Oil & Conflict

Gideon Rachman has an excellent piece in the Financial Times about the centrality of oil in foreign policy:

Energy is at the heart of many of the biggest issues in international politics. That is because none of the world’s major economic powers – the US, China, Japan or the European Union – is close to self-sufficient in oil and gas. Global demand for energy is rising steadily and the major powers are jostling to secure supplies. In his recent book, Rising Powers, Shrinking Planet, Michael Klare, an American academic, argues that “a world of rising powers and shrinking resources is destined to produce intense competition among an expanding group of energy-consuming nations”. The book’s cover carries a warm endorsement from Dennis Blair, the US director of national intelligence.

That great powers would go to war over a scarce resource is a no-brainer. That a great power with a vast edge in educational, technological and economic resources would sleep-walk into such a scenario seems unthinkable. Yet it appears to be occurring.

(AP Photos)