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Politics : Foreign Policy Discussion Thread -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Hawkmoon who wrote (7896)	12/23/2006 3:26:22 PM
From: Mary Cluney	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 15987

So think about what would happen if Al-Qaida leaders were able to snatch control of those resources to fund their Jihad. Think about the economic consequences of that when you think about how much this war is costing us. This is at the core of the ISG proposal. We can not dictate to the ME what they have to do in their own interest. They have a lot more to lose than we have. No one really want to see the militants take over Iraq. Not the Saudis, not Syria, not Iran, not Turkey, not the Egyptians, the Jordanians, not the Lebanese, and not the Israelis. They don't sell oil, they starve. If we go home and the ME goes out of control, we are inconvenienced for a brief period of time. We lose (the world loses) 25% of world oil output. Crude goes to $200 a barrel. We pay $5 or 6$ a gallon. We go into full conservation mode. Alternative fuel becomes competitive. Other oil producing countries step up production. These are some of the conditions that we will eventually face in any case - perhaps 25 -50 years down the road. We might as well face up to it now. That is the worst case scenario for us. But, there is an outside chance that the rest of the world may come to some sense and want to enter into negotiations to prevent this from happening. We have nothing to lose. They have everything to gain.