Grand Theft Babylon

Beneath the bellows over Iran and the mayhem in Iraq, the real struggle for Mideast dominance quietly unfolds. As petrostates around the globe exert increasing command over their energy assets, Iraq is on the verge of ceding theirs to the control of American and British oil companies. If all goes as planned, the oil giants will have performed the heist of the century.

A little-known analysis by Greg Muttitt in November 2005 for Global Policy Forum reveals the breathtaking earnings to be generated by the "production sharing agreements" [.pdf] ready for signing the day Iraq officially forms its new government. These agreements, which in name imply revenue-sharing and state control over the underground assets, in truth are vehicles so skewed in favor of Anglo-American petroleum companies that they have no counterpart in today's oil world. . . .

Not since Standard Oil won a 60-year concession from Saudi Arabia in 1933 for $35,000 has the oil industry been poised to make so much money.

This piece by Anne Berg is another 'must read', if you haven't already.

With what's happening in Venezuela, Peru, and Bolivia, signing these Iraqi oil contracts takes on increasing urgency. No wonder those twits in Congress are complaining about Iraqis twiddling their thumbs in forming a government.

BTW, LaRouche reports that the US is trying to oust Ibrahim Al-Jafaari because he's too independent.

Q. Scott, on Iraq, there's a report that the President does not want Prime Minister al Jafaari to lead a new government of national unity, and that he actually put this into some sort of a letter or some sort of communication to a Shiite leader. Does the President want Prime Minister al Jafaari to move forward as leader?

McClellan denies it, of course. But, no doubt this is behind the delay. The man refuses to step down.