DON'T BELIEVE THE HYPE: We are NOT funding both sides in the War on Terrorism
Thomas Barnett
ARTICLE: "Bush's Latest Energy Solution, Like its Forebearers, Faces Hurdles," by John J. Fialka and Jeffrey Ball, Wall Street Journal, 2 February 2006, p. A1.
It's Tom Friedman's latest sound-bite ploy, and it's totally nonsense. But someone with his media power says it, it can have a lot of impact.
Friedman says that when Americans use oil, we really fund global terrorism, in addition to funding the war to stop it.
He's wrong on both counts.
The reality is, if American can't float it's sovereign debt, then we can't fund the Defense Department in this war at a level that keeps us active overseas. Who buys that debt? It gets bought by old security allies (like the Europeans) and heavy trade partners (like Japan and China, both of whom now hold close to $1 trillion in U.S. debt, making them the leaders by far). These countries fund our Global War on Terrorism because they have neither the will nor the wallet to make it happen on their own, so they outsource this essential global function to the Americans. This is why it's important that we make them happy with how we conduct it. No happy, no funding.
Americans also do not fund the terrorist side in this war by using oil. Let's remember some key facts here.
First, oil is about 40 percent of our energy consumption.
Of that 40%, we import about 60%, meaning imported oil accounts for about 25 percent of our total energy use.
How much of that imported oil supports terrorism?
The vast bulk of our imports come from the following countries: Canada (#1), UK (#10), Russia (9), Mexico (2), Venezuela (4), Nigeria (5), and Angola (8). These countries, none of which can be described as funders of radical Salafi jihadists, account for 37% of our oil consumption. Three Muslim countries (Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Algeria) collectively now account for 12% of our oil consumption. That's a whopping 5% of our total energy consumption. Let's posit, just for the sake of argument, that 5% of that money is spent on promoting radical Islamic ideals harmful to global stability, and that 5% of that 5% might actually make it in the hands of terrorists who would use it to harm Americans and their interests in this world. Now we're down to 1/100th of one percent of U.S. energy spending somehow being used against us, and even that figure probably overstates reality several fold.
Then realize that energy spending is only a fraction of the U.S. economy.
Then compare that calculation to the amount of economic connectivity America had with other enemies in other wars throughout history and tell me that somehow this situation is profound or ironic or sad or hypocritical.
And then tell me that our only reasonable answer is to launch some "man to the moon" like effort to recast our energy profile.
Our economic and political-military interaction with the outside world is a profoundly complex thing, deserving of seriously ambitious attempts at explanation, visioneering, and grand strategizing.
And guess what? Journalists aren't the answer, though they provide a lot of good questions. Outsourcing strategy to people whose main skills come in describing current affairs and critiquing current responses is a mistake, because what you will get, time and time again, are simplistic answers like this.
Plenty of op-ed columnists do this well, taking their analysis right up to the point of advocacy but not pretending that they're offering comprehensive grand strategy upon which major policy turns should be based, much less major government interventions into the private sector (how come we so often advocate huge socialist answers to the problems we encounter because our form of capitalism is being so damn successfull in spreading itself around the planet?).
My advice: you want to be a strategic thinker, then lay off the junk food. Friedman's a brilliant describer of our complex world, and when he sticks to that amazing skill he's a huge help in promoting understanding, probably doing more to educate Americans about globalization than any other thinker in this age. But please, no swallowing this Kool-Aid.
Posted by Thomas P.M. Barnett at 09:51 AM | Comments (2)
Evoked? Provoked? Ask Tom
Russia hasn’t dropped out of the Core yet
ARTICLE: “Goldman Sachs Rediscovers Russia: A Race for Underwriting Business,” by Heather Timmons, New York Times, 3 February 2006, p. C3.
Last Economist listed Russia has experiencing the greatest percentage uptick in foreign direct investment right now among top emerging markets.
And as this article points out, Russia is not only aggressively courting foreign investments, Russian companies, “buoyed by high oil and gas prices, are expected to engage in acquisitions this year and will be looking for help from big Western banks.”
I know, I know. The “loss” of a democracy that was never there, and some serious grabbing for power by the state in the natural resources sector, but so long as Russia remains open for money, connectivity with the outside world improves. That, coupled with a lot of social connectivity (Russians come and go as they please and they excel in many global sectors, especially sports), means Russia stays in the Core for now.
Ah, but they have seemingly so many conditions for their partnership on security issues. Yes they do, but the synching up of those requirements with those of the Chinese, Indians, Japanese, Europeans, Americans, Brazilians, etc. is the process of building the next generation of security regimes for the Core as a whole. It’s happening, slowly but surely, over Iran and North Korea. Won’t end up looking like our preferred vision across the dial, but if done well, the threat of major wars recedes into history—gone for good.
Remember that when you want to get all jacked up about this “increasingly dangerous world” that strikes so many as more dangerous than the Cold War. If you can’t get past that myth then you can’t see the world for what it is today, and what it will become tomorrow.
Posted by Thomas P.M. Barnett
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