the nearest atlas for a moment -- Europe desperately needs to get a handle on Central Asian energy resources, which is easy to say but has proven surprisingly hard to do. No wonder the NATO Secretary General's special representative, Robert Simmons, has been logging massive frequent-flyer miles to Central Asia over these last few years.

Just under the surface of an edgy entente cordiale between the European Union (EU) and Russia lurks the possibility of a no-holds-barred energy war -- Liquid War, as I call it. The EU and the U.S. are pinning their hopes on a prospective 3,300-kilometer-long, $10.7 billion pipeline dubbed Nabucco. Planning for it began way back in 2004 and construction is finally expected to start, if all goes well (and it may not), in 2010. So if you're a NATO optimist, you hope that natural gas from the Caspian Sea, maybe even from Iran (barring the usual American blockade), will begin flowing through it by 2015. The gas will be delivered to Erzurum in Turkey and then transported to Austria via Bulgaria, Romania, and Hungary....

[Selatius]

9. The Russians will not let it be that easy for NATO to take away that fuel.

They will try to throw obstacles in the path to stop the plan, and NATO will quickly find that a fuel-hungry China is also looking for crude oil and natural gas to ship back home as well.

Central Asia is going to become a room full of powerful people, each one looking at each other wearily, and whenever one of them reaches into his jacket pocket, the rest quickly do the same just in case it's a hostile move.

[KharmaTrain]

10. Pakistan Is The Real Target

In 1980 the pipeline made a lot more sense than it does today. Besides the high costs of maintaining and securing it (which our mercenaries would surely love to profit from) the main reason for a pipeline, the Soviet Union, no longer exists. Our oil companies are profiting from their control in Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan that have built their own pipelines and feed the European markets. The concept of a pipeline in such a mountainous and turbulent region is a distraction not the major cause for our enhanced military presence in that region.

The real and unsaid "enemy" is Pakistan. It's where the "terrorists" live and is also one that is a bigger threat to the region than the Taliban or even Al Queda. The Pakistan military is playing both ends against the middle as they take our money and want to control the tribal areas along the Afghan border...yet they also continue to rattle sabers with India and see an never-ending American involvement in the region as a cash cow. It's a country of many contradictions as the ISI and CIA really are the players here and not always on the same page.

[mmonk]

11. The pipeline is scheduled to resume in 2010 through Helmund

and Kandahar. Check where we are concentrating the buildup. An alternative route has been proposed by Iran called the IPI pipeline. That is what we are trying to avoid, especially with all the participating donors to the TAPI project.