I'm sorry, but I've had a little too much of this crap.

Currently, the U.S. is the top dog, however, rather than taking advantage of its position, it looks like some sort of circus contortionist act .

Act now, act immediately and whatever the price, gain control of middle east oil – just do it! The cost will be less in the longrun.

All this dancing about and diplomacy amounts to just digging a grave.

Because we are a  country populated by a people with a fundemental respect for law and fair play.

No argument there. But just how can you put "fair play" and the "middle east" in the same sentence?

This area of the globe, from whom the U.S. depends for its survival, is not merely a fertile site for the cancerous growth of terrorism, all it's people are slowly bleeding themselves dry. Meanwhile, Iran, Iraq, Libya, U.A.E., Kuwait and Saudi are just hangin' bro!

The U.S. MUST get the oil – whether it does so by blackmail, whoring or pimping or by taking control – that is the question!

I've been saying it for years. We should just go over there and take all the oil by force and screw all those arabs. What could they do about it ? Kill them all.

WE do not depend on the middle east for survival. We simply choose to buy our oil there. We are sitting on the biggest reserves in the world. Right now it is better to buy theirs and use it up, than use our own up.

Who do you think will get more for their oil? The middle east now, when we are sitting on huge reserves, or us when we have used theirs up and are sitting on the last of the oil?

Of course this argument ignores Russia's large reserves as well, but I think we will be burning Russian oil sooner than you think.

AR15ForFun

Mexico has quite a bit of oil.

Biggest "ENERGY" (NG) reserves in the world – under the U.S. – unlikely, but, yes, a hell of a lot of gas. Oil reserves, nowhere near!

I said in a post a few months ago, the U.S. should be looking at utilizing its gas reserves for energy – but that does not, and never will, replace the wealth of hydrocarbon products made from crude oil fractionation!

Moreover, U.S. industry is currently entirely geared to supply lines, refineries ect. based on a supply of Arab OIl. It has no means of quickly redirectly its focus to a currently non-existant internal gas or oil supply nor an infrastructure based on internal supply.

I know what I am advocating is brutal and crude foreign policy. However, the alternatives seem to become more uncertain and more expensive (lives and $) as each day goes by and may eventually become completely impossible.

I realize that I am suggesting that the U.S. should become a bully. However, I am suggesting this role in order to prevent complete chaos in the schoolyard.

I should also say that I know that many dictatorial regimes have proffered the same same justification in the past – but this is not a game, it's real and it's about you and your kids' future.

Yea, but what's in their hair doesn't count[;)]

sgtar15

Re-taking the mid-east oil fields would be both moral and just.  Yes, [b]re[/b]-taking.  Why do I say that?  For one, it was the British-owned "Anglo-Iranian Oil Company" who built the current infrastructure to produce oil in Iran.  Then in 1951, the Iranian parliament voted to nationalize the oil industry, essentially seizing the oil fields which were developed and owned by western technology and know-how.

I say let's go.

-kill-9

My source:  [url]http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Blum/Iran_KH.html[/url] (An excerpt from a [b]pro[/b]-Iranian book)

You didn't learn a very good lesson from the British experience, did you?

It would be virtually impossible for the US by herself to occupy that much land mass as well as fight the inevitable non-stop guerilla war that would ensue.  We are a powerful nation, no doubt, but we aren't THAT powerful.  

True.  I don't know how we do it, or if it's even possible.  I guess my main point is a counter to your original reply.  It would be very fair, just, and moral to take them.  Iran's ownership is illegitimate.

-kill-9

I buy oil from the mideast for the same reason I buy products from the store; they are not mine to take.

kill-9, that information indicates that [i]Britain[/i] has legitimate claims to Iranian oilfields.  It does not indicate that the US does.

AR15ForFun has it right - we have plenty of our own oil. I think it is very prudent to use up Arab oil now and still have ours later. However, we should at least have enough infrastructure in place so we can get at ours quickly if needed, like in case of an all out war in the middle east. Also, we have huge reserves of natural gas, so if we had to we could convert a lot of our energy usage to that, although it would take some time. As it stands now, the Arab countries are as dependant on us as we are on them. I doubt all of them would cut us off. Hell, even Iraq would sell oil to us if we would let them! With the exception of oil exports, there is very little that the Arab desert shitholes could sell to make enough money to maintane their, uh, lifestyles. It would just get worse for them, and it already isn't very good.
And we haven't even discussed any of the new "clean" coal technology.....

I think it would be easier to send out SEAL teams after the Saudi's who are financing AL-Quaida.

Let the Saudis find out there are repucussions for supporting terrorism.

We could also do an oil buying program that only concentrated on buying from non-Islamic oil states. Currently Russia produces more oil than Saudi Arabia.

In point of fact, the British never LOST their empire...they gave it up voluntarily, and the nations that they used to control are much the worse for them leaving.