When the bill is signed into law, will we celebrate

The stealing of another nation's resources? Bush and Cheney really really really need this bill to be signed:

BAGHDAD, April 19 Reports that Iraq's Parliament will take up the draft oil law next week may be wishful thinking, since negotiations continue and the Kurds oppose it.

After nearly a year of tense negotiations, Iraq's Cabinet in February endorsed the hydrocarbons law framework, which would set out exactly how the country's vast oil and natural-gas reserves would be governed.

But ongoing disagreement between the central government and the Kurdistan Regional Government is a roadblock to reaching terms on important annexes to the law.

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Iraqi oil and government officials and foreign technocrats are meeting in Dubai, the United Arab Emirates, in an attempt to iron out differences. Oil Minister Hussain al-Shahristani said at the meeting that he will turn it over to Parliament next week.

Shahristani is being pressed by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who is getting heat from Washington to pass the law -- a benchmark President Bush has set for success in Iraq. Maliki is threatening to reshuffle his Cabinet posts, including the Oil Ministry spot.

The Washington Post:

The OPEC member has the world's third-largest proven oil reserves and needs billions of dollars to revive its oil sector, which is crucial for rebuilding its shattered economy.

Shahristani said earlier this month that it was "achievable to pass the law within two months since all political parties are in favor."

The long-planned law will also restructure the Iraq National Oil Company as an independent holding firm and establish a Federal Council as a forum for national oil policy.

The world's top oil companies have been manoeuvring for years to win a stake in Iraq's prized oilfields such as Bin Umar, Majnoon, Nassiriyah, West Qurna and Ratawi, all located in the south of the country.

Is this a beginning to the Russian United States Oil wars?

The “scandal” may not be American market ideology in Iraq. The real scandal may be the US move to nationalize some key elements of the Iraqi oil industry in an effort to thwart Russian (and French) ambitions.
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If the US invasion of Iraq was part of a Great Power battle with Russia, then the key decision on the Iraqi hydrocarbons law may have been to renationalize those Iraqi oil fields that were set to fall into the hands of Russia and France.

Privatization?:

A secret NSC memorandum in 2001 spoke candidly of “actions regarding the capture of new and existing oil and gas fields” in Iraq. In 2002 Paul Wolfowitz suggested simply seizing the oil fields. These words and suggestions were draconian, overt, and reprehensible-morally, historically, politically and diplomatically. The seizure of the oil would have to be oblique and far more sophisticated.

A year before the war the State Department undertook the “Future of Iraq” project, expressly to design the institutional contours of the postwar country. The ­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­”Oil and Energy Working Group” looked with dismay at the National Iraqi Oil Company, the government agency that owned and operated the Iraqi oil fields and marketed the products. 100% of the revenues went directly to the central government, and constituted about 90% of its income. Saddam Hussein benefited, certainly-his lavish palaces-but the Iraqi people did so to a far greater extent, in terms of the nation’s public services and physical infrastructure. For this reason nationalized oil industries are the norm throughout the world.

The Oil and Energy Working Group designed a scheme that was oblique and sophisticated, indeed. The oil seizure would be less than total. It would be obscured in complexity. The apparent responsibility for it would be shifted, and it would be disguised as benefiting, even necessary to Iraq’s well being. Their work was supremely ingenious, undeniably brilliant.

The plan would keep the National Iraqi Oil Company in place, to continue overseeing the currently producing fields. But those fields represent only 19% of Iraq’s petroleum reserves. The other 81% would be flung open to “investment” by foreign oil interests, and the companies in favored positions today-because of the war and their political connections-are Exxon/Mobil, Chevron/Texaco, BP/Amoco, and Royal Dutch/Shell.

The nationalized industry would be 80% privatized.

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The Iraqi people do, however, benefit to some degree. The seizure is not total. The hydrocarbon law specifies the oil revenues-the residue accruing to Iraq-will be shared equally among the Sunni, Shiite, and Kurdish regions, on a basis of population. This is the feature President Bush relies upon exclusively to justify, to insist on the passage of the hydrocarbon law. His real reasons are Exxon/Mobil, Chevron/Texaco, BP/Amoco, and Royal Dutch/Shell.

No one can say at the moment how much the hydrocarbon law will cost the Iraqi people, but it will be in the hundreds of billions. The circumstances of its passage are mired in the country’s chaos, and its final details are not yet settled. If and when it passes, however, Iraq will orchestrate the foreign capture of its own oil. The ingenious, brilliant seizure of Iraqi oil will be assured.

That outcome has been on the Bush Administration’s agenda since early in 2001, long before terrorism struck in New York and Washington. The Iraqi war has never been about terrorism.