America and Oil: Declining Together?

[marmar]

from TomDispatch:



America and Oil
Declining Together?

By Michael T. Klare


America and Oil. It’s like bacon and eggs, Batman and Robin. As the old song lyric went, you can’t have one without the other. Once upon a time, it was also a surefire formula for national greatness and global preeminence. Now, it’s a guarantee of a trip to hell in a hand basket. The Chinese know it. Does Washington?

America’s rise to economic and military supremacy was fueled in no small measure by its control over the world’s supply of oil. Oil powered the country’s first giant corporations, ensured success in World War II, and underlay the great economic boom of the postwar period. Even in an era of nuclear weapons, it was the global deployment of oil-powered ships, helicopters, planes, tanks, and missiles that sustained America’s superpower status during and after the Cold War. It should come as no surprise, then, that the country’s current economic and military decline coincides with the relative decline of oil as a major source of energy.

If you want proof of that economic decline, just check out the way America's share of the world's gross domestic product has been steadily dropping, while its once-powerhouse economy now appears incapable of generating forward momentum. In its place, robust upstarts like China and India are posting annual growth rates of 8% to 10%. When combined with the growing technological prowess of those countries, the present figures are surely just precursors to a continuing erosion of America’s global economic clout.

Militarily, the picture appears remarkably similar. Yes, a crack team of SEAL commandos did kill Osama bin Laden, but that single operation -- greeted in the United States with a jubilation more appropriate to the ending of a major war -- hardly made up for the military’s lackluster performance in two recent wars against ragtag insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan. If anything, almost a decade after the Taliban was overthrown, it has experienced a remarkable resurgence even facing the full might of the U.S., while the assorted insurgent forces in Iraq appear to be holding their own. Meanwhile, Iran -- that bête noire of American power in the Middle East -- seem as powerful as ever. Al Qaeda may be on the run, but as recent developments in Egypt, Libya, Syria, Yemen, and unstable Pakistan suggest, the United States wields far less clout and influence in the region now than it did before it invaded Iraq in 2003. .............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175441/tomgram%3A_michael_klare%2C_is_washington_out_of_gas/#more (follows a brief intro)

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

1. Although oil is involved, I think it has more to do with adopting

failed right wing policies. Which, of course, include the failure to move away from our dependence on oil.

[yurbud]

2. one Russian general said the collapse of the Soviet Union was tied to passing Peak Oil

the oil revenue gave them financial room to maneuver, but when they lost that slack, they couldn't afford to keep the natives on the reservation.

We have been putting off the inevitable since we hit Peak Oil in the early 70's.

If we had taken the appropriate swift action to switch to other sources, we wouldn't be in decline OR need to be an empire.

[4dsc]

3. appropriate swift action will never come

I know you want to believe the transition to another fuel is a MUST but when facing reality you come know its not possible.

We are headed to world where living with less oil, a lot less oil, is going to rule the day.

[yurbud]

4. eventually, market forces will do what our corrupt government refused to do.

people will figure out how to get their hands on new technology the price of oil becomes to high or the availability becomes too low.

If you read Daniel Yergin's THE PRIZE, there was a pretty swift switch from whale oil to kerosene once the whale oil supply started to dry up.