Hagel promises an arms race to Gulf allies
Chuck Hagel was on the loose in the Persian Gulf region today, according to the Stars & Stripes. He promised that the US isn’t abandoning our oil-rich allies, he promised that the US will provide to our friends a missile defense system to protect them from Iran. Apparently, it was a nod to the fact that he already knows that negotiations with Iran won’t be very productive;
The agreement freezes aspects of Iran’s nuclear program for six months while a permanent deal is sought, but some U.S. allies fear it will embolden Tehran to possibly menace the region.
In his speech Saturday at the Manama Dialogue, an annual security conference in Bahrain, Hagel offered reassurance, including proposals he said would strengthen regional missile defense.
“DoD will not make any adjustments to its forces in the region — or to its military planning — as a result of the interim agreement with Iran,” Hagel said.
Russia wasn’t very happy when we promised Eastern Europe that we’d provide them with a protective umbrella from a missile attack from Russia. In fact, they were so not happy, that President Obama cancelled the operation. I’m pretty sure that Iran will complain about a US provided security system for Iran’s neighbors, too.
I can’t help but wonder why it’s such a good idea for our Gulf allies, but not so much for our European allies. And I also can’t help but wonder how the Obama Administration thinks that a bunch of missiles aimed at Iran won’t start an arms race in the region, and why they don’t think that those missiles will provide Iran with an excuse to continue their nuclear program. Also, I’m not sure how the missile shield will provide a defense against the butt-bombers, shoe-bombers, car-bombers and the other various bombers who are being exported from Iran.
Yeah, I know a missile shield is a defensive measure, but that’s not how it’s going to be portrayed in the international media. You know, if we drilled for and refined our own oil we wouldn’t have to give anyone there anything except a couple of shovels full of dirt when they get done with each other.
Category: Foreign Policy, Terror War
We do drill for and refine our own. US oil production is up enough to worry OPEC and make them see that they are no longer the oil kings they once were.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-24935364
Maybe people in WDC don’t know that.
President Asterisk’s already armed his allies: the CIA was selling shoulder-launched anti-aircraft missiles in Benghazi. President Asterisk refused to deploy ABM and anti-air assets in the former Warsaw Pac countries who’d become our allies.
So if Hagel is selling, who’s buying? Iran? Hezbollah? Hamas? The Palestinian Authority?
Are we stirring the pot or protecting the the pot? joe
I don’t know which way the wind is blowing in this, any more than any of you do, but it looks as though every possible fumble in the books is being made.
This is just mind blowing stupidity. And to what purpose? To feed the vanity of an indolent, incompetent dabbler and dilettante who can’t even decide what suit to wear today?
I’m just trying to understand how on earth so many things can be done ass backwards without long-term serious damage to global relationships that took years to build and solidify.
I have to unload this.
I am fed up with all the crapweasels in Washington and the crap that they bring with them, and I don’t know what to do about it because I can’t believe anything that any of them say any more.
B. Hussein 0bama & company have forbidden oil drilling on public land, and it’s the private sector doing all the good work. At one time, the USA was the World’s biggest oil producer and exporter. Bacteria then, supply and prices were no problem, proof that America runs better on American oil!!
As for the cadre of lying, incompetent assclowns currently in DC, GOD HELP AMERICA, they’re doing all they can to take her down.
Proud, holding off drilling on public land saves it for later use. It’s so dumb that it’s smart. And since there is no real evidence that the Alaskan pipeline built in the 1970s(?) has caused any major damage up there (the caribou go right under it), the debate about building another pipeline from Canada down to US refineries is pointless.
I would want to know that the transport will be kept clean and no spills or leak or explosions erupt. But there is no excuse for being so bogged down in the 1970s ecosystem panic attacks any more, when methods are in place to keep things clean and non-polluting. The Bakken oilshale field has proven that. I think there’s more pollution from bad coal mining practices in the Appalachian ridge.
The Lyin King allegedly wants to break precedent & stay in D.C. when his Presidency ends. This one I believe. The given reason is that he doesn’t want to uproot his kids from school…yeah right, its about the money & staying in the lime light. Sorry Chicago, but the Emperor knows Washington has the most millionaires & political influence, and you know the elitist Bam just loves the smell of money & power. You seriously think this incompetent egomaniac & Moochelle are gonna just disappear to a nice cozy beach house in Hawaii?
I agree Ex, my outrage meter has overloaded. Everything this Administration does is a disaster. They are either massively stupid or doing these things on purpose to take down the US, there are no other explanations.
And every word out of their mouths is a lie.
The Caesars had the Praetorian Guard as their protectors. However, if the Praetorian Guard thought any Caesar was getting out of hand, they assassinated him.
Doggone, Ex-PH2, I think you’re right, never bothered to think about it that way! Yeah, I was in college in the late 80’s and got fed a lot of eco-doomsday hype, part of which was that the Alaska Pipeline was an eco-disaster about to happen any day, and the only leak it’s ever had was from some fool who shot a hole in it!! Pipelines are definitely the answer, but B. Hussein 0bama WILL NOT disobey his owner/handlers, namely George Soros, who is heavily invested in Brazilian oil (which is plagued with problems, I hope he loses barges full of money on it!) and Warren Buffett, who owns BNSF Railway, one of the “Big Four” Railroads left in the USA, and makes a lot of money transporting crude oil.
Yeah, let’s turn one of the most vital naval chokepoints in the entire world into a free-fire zone. Atta boy, Barruh, that’ll show ’em!
@8 – I meant to add this question: how many people wanted to have Nixon as a next-door neighbor after he ‘resigned’?
Try to be patient. The influence is fading away.
Just in… check out this fuckin’ douche:
http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/bateman-on-guns-120313
@11 Proud, I’m more and more convinced that the problematic weather cycle we’re having in both the north and southern hemispheres has more to do with the millions of acres of jungle in South America that have been clearcut and replaced with savannahs and farmed with soybeans and corn, for the fuel industry. This is the second winter in less than five years when snow has fallen and stayed, and even shut down roads, in the Atacama region of Peru. This hasn’t happened in living memory, any more than snow on the beaches of Brazil has occurred before.
Ethanol comes from both of those grains. Any grain that can be fermented, including rice, produces ethanol. Ethanol is also produce from the detritus leftover from logging, e.g., wood chips and sawdust. All of that is going on in South America and southeast Asia. They aren’t burning the wood, they’re turning it into ethanol. There’s more money in that and in cutting trees for the furniture industry.
If you think the weather is weird now, it will get weirder and it won’t reverse itself until some time between 2015 and 2019.
Wood alcohol is methanol and has a different polarity and is not a good idea to drink. Methanol can be used in the separation process for the production of biodiesel. Wood detritus can be used to produce ethanol but separating it through fractional crystallization. . . .
This is how I know I am far from busy.
I based my ‘wood byproducts for ethanol’ on articles like these:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/10/131023090804.htm
http://news.cnet.com/8301-11128_3-57340218-54/oil-refiner-chips-in-for-wood-to-biofuel-plant/
This one from ‘Wired’ takes some time to open, so be patient.
http://www.wired.com/autopia/2009/10/new-ethanol-facility-turns-wood-chips-into-fuel/
It’s a WWII technology that was abandoned in favor of more exepedient processes.