Arm-erica: The Bullet-holes of Hypocrisy

A press release in a 2005 study from the Human Security Center says that number of armed conflicts has dropped by 40% since 1992. A very lukewarm and bittersweet piece of news that maybe welcome, but still difficult to digest. But further on, the release (pdf) says:

Most armed conflicts take place in the poorest countries of the world, but as income rise, the risk of war declines.

Okay... the little fact seems to diminish the study somewhat. What exactly is the nature of these nation's to invest so much in arms despite their people's suffering is beyond any reason. Nations like Chad, the fifth poorest nation in the world, continue to fuel atrocities in Darfur - squaring off with another nation in which it really doesn't have any business in meddling with. The nature of the arms industry is this according to Globalissues.org:

Global military expenditure and arms trade form the largest spending in the world at over $950 billion in annual expenditure, as noted by the prestigious Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SPIRI), for 2003.

It is agreed, undoubtly, that arms trade is a huge business. Moreover, the Red Herring (requires password+ID) reports that more money is fueled into new technologies to "smoothen" the effects of war (efficient killing). Further on, the report brings up this:

America's military is the country's biggest business. According to the House Budget Committee, in 2000, defense expenditures represented 16 percent of discretionary federal spending.

The United State's current war in....um...everywhere. The business of war and arms is peaking at this point for one the largest and sophisticated military in the world. However despite the United States own military expenditure, the government is able to balance the costs through being one of the forerunner's in the arms market. A report (pdf) published on August 29, 2005, catalogs the number of conventional arms transfer across the world. Conventional meaning limited to guns, assault weaponry and not in the realm of higher military technology such as ballistic missiles or nuclear, chemical, biological weaponry.

The second page of the report reveals striking facts, or may not be striking at all:

• Developing nations continue to be the primary focus of foreign arms sales by weapons suppliers. During the years 1997-2004, the value of transfer of arms with developing nations accounted for 62.7% of all such agreements worldwide.
• The value of all arms transfers to developing nations in 2004 was $21.4 billion. The number of arms deliveries to developed nations totalled to a value of $22.5 billion.
  
• In 2004, the United States ranked first in arms transfer agreements with developing nations with nearly $6.9 billion or 31.6% of these agreements. Russia was second with $5.9 billion or 27.1% of such agreements.
  
• In 2004, the United States ranked first in the value of arms deliveries to developing nations at nearly $9.6 billion or 42.6% of all such deliveries. Russia ranked second at $4.5 billion or 20% of such deliveries.
  

The United States has been in the forefront of selling arms to many nations, establishing the marken alongside Russia. The Federation of American Scientists (FAS) cite light arms as one of the purveyors of constant destruction around the world:

Illicit arms trafficking fuels civil wars, contributes to sky-rocketing crime rates and feeds the arsenals of the world's worst terrorists. Particularly troubling is the illicit trade in small arms and light weapons (SA/LW). SA/LW account for an estimated 60-90% of the 100,000+ conflict deaths each year (Small Arms Survey 2005) and tens of thousands of additional deaths outside of war zones.

Conventional and light weaponry no doubt inflict a larger death toll despite the obsession of many developed nations have with controlling the use of chemical nuclear and biological weapons. In the background, conventional arms seem to repeatedly go unnoticed, and inflict a higher human toll than imagined. With the number of arms transfers that occur through the United States, although it is a business, after the weaponry is tranferred, there is no way to track or be able to ensure that weaponry does not fall in the wrong hands, and in particularly concerns Russia with its shaky adminstration. Ironically the report also reveals this fact:

The United Arab Emirates (U.A.E) was the leading recipient of arms deliveries among developing world recipients in 2004, recieving $3.6 billion in such deliveries. Saudi Arabia ranked second in arms deliveries in 2004 with $3.2 billion.

The Dubai Ports deal that rocked the United States a few months ago, met opposition by the public because UAE was "known" to support terror groups with anti-western sentiment. Despite this, UAE was still the largest reciever for arm deliveries. Furthermore, Saudi Arabia, a nation that has repeatedly holds a "shady" stand on international terrorism, also recieved an extraordinary amount of arms. What gives? How do we explain this?

The United States history in the arms trade is quite extensive actually and reveals holes in the policies that the government reflects or at least tries to. PBS Frontline World presents an interesting and in depth look into the worldwide arms trade and its evolution:

The richest and longest-lived practitioners of this treacherous business simply "fronted" for a particular government or alliance or even "ruling family." In the 1950s and 60s, the late legendary Sam Cummings, a CIA veteran, supplied anyone who had U.S. government approval with weapons from stockpiles in the United States and the United Kingdom. And, of course, there were the "middlemen" who stood in for the oil rich, such as Adnan Kashoggi, who in the 1970s and 80s often fronted for the interests of the Saudi royal family.

Furthermore:

During the first 25 years of its existence, Israel was often denied weapons and ammunition by U.S. and European governments, as well as most nations in Asia and, of course, the Middle East. As a result, it built its own arsenal and related industries that are to this day active internationally. Israeli arms and trainers have turned up in China, Guatemala, Ecuador and Central Africa. Israel Defense Industries has a long history of both procurement and development of military technology and its sale overseas. The man once known as the richest Israeli, the late Shaul Eisenberg, is an example of the "legitimate" arms entrepreneur using the trade in weapons and weapons technology to create a multi-faceted business empire.

Israel according to another FAS resource:

Since 1950, the United States has provided more than $46 billion dollars in grant military aid to Israel, a sum that outstrips military aid to Egypt, America' s next largest beneficiary, by at least $20 billion. Israel has also received many billions more in grant 'economic' aid, loans for military purchases, and used American armaments.

However, Israel has been accused of actions that may violate U.S. arms export control laws. Specifically, some Israeli military operations and reported retransfers of U.S. weapons or technology may have violated the Arms Export Control Act (AECA) and the Foreign Assistance Act. More broadly, Israel serves as an example of how vast amounts of arms sales and military aid eventually contribute to a loss of U.S. control over conventional arms proliferation.

It is difficult to track arms. Although weapons are supplied in a diplomatic fashion, there is just no way to keep track of all it. In effect, they can be distributed unknowingly to the nations that first supplied them. Which can have a disasterous effect when they are used against the nations that have produced or supplied the weapons in the first place - a la Stinger missiles in Afghanistan. We as a nation try to push the image of peace and cooperation, but we seem to reduce that image to a lie everytime things like this happen. The shortsightedness cannot be that short of the government. Frontline goes on to profile some of the most prolific arms dealers in the world. One in particular that is profiled is Jean Bernard Lasaund who operated out of Miami International Airport:

A French citizen by birth, Lasnaud has made South Florida his home for more than a decade. Personable and easy-going, he was in the business of selling tanks, rocket launchers and SCUD missiles from a luxury condo in a gated South Florida community. With the proper paperwork, a customer can still order a fighter plane or a 400-bed field hospital from Lasnaud's Web site.

He was accused of:

Over the years, Lasnaud, 60, has been sought on a number of arms-related charges - mostly allegations of embargo violations and financial fraud - in France, Belgium and Argentina. A Belgian newspaper reported in 1983 that Lasnaud was convicted in absentia for illegal arms trafficking. He was sentenced to two years in prison, but the newspaper said police could not find him. A few years later, he showed up in the United States.

Lasnaud now stands accused in Buenos Aires courts of brokering sales of Argentinean weapons to Croatia and Ecuador from 1992 to 1995, in violation of U.N. and international embargoes.

In all, more than 6,500 tons of small arms and ammunition found its way to wars in the Balkans and the Andes, for fees totaling $100 million or more. Investigators estimate that half the money went for bribes.

Ironically despite of all these crimes and having been issued a "red warrant" for his arrest by Interpol (Osama Bin Laden too has a "red warrant") the United States Justice Department stepped backwards in extraditing him to Latin authorities to stand trial for these crimes. Recently however:

UPDATE: Just days after the publication of this Web-exclusive report on May 23, Jean Bernard Lasnaud was arrested in Switzerland in response to an Interpol request. Swiss authorities contacted the Argentina courts, where the current judge on the case quickly requested Lasnaud's extradition. If sent to Argentina, Lasnaud will face 22 years in prison on charges of arms smuggling and "abuse of authority."

As this FRONTLINE/World report pointed out, the U.S. had broken from standard practice and never took even basic steps toward detaining Lasnaud. If he finally faces the Buenos Aires courts, it is hoped Lasnaud's testimony will help shed light on how a wanted international arms smuggler was able to spend a decade living openly in the U.S.

Wow, I mean WOW. Is that not the height of hypocrisy? This could also fuel a sense of anti-US sentiment across Latin American which is spreading already. The refusal or slowness to act to detain him doesn't prove well for the image of the United States. The International Action Network on Small Arms (IANSA) released an interesting fact sheet (pdf) with a striking statistic:

According to Mexican authorities, 80% of the guns in Mexico originate in the US. In 2002, the Toronto police's gun taskforce estimated that 50% of handguns recovered in crime were smuggled from the US. 30% of guns recovered in Japan originate from the US...

Although the crime rates maybe assumingly low in Canada and Japan, who knows where these light arms will end up? Disarmament and arms limitations are undoubtly linked and have effects on international security. But for the United States to not quell its arms deliveries outside the boundaries, we suddenly get a feeling that we a nation are almost indirectly causing our own fear of lack of security since 9/11. Arms dealings occur all over the place, and there is little control to stop it and also kills or diminishes our sense of security it is like a Iran-Contra Affair times 10.

It is hypocritical for a nation that calls on other nations to disarm or lay-off tactical weapons programs (Iran) when conventional arms are a bigger problem. The recent arms deal to sell F-16's to India for example, only pitts the two (Pakistan) nuclear rivals in more a deadlock than defusing the already critical and fragile situation. In a recent published report, Boeing was actually surprised by the arms deal brokered with India:

But rarely ever to India, which resolutely bought arms from the Moscow, Washington's Cold War rival, and Europe.

Then one day it began changing. Early last year, a top Boeing executive received a phone call from Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's office. The US was going to finally clear the sale of F-16s (made by Boeing's rival-in-arms Lockheed Martin) to Pakistan. But the Secretary was keen to offer India more advanced F-16s and even newer Boeing-made F/A-18 Super Hornets in keeping with the strategic shift in the region. Was Boeing prepared for that?

"We were all stunned," another Boeing executive, who asked not to be named because of the sensitivity of the exchanges, recalled. "This is a new generation combat aircraft that we have not sold to our closest allies. Outside the US Navy, no one has it. Yet here was the Secretary asking if we were ready to sell to India and also ready for joint production." Boeing's reply was swift: Sure thing.


The very first post in the blog about Indonesia where Senator Kit Bond visited disaster hit areas of Aceh Province and in the process sold military equipment like F-15 jets. We are open to arms dealings across the world, with weapons firms showing off their wares in a recent "show" in Singapore:

The Singapore air show, which ended Feb. 26, is one of the world's largest arms bazaars. It's a hot spot for foreign countries looking to buy American-made fighters, drones such as those made by AV and other military equipment. The biggest U.S. defense contractors entertained generals here and cultivated contacts from nations on the Pentagon's approved buyers list. They were competing with defense firms from France, Britain, Russia and Sweden who chase the same market.

During the Cold War, air shows in Paris and near London offered settings for the U.S. and the former Soviet Union to sell billions of dollars' worth of weapons to their allies, while spies strolled the exhibit halls. But in recent years, much of the deal-making has shifted to Singapore as American defense contractors, big and small, focus on boosting sales in Asia to make up for the coming slowdown in Pentagon spending.

It is also important to point out that the terrorist groups that we do have a "fear" of, use conventional weapons, small arms, and explosives to further their agendas. We make a big issue out of WMD when the focus should be conventional arms. They are the root to what inflicted 2,000 military deaths in Iraq today. There was no nuclear, chemical, or biological threat. And I hate to say it, the planes in 9/11 - they were conventional even an unorthodox form of weaponry. The emphasis is being misplaced wholly on pre-emptive measures for the threat of WMD use by terrorist groups when the threat NOW is conventional weapons. If the emphasis for disarmament of WMD does not coincide in conjunction with the disarmament of conventional arms - then honestly there is NO effect in the hopes that violence and armed threat will decrease. This also includes landmines, which have inflicted death and maimed millions from Cambodia to Mozambique. In a 1997 BBC news story, it highlights a landmine treaty that was signed by many nations, but surprisingly NOT the United States:

A treaty banning landmines is being signed by at least 89 countries in Ottawa, Canada, but some major producers and users of landmines, including the United States and China, will not be adding to the list of signatories.

And of course, the reason:

However, the US government will not sign because it still sees a use for landmines in preventing any North Korean invasion of South Korea.

Interesting reasoning nonetheless, it still doesn't make sense in the context of today's world - where the United States is trying to push an image of "peace" against a growing anti-US sentiment.

India's Pain in the Ass-am

As the price of oil further reaches new heights, beyond just the United States, other nations also have their fair share of controversy and problems surrounding gas prices. The state of Assam in the northwest sector of India, is home to some of the richest reserves of crude oil and other minerals in India. The Gulf Times (A Middle Eastern paper reporting on another nation's oil production, I find humor in this) says that Assam accounts for a major part of India's oil production:

India produces about 30mn tonnes of crude oil annually, with Assam accounting for about 5mn tonnes of the total...Assam has over 1.3bn tonnes of proven crude oil and 156bn cubic meters of natural gas reserves of which about an estimated 58% of these hydrocarbon reserves are yet to be explored. Assam currently produces about 5mn cubic meters of natural gas annually.

With the nature of Assam's geological endowments, India faced a critical issue recently in their oil needs. Recently 72-hour protest was laid by a student union groups against Oil India Limited (OIL) calling for a more comprehensive economic package for Assam. The effects of the protest made a critical impression on the production and energy needs of India. An OIL spokesman said:

'The protests have hit hard our operations, and the production loss till late Friday is estimated to be about 1,200 to 1,500 kilo litres. The entire operations is likely to be severely affected today (Sunday) with the protest becoming stronger,' Bharali said.

The recent protests are only a small part of India's increasingly difficult relations with the state of Assam. With oil as one the main wealth coming out of the region, relatively speaking (actually it is tea, where Assam is the largest producer of in the world), it only becomes the target of interest for the government, but other groups seeking power or attention of somekind. The United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA) has been active insurgent group operating for a good decade within the boundaries of Assam:

"United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA) was formed on April 7, 1979...to establish a 'sovereign socialist Assam' through an armed struggle."

Some interesting facts before I get to the point...

Subsequently, links were established with Pakistan's Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) and the Afghan Mujahideen. Reports indicate that at least 200 ULFA activists received training in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Seized documents and interrogation of some arrested activists revealed that the Defense Forces Intelligence (DFI) of Bangladesh had also trained ULFA cadres in the Sylhet district.

Paresh Baruah has been regularly visiting Karachi since 1992-93. He is also reported to have met Osama bin Laden in 1996 during a visit to Karachi. The ULFA leader was reportedly taken to a camp on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, where he not only received assurance of military help in the form of arms and ammunition, but also assurances of co-operation and logistical support of all international organisations owing allegiance to bin Laden, including the International Jehad Council, the Tehrik-ul-Jehad, Harkat-ul-Jehadi-e-Islami (HuJI), apart from the Al Qaeda.

With all that taken into bunk, ULFA is a major source of problems for India. Naturally as any insurgent group would operate, they look to dismantle or strike fear or a destablize/disable the entire nation through the boundaries that they are contained in. Assam all the way in Northwestern India, the only way to shake up a nation of 1 billion people: go for the oil.

Suspected rebels launched renewed attacks overnight on pipelines in eastern India, leaving oil operations in the remote region in critical shape, a top oil official said Monday...
"Our production is on, but our storage capacity is going down, and our operations are turning critical," G.K. Talukdar, the head of state-owned Oil India Limited's operations in the eastern state of Assam...
Late Sunday night, a crude oil pipeline was blown up in a small village outside of Duliajan, while a natural gas pipeline, which had been feeding an electricity power plant, was blown up in another nearby village, Bokuloni.

In another event:

GAUHATI, Nov 26: A powerful Indian separatist rebel group claimed responsibility on Friday for blowing up an oil well and injuring at least five soldiers.

A spokesman for the United Liberation Front of Assam told reporters the blasts on Thursday were in response to a "lack of positive response from the Indian government" to their offer of peace talks.

The blasts came soon after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh rejected the group's demand for independence for Assam. The rebels blew up an injection well belonging to India's state-owned Oil India in the Lankachi area in the east of the state.

So why does this matter? It seems most insurgent groups have become more and more keen on be able to destablize a nation or even the world through targeting the means of running economies or the livelihood of nations: energy. It is a very signficant pattern that reoccurs and makes a huge flux in oil prices. It has been apparent in many cases especially in the Middle East.

But despite this, many newspapers and other media outlets repeatedly comment on the growing rise of China and India's economies - which are probably the fastest growing in the world. This combined with their huge respective populations, drives a direct relationship on each nation's consumption of oil.. that is, with they economies and population, they will each consume a huge amount of oil:

IN 2004 alone, India's oil consumption spurted by 11 per cent despite sky-high oil prices. India is now the world's fourth biggest oil consumer, following U.S., China and Russia.

India's oil consumption, now about 2.25 million bbl/day, is estimated to rise, at present rates of expansion, to a huge 5 million bbl in five to seven years.

Our oil companies are looking to Russia, Latin America, and African countries from Angola to Chad, Niger, Ghana and Congo, to Sudan. Other targets include Ecuador, Sri Lanka, Iraq and Venezuela. There is Myanmar of course; and above all, Iran with which a deal for a 2,600-km gas pipeline through Pakistan is likely to be signed. India has signed a $2 billion contract for a 20 per cent holding in Russia's Sakhalin-I field. It wants to secure one million bbl/day from Russia alone.

India has emerged as China's main rival in grabbing oil contracts in as many countries as possible - following a long trail of rising powers, including imperialist states

With India's own internal troubles, it forces the nation to depend on other sources of oil to meet its growing needs. In the year 2006, the economy of the nation undoubtly has gone up since 2004. But coupling India's need for oil, internal struggles, and then looking for more sources of oil all these little actions and events are bound to have a huge chain reaction on the worldwide demand of oil and drive the prices further up. Considering that India's GDP is far below any average American or European, for a population of its size, the price of gas will probably have an effect 100 times harder than the average American consumer.

Beyond Valdez, Part 4: Cameroon's Ecocide

The relatively unknown nation of Cameroon which borders Chad carries oil along the pipeline part of the much touted Exxon-Mobil Oil Consortium into the Bight of Biafra for processing. The pipeline according to the website for the consortium has been carefully assessed on all levels including environment. The website (pdf) says:

"Over 100 biologists, economists, wild life specialists, sociologists, and other independent worked over a course of seven years to produce a 19-volume environment assessment"

However it does not go into saying how many of those 100 were actually biologists and wild life experts. Despite the 19-volume assessment over seven years, we as humans should always learn one thing... You just can't predict mother nature. Whether it comes down to things like hurricanes (evoking the tragedy and miscalculation of Katrina), earthquakes, down to the convergence of mankind with nature... things will change, an abberation will take place affecting the natural habitat when something new is introduced. Disturbing nature, is expected.

A press release from the Environmental Defense says:

"In Cameroon, the construction of the pipeline has not brought benefits to the population. Instead, it has caused destruction of the environment and of important resources such as fisheries." says Samuel Nguiffo, director of the Center for Environment and Development in Cameroon, and adds: "October 10 will be a public celebration of the broken promises of the pipeline construction in Chad and Cameroon, and of human and worker's rights abuses. The World Bank should not be proud. We are joining our neighbours in Chad in the day of mourning, because we ourselves have no reason to celebrate this day."

Where it was government in Chad, in Cameroon it is the environment. Cameroon's economy is actually one of the brighter spots in Africa. Wikipedia reveals that:

"Yet because of its oil resources and favorable agricultural conditions, Cameroon still has one of the best-endowed primary commodity economies in sub-Saharan Africa...The single largest economic activity in Cameroon is still subsistence agriculture."

With an "endowed" economy and the fact that a large percentage of Cameroon's economy is agricultural... it becomes necessary that the environment is not damaged by the existence of other structures. According to Friend of the Earth International:

"The pipeline cuts across sensitive and valuable ecosystems, particularly in Cameroon's coastal rainforest. Project-related upgrading of existing seasonal roads has led to logging and illegal poaching in otherwise inaccessible areas. The pipeline traverses several major rivers, and construction has already caused oil spills and polluted the water system."

The accidents and miscalculations based on human error is something that a pre-assessed environmental assessment cannot account for. You cannot predict the ecological destruction that will come about from human action beforehand (Exxon-Valdez perhaps?). It is something when it happens, nature will either adjust to or end up victim to.

Ironically Scary...

The war-torn nation of Sierra Leone... known for its blood diamonds, corruption, years of civil war... and killer chimps. A collateral effect of years of raging war? They say primates are very impressionable and are capable of mimicry of human actions...

Beyond Valdez, Part 3: "Love thy Neighbor"... not fuel their war

A continuation of older posts in a series "Beyond Valdez" - Part 1 and Part 2.

The unknown landlocked African nation of Chad has overcome a series of attacks on its capital apparently a result of a "spillage" of the conflict raging on in Darfur region, part of Chad's neighboring nation Sudan.

Chad's economy relies on oil as its main resource in fueling its economy. As a result, rebels sought to control the oil fields in an effort to control and destabilize the current regime of Chad. In a CNN report:

An Exxon Mobil-led consortium exported 133 million barrels of oil from Chad between October 2003 and December 2005, according to the World Bank, earning Chad $307 million.

Exxon-Mobil once again arises amongst the ashes of a violent background. The Exxon-Mobil Consortium involves exploiting Chad's oil reserves and creating a pipeline to channel oil through Chad into Cameroon where eventually Chadian crude can be shipped overseas from the Gulf of Guinea. Despite the high hopes of the project, Chad still falls victim to corruption as a result of its oil wealth and enhances the status of Chad as the world's fifth poorest nation. How is it that with such oil wealth, why do nations still suffer?

A recent article by the Christian Science Monitor analyzes the conflicts raging on in Chad with the government and rebels standing-off on oil fields. Further on, Chad has increasingly been involved in supporting rebels of Darfur (although the government maintains they are neutral) and in exchange, Sudan fuels rebels of Chad. This could be because Idriss Deby, the current leader of Chad, is of the same ethnicity of the Darfur region. Meanwhile...

Chad now pumps about 160,000 barrels a day through a 650-mile pipeline to Cameroon's coast. The pipeline was partly funded by the World Bank as part of a deal that aimed to create a model for ensuring that oil revenues help Africa's poorest. In December 2005, when Deby altered the agreed-upon poverty reduction laws that had been central to the deal's negotiations,the World Bank froze $124 million in loans already earmarked for Chad.

And nation's do not have friends, they have "interests". This is proven when Deby threatened to cut oil exports as the price of oil peaked at $71/barrel...

The US State Department quickly announced this week that it was sending a senior official to act as an "honest broker" to try to resolve the oil and rebel issues.

And the reasons for the "quick" action:

In all, Africa's oil exports are growing rapidly - and could provide 25 percent of US oil imports by 2015.

Ironic, that the United States acts when their interests are threatened, despite the years of war and suffering endured by people of Chad and not to mention the much publicized atrocities that have occurred in the Darfur region. We still somewhat indirectly fuel the atrocities that happen despite our sympathy and calls to end the events that happen in Darfur. Even as the pipeline project went on, according to Amnesty International USA, the project was far from democractic:

In March of 1998, Chadian security forces reportedly killed more than 200 unarmed civilians in the villages of Dobara and Lara in the Doba oil region. The massacre was never investigated. The community consultation process for the oil project took place in Chad largely in the presence of the security forces responsible for these human rights violations, hence exacerbating the climate of fear and intimidation in the oil region

The project went on naturally, with the people struck with fear from ever even consider saying "no" the proposed pipeline. So as oil is shipped through the pipeline, with the government reaping the benefits of the money generated... where does that money go? The BBC reveals that Deby actually publicly stated that Chad requires the money generated by the oil fields to pay for arms:

"Why shouldn't Chad be allowed? We are going to buy weapons. We're going to do it openly. In the next two days these arms will arrive," Mr Deby told the French daily Le Figaro newspaper.

Again, a corrupt government of the fifth poorest nation in the world fails to channel the money where it needs to go: the people. Spending more money on arms could lead to a possible escalation in the conflicts in the Darfur region with the Chadian government supporting rebels in Sudan. The United States is slow to act to analyze where and how we get oil - we may as a nation call down violent acts in the Darfur region, but we hardly notice we somewhat fuel the tension. Certainly with Exxon-Mobil's track record, we would definitely not want them there as diplomats in securing more oil for our thirsty populace. Although Exxon-Mobil posted $9 billion in profits... the costs as a results of these profits are just way too high...

FIFA - the New UN?

Borrowed this from Ryan's blog... I thought it was hilarious and worth looking at.

Beyond Valdez, Part 2: Bleeding Africa

A continuation of a prior post Beyond Valdez, Part 1 - regarding Exxon-Mobil's web of corruption with foreign governments and the price of oil both economic and human. Exxon's reputation just doesnt stop with the events of Kazakhstan. Exxon's hand further reaches into nations part of Africa.

Angola, a war-torn nation, still succumbs from the scars in which over 300,000 people have died and thousands still maimed by landmines and more threats of social upheaval. According to Forbes, Exxon-Mobil stake in Angola lies in the 12 million acres of off-shore area which possesses 7.5 billion barrels of crude oil.

And how does Exxon-Mobil look to get a handle on all that black gold? By the same means as they did in Kazakhstan:

Getting at that oil wasn't pretty--ExxonMobil handed hundreds of millions of dollars to the corrupt regime of President Jose Eduardo dos Santos in the late 1990s, helping to prolong Angola's ruinous civil war--but then the oil business is rarely pretty. "You kinda have to go where the oil is," deadpans Lee Raymond, ExxonMobil's chairman.

The reputation of Exxon-Mobil's oil profit's maybe linked to its ability to "diplomatically" out-manuveur other companies in securing oil fields by dealing with dictator's or the "bad guys" that run the poorest nations.

The financial stakes for an outfit like ExxonMobil are prodigious. It earned $9.5 billion after taxes extracting fossil fuels last year, four times what it netted from refining and chemicals. Without a new supply it would be reduced to earning a slim refining markup on crude it buys from well owners. Which is why ExxonMobil is willing to apply its diplomatic and economic muscle over a long period of time to get into a new oilfield

The cost? Well the $9.5 billion in profits of course. Beyond that Exxon has "generously" contributed to the well-being of the people of Angola according to the International Labor Rights Fund:

Oil companies often fear working too closely with governments of new oil powers such as Angola that ask for help in addressing social ills. Many of these nations, including Angola, have been criticized by Western nongovernmental organizations and international lending institutions for failing to explain sufficiently how they spend the billions of dollars they receive each year in oil revenue. Being seen as an arm of these governments, even in building hospitals or schools, invites criticism that an oil company is enabling financial mismanagement -- and the long-term dependency it creates.

Exxon-Mobil's flirtation with corrupt nations has become a habitual practice of the company in producing the record profits it earned despite the major outcry on the rising prices and increasing shortage of oil. The problems lies in that although Exxon has provided money to the nation's that holds deposit's of oil, in turns the other way and fails to look into how money is being funneled and for what cause.

The dependency on the oil company money creates a burden, guaranteeing money goes into the pockets of corrupt officials with the public seeing the end of the drip. In a report by the Boston Globe, despite the vast reserves of oil wealth Angola possesses, much of the population fails to see any benefits arise as a result of that wealth. Angola's small population (30 million) accounts for more oil money per capita compared to Africa's largest oil producer, Nigeria which has a population of roughly 135 million. However....

But such prosperity does not reach the majority of Angolans. Seventy percent of its population lives on less than $2 a day. Roads in the countryside are ruined. The railway system has collapsed, and the agricultural base is in tatters. The country imports almost all its sugar, after once being one of the world's largest exporters.

Furthermore:

The United States and other developed nations will depend even more on Africa's oil in the next decade; some predict that a quarter of US oil imports will come from Africa in the next decade, up from the current 15 percent.

With nations like Angola supplying much of the world's developed nations valuable oil, does it not become our responsibility that we do not take advantage of this by allowing others to suffer while our thirst is quenched? Of course, it is the responsibility of any government to see to their own people, but we further their cause by ignoring where we get the gas to fuel our vehicles and live under the umbrella of "freedom". Can we accept all this at someone else's expense? It's just very hard to give up...

Thems fightin words!

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is now slamming the international community on "blocking" the scientific advancement of the nation of Iran which is now reportedly been able to produce enriched uranium.

My own deliberations with Iran's advancement in nuclear technology is not so much that they have been able to produce enriched uranium, but more or less Ahmadinejad's poor choice of words, in a CNN report:

Adding fuel to that fire, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad repeated assertions that furthered concerns about Tehran's nuclear ambitions, again calling for Israel's destruction.

Nuclear ambition + Israel's destruction = Hell of a lot of reason for the international community to criticize and denounce the moves by Iran's current regime. How do you expect the word choice of "destruction of Israel" combined with "nuclear ambitions" to play out? It is not so much the international community is obsessed with keeping Iran in the stone age but more or less the "proper motives" of pursuing such a program... I think words like "nuclear ambition" combined with "peaceful, civilian, energy production" might warrant a much nicer international response... try it sometime.

Note: I am backlogged in posts... I've been battling a bad case of the flu for the past week. Rest assured, I am still completing a weeks worth of posts that will hopefully be done soon.

Beyond Valdez, Part 1: Exxon-Mobil's Kazakh Spill of Corruption

The spike in oil prices in the United States since the advent of the Iraq War has many worried over the gasoline prices that may reach new heights during the summer. Exxon-Mobil however has continously posted extreme profits during the much watched oil flux dominanting the last couple of years. According to BBC, the much publicized story of Exxon tripling its profits $9.9 billion despite the occurence of natural disasters, shaky relationships with Venezuela and the war in Iraq.

Exxon hasn't had the best reputation with much of the public resulting from the massive Exxon-Valdez oil spill. But with such shaky future in oil and not the best of reputations how does Exxon-Mobil generate such a huge profit? The beginning of Exxon's reputation doesn't just end with the Valdez oil spill... Moreover other situations have arisen as well, particulary the Caspian Pipeline Consortium:

The Caspian Pipeline Consortium (CPC) is a $2.6 billion project consisting of a 935-mile crude oil pipeline that runs from the Tengiz oil field in Kazakhstan to the Russian Black Sea port of Novorossiysk. Construction on the CPC pipeline began in 1999. It is a key East-West pipeline that will carry oil from the Caspian Sea region to international markets.

The CPC project is the largest, single United States investment in Russia. U.S. companies, including ChevronTexaco and ExxonMobil, have contributed nearly one-half of the $2.6 billion investment

As much as the oil pipeline sounds like a great idea, but it has been plagued by many fits of corruption. Exxon-Mobil according to Forbes, was desperate to get into the oil fields of Kazakhstan that they resorted to bribery in order to entice officials of the Kazakhstan government through a "fixer" named Jim Giffen:

The complaint, filed by the United States attorney in Manhattan, also charges Mr. Giffen with transferring $20.5 million in 1997 to a Swiss account whose beneficiaries included a "senior Kazakh official" and "his heirs."

and the heir:

The complaint does not identify the senior official, but legal documents from Swiss authorities, who first uncovered the bank transfers, allege that the account's beneficiary was Kazakhstan's president, Nursultan A. Nazarbayev.

Who is Giffen?:

First, they had to win approval from Jim Giffen, a New York investment banker who became an official in Kazakhstan's government and held sway over its energy deals.

According to the same report, Kazakhstan would be one of the top producers of oil in the world by 2015 which heightened the interests of oil corporations to invest in Kazakhstan. Further on:

``You couldn't go to a Kazakh minister, particularly if you were an American company, without going through Giffen,'' says Ed Chow, who managed external affairs at Chevron Overseas Petroleum Ltd., a unit of San Ramon, California-based Chevron Corp.

And of course, there is more:

The alleged bribes, according to the indictment unsealed Wednesday, were in connection with six separate oil transactions involving Mobil Oil, Amoco, Texaco and Phillips Petroleum and the sale of oil and gas rights in Kazakhstan. And those aren't the worst of it. He also has been charged with violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, committing mail and wire fraud, money laundering and conspiracy. Giffen, who had the title of "counselor to the president" of Kazakhstan, "made unlawful payments of $22 million from Mobil to secret Swiss bank accounts," according to the U.S. Attorney's office for the Southern District of New York.

Amongst the corrupted, Giffen had allegedly supplied a vast array of luxury items to the Kazakh family:

Part of the fees paid by U.S. oil companies were allegedly used by Giffen to purchase an array of luxury items, including millions of dollars in jewelry; fur coats for President Nazarbaev’s wife, Sara, and a daughter, costing nearly $30,000; $45,000 for tuition at an exclusive Swiss high school; and tuition at George Washington University in the U.S. capital for Nazarbaev’s daughter Aliya. Giffen also allegedly bought an $80,000 Donzi speedboat for Balgimbaev to present to Nazarbaev and two American snowmobiles for Nazarbaev and his wife.

What's the point? The point is that although much of the current administration is continously being harrassed by the public on the war in Iraq and the price of oil, how is the government supposed to do anything when it comes down to the oil companies pretty much altering and setting forth foreign policy? Kazakhstan itself isn't exactly the purest of nations and has its own record of human rights violations:

Kazakhstan’s vast energy wealth has made it an important geostrategic partner for many countries and institutions and raised the political stakes inside the country significantly. As a consequence, in recent years the government undermined freedoms to shield itself from public scrutiny and political rivals, and to protect its substantial control over the hydrocarbon sector.

Sounds familiar? In any case linking corruption to American companies puts the entire United States at risk as it reflects the practices of the entire country especially with the price of oil and the Iraq War. By allowing such practices, or turning a blind eye to fuel our thirst for oil... we fuel regimes that ultimately supress their own people.

Since when do oil corps. run our foreign policy?

Cricket Hooligans

Odd... You usually think violent connotations pertaining to sports like football (not American, worldwide) but the gentleman's game of cricket??

Nuclear Step-down Unit

In an interesting report by the Rising Nepal - analyses the issue of the new nuclear pact that the United States and India brewed up last month. Under the report, the Rising Nepal brings into view that the reasons for the nuclear technology transfer maybe related to China:

Moreover, analysts who note the fervent interest by the Pentagon and the US arms manufacturers, over the past several years in cultivating New Delhi, contend that the main motivation appears to be strategic � namely, the hope that India, along with Japan, will become a strategic counterweight to China in Asia.

Interesting... in whatever case, the deal has been rousing emotions on many sides. Roughly a month later, Jimmy Carter wrote for the the Washington Post in a story wary of the new deal set up between the two nuclear nations:

The proposed nuclear deal with India is just one more step in opening a Pandora's box of nuclear proliferation.

Could it be? The signals that the United States sends is wholly mixed on the entire nuclear and nuclear weaponary issue. For a nation that takes on the role as a nuclear watch-dog of sorts - citing the development uranium enrichment in Iran and North Korea to produce nuclear weapons - the United States isn't exactly practicing what they preach themselves.

The Comprehensive Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) an international treaty under which nations that do sign and ratify the treaty agree to not test nuclear devices. The ratification process is as so:

Ratification

1. Ratification of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty is a two-step process, which has to be secured first at the national level and then at the international level.

2. The CTBT stipulates that it should be ratified according to a State's constitutional processes.
The ratification process differs from State to State.

3. Approval is generally required by the legislature or the executive of a State, or both.

The United States has signed the CTBT on Sept. 24, 1996 and nearly 10 years later has not ratified the treaty since then (CTBTO.org->Signature Ratification->Search United States) clearly an act of our own legislative organs. Although there has been no nuclear tests (or so we assume) the mere act of not signing such a treaty gives all the more reason of sending signals of confusion throughout the international community.

Furthermore former President Carter brings up an excellent point:

The only substantive commitment among nuclear-weapon states and others is the 1970 Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), accepted by the five original nuclear powers and 182 other nations. Its key objective is "to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons and weapons technology . . . and to further the goal of achieving nuclear disarmament." At the five-year U.N. review conference in 2005, only Israel, North Korea, India and Pakistan were not participating -- three with proven arsenals.

The Non-Proliferation Treaty or NPT is exactly stated as above. With India refusing to sign the NPT for security issues regarding its rival, Pakistan and Pakistan's close military ally, China. So how does this new deal come into focus? Again new confusing signals are made - the United States has long been against the rising nuclear tensions between the two rivals, but the incidence of a new deal involving nuclear technology just doesn't have help the situation at all. Consquently, the deal with India maybe a bit shaky and risky as USAToday reports:

In 2004, the State Department sanctioned an Indian scientist, Y.S.R. Prasad, for aiding Iran's nuclear program. Prasad is a former head of India's Nuclear Power Corporation and an expert on the extraction of tritium from heavy-water reactors. Tritium is used to make small, compact nuclear warheads.

Keyword: warheads

Prasad has denied giving Iran information about tritium, and the Indian government has asked that the State Department restrictions on U.S. dealings with the scientist be lifted, said Venu Rajamony, spokesman for the Indian Embassy.

Other keyword: Iran

With the United States' current bout with Iran, the proliferation of nuclear technology in an geographically close area to Iran maybe not be in the best interests of security which the US has been obsessed with lately.

And wise President Carter rolls on:

Another long-standing policy has been publicly reversed by our threatening first use of nuclear weapons against non-nuclear states. These decisions have aroused negative responses from NPT signatories, including China, Russia and even our nuclear allies, whose competitive alternative is to upgrade their own capabilities without regard to arms control agreements.

Just not good... to anger other nations. If the United States is to transfer nuclear technology to India there must a be a more comprehensive step to allowing that transfer. Rather than taking into account a "promise" of the use of the technology for civilian purposes, the United States should have required the stipulation that India sign NPT as a sign of "good faith" with the rest of the international community as eyewitnesses. Maybe then... will the region become stabilized and the possibility of Pakistan to follow suite.

What the heck?

Rightttt