Will US and UK get the spoils of war?

[TankGirl]

The Independent:

Iraq's oil: The spoils of war
By Philip Thornton, Economics Correspondent
Published: 22 November 2005

Iraqis face the dire prospect of losing up to $200bn (£116bn) of the wealth of their country if an American-inspired plan to hand over development of its oil reserves to US and British multinationals comes into force next year. A report produced by American and British pressure groups warns Iraq will be caught in an "old colonial trap" if it allows foreign companies to take a share of its vast energy reserves. The report is certain to reawaken fears that the real purpose of the 2003 war on Iraq was to ensure its oil came under Western control.

The Iraqi government has announced plans to seek foreign investment to exploit its oil reserves after the general election, which will be held next month. Iraq has 115 billion barrels of proved oil reserves, the third largest in the world.

The pressure is mounting for the US troops to leave, and the era of independent and democratic Iraq is supposed to begin soon, so whatever looting is in the secret US-British war agenda has to be done soon or it may become impossible. What do you think, will they manage to pull it out?

[Ramona_A_Stone]

lol

....or will they do the impossible and not pull it out, yet still get the money shot?

:rimjob:

oops, I mean rimshot...

[floydian slip]

mission accopmlished, oil is still valued in dollars instead of euros. IMO that is why the rush to war. Saddam was going to try and do that and get opec to go along with it.

[Mazer]

If we were going to take their oil why didn't we do it in 1991? And why would Bush want to start drilling in Alaska if we had Iraq's oil?

Taking their oil won't make it any cheaper, we'll still be paying $5 a gallon in ten years no matter what we do. This will be due to world politics rather than scarcity.

Found this little gem.

[theknife]

meanwhile, the Kurds get down to business and cut thier own deal:

Kurdish Oil Deal Shocks Iraq's Political Leaders
A Norwegian company begins drilling in the north without approval from Baghdad.

By Borzou Daragahi, Times Staff Writer

BAGHDAD — A controversial oil exploration deal between Iraq's autonomy-minded Kurds and a Norwegian company got underway this week without the approval of the central government here, raising a potentially explosive issue at a time of heightened ethnic and sectarian tensions.

The Kurdistan Democratic Party, which controls a portion of the semiautonomous Kurdish enclave in northern Iraq, last year quietly signed a deal with Norway's DNO to drill for oil near the border city of Zakho. Iraqi and company officials describe the agreement as the first involving new exploration in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003.

Drilling began after a ceremony Tuesday, during which Nechirvan Barzani, prime minister of the Kurdish northern region, vowed "there is no way Kurdistan would accept that the central government will control our resources," according to news agency reports.

In Baghdad, political leaders on Wednesday reacted to the deal with astonishment.

"We need to figure out if this is allowed in the constitution," said Adnan Ali Kadhimi, an advisor to Prime Minister Ibrahim Jafari. "Nobody has mentioned it. It has not come up among the government ministers' council. It has not been on their agenda."

and more power to 'em.