So Why Are We Allowing ISIS to Export Oil?
I just fought down my natural revulsion to anything that comes from the major networks to watch “Sixty Minutes.” Teased into it by the promise that former SecDef, Leon Panetta, was going to blow the whistle on his former boss, Obama, I allowed myself to be sucked in. Panetta did say that it was a mistake to remove all American troops from Iraq, but to characterize that as a denouncement of Obama’s foreign policy was a bit lame. What became more readily apparent was that Leon was speaking up and speaking out for that oldest and most venal of reasons, to sell his new book.
From the entire interview what came across to me as completely unbelievable – no, unacceptable — was the revelation that ISIS is a self-funding movement due to its control of producing oil fields in Northern Iraq. King Abdullah of Jordan estimated the ISIS revenues from energy production were approximately $6,000,000 per day, a helluva lot of income for a ragtag terrorist organization. He then went on to say that they are, in fact, bootlegging their product at well below the market price, as low as $30.00 per barrel at a time when legitimate product is moving through major markets at triple that figure.
When I heard that my immediate response was to look at my spouse in astonishment and yell, “What the hell? Why are we allowing them to do that?” That question should be one that every tuned-in citizen asks of his elected representatives in Washington. To gather production from an oilfield into a central, marketable product requires a well-engineered network of collection processes that are quite visible to aerial observation and equally vulnerable to aerial attack and destruction. If all that black gold is moving through underground pipelines, there still must be major gathering points and transshipment terminals.
So why are these key targets not being bombed into oblivion by our military, thus cutting off ISIS’ cash flow? An age-old tenet of war is to strangle your enemy’s economy. Why then are we allowing these murderous thugs to extract, transport and sell on the international market a product that feeds their murderous atrocities? I’ve spent a large portion of my life around west Texas oilfields and you can believe me when I tell you that while all the geological exploration takes place mostly underground, the actual drilling and the subsequent collection processes take place right out there in the open, totally vulnerable to attack from the air. Even underground pipelines have periodic, above surface pumping stations just sitting there waiting for a smart bomb.
So, Barack, why are you sitting on your butt and allowing ISIS to fill its coffers by exporting oil?
Crossposted at American Thinker
Category: Terror War
I said this several weeks ago, when the news appeared that ISIL/IS had seized those oil wells:
BOMB THE DAMNED OIL FIELDS. SET THEM THE HELL ON FIRE.
Why was I the only voice in this back then? Why? I knew what was coming. I could smell it in the air. Hitting a convoy of trucks is nothing.
BOMB THE DAMNED OIL FIELDS NOW.
Yea, you were right PH2.
I’d rather see the oil fields rendered useless to ISIS, I just don’t see the politicians doing it because of the belief we need that oil.
Then the Glorious Leader would coming dangerously close to pissing off Greenpeace and other vital supporters. They might even declare him an “environmental terrorist” (the horror! The horror!), which we all know is far worse than being, you know, an ACTUAL murdering, raping terrorist.
Besides, everybody knows that we really should be nice to these misunderstood practitioners of the Religion of Peace! Setting oil wells alight is not just an environmental “crime,” it’s mean!
Remember who you’re talking about. These people can’t wrap their heads around the fact that pacifism stops working when your opposition is actually bloodthirsty.
The amount of oil we import from those pumps is minute in comparison from what we get from the Saudis, Venezuela, and other OPEC countries, and from Canada.
We are, in fact, exporting oil, for reasons that I do NOT understand, because the Bakken oil field’s crude is higher quality and higher volume than was originally estimated. That stuff should be kept here at home where WE can drop the price of oil and the price of gas at the damned pump.
The asinine idea that we are seling our own oil overseas just blows my mind.
In fact, it blows in more ways than one.
Oh, and that pipeline still hasn’t been built, because like the Alaska pipeline, it will severaly damage the environment and keep critters from migrating. SURE, it will. If you see photos of the Alaska pipeline, its on stilts. Great care was taken to not damage the permafrost, account for the Denali fault movement, and avoid leaks. BP and Chevron have both had more leaks in CONUS48 than the TApipeline.
This is all hogwash and we all know it. The jobs this pipeline construction will provide are needed. There is a demand by oil companies for workers now. I am SO TIRED of the imbecilic, head-in-the-sand bullshit coming out of this administration. I can hardly wait for 2016. We need people in Congress who wil outweigh and outshout senile idiots like Harry Reid and DiFi and Puglosi – LOTS of people, whose grasp of reality is sound and tested.
Oh, yeah – I’d like to know why a foreign company like BP is drilling gas and oil on US soil, instead of US companies.
Sorry about the rant. I’m done now.
Ex, we can’t build the pipeline. If Barrycade OK’d the pipeline, it might cut into the profits that Buffet will make by hauling it in tank cars on the BNSF railroad. And, it may cut into the profits that Tom Steyer will make if the pipeline is blocked. He’s “invested” in green energy.
Very true. Let’s not forget that Buffet is a co-owner/puppeteer of B. Hussein 0bama along with George Soros!
Imo, it’d be more useful, long term, to sink the ships carrying that oil to France and Germany.
Yes, but then we wouldn’t get to use it.
I’m saying ‘keep it here’.
Yeah, but wouldn’t it be fun to blow up a French ship ???
Because generalissimo’s military expertise in crafting a no boots on the ground strategy makes it kind of difficult to take and hold ground.
Or because we have the waterheads whining “it would be an ecological disaster, we can’t do that!” I’m pretty sure there are more than a few “save the planet at any cost” types in, or supporting, this administration (like ‘most of them’.)
In other news, a tanker load of oil the Kurds have been trying to sell for months is still anchored off Galveston because it is too politically sensitive to unload it.
I’ll take some! How much do they want per gallon?
I didn’t hear them screeching about the disastrous consequences of the Fukushima earthquake. Did you?
Are they picketing the Russian embassies over its dreadful abuse of the environment for increasing oil and gas production?
Are they bullying the Canadians at the northern border about the Trans-Canada pipeline and how dreaful mining the tar sands is for the environment?
No, but they’ll grin like apeshit when they plug in that all-electirc box on wheels that lets them go 48 miles total on a single charge, requires several hours to recharge, and has batteries that are made of materials more damaging to the environment when disposed of than oil ever was or will be.
For shame! Do you seriously expect them to address real culprits? They don’t attack folks big enough to defend their own selves, especially if the truth is on the defense’s side.
The amount of Syrian oil reserves is abou5t 2,500 millions of barrels. They are way down on the list of oil-producing countries. less athan Argentina and Sudan.
In fact, the US has a reserve volume a helluva a lot higher than Syria’s. The oil these clowns are stealing is not being sold on the commodities markets. It is going to black market traders who don’t care where the hell it comes from or who gets hurt by it. It is then sold on the regular commodities markets, with no way to trace its origins.
The Kurdish tanker has not been seen on the Texas coast since the beginning of September. Why it was going to be seized was beyond me, but every damned thing this idiot administration does is so ass backwards, it’s a wonder they can even find the nerve to show up on TV at press conferences any more.
Those damned oil fields should be bombed now.
Will dEAR Leader’s teleprompter have a statement after he’s done playing golf today? We need to do away with a few barge loads of asinine EPA regs, give the tree huggers the middle finger, and allow the oil companies to expand their refineries as well as build a few more. Once that happens, we could see gas prices take a nosedive, but alas, the gaggle of clowns we currently have in charge are too obsessed with handing out as much as they can to welfare flunkies and illegal aliens as well as exposing US Military Personnel to Ebola!
I watched 60 Minutes.
It made me sick.
Oh, before I forget — timing is everything now.
Look for some extreme swings in all commodities prices, especially in oil. Right now, the US dollar is king again, because the Eurobank decided to engage in its own quantitative easing a few weeks ago. Per a financial analyst whose weekly column I read, expect a higher high than we’ve already seen, followed by either volatile ups and downs or a striking high followed by a precipitous drop between now and March 2015.
Here is a recent quote from him: “All that vclatile energy could result in something quite spectacular…. If markets rise, it could be spectacular. If markets fall, it can be equally spectacular. And if they rise sharply at first, they could then reverse and fall just as sharply, perhaps after or during the next eclipse set, which takes place October 8 (lunar) and October 23 (solar).”
“The Fed meetings last week seemed to suggest that the economy is growing in strength, but yet the Fed doesn’t want to let interest rates return to “normal,” as if they or anyone really understands what is or will be “normal” ever again following this 2008-2015 time period.”
“Nevertheless, they did use that word “normal” in their projections – with no time line attached to it. There was vague mention that “normal” could return in 2017. I would say it returns after 2020-2022, but the peak of this abnormal period will pass after March 2015. It’s what happens between November 2014 and March 2015 that has me concerned.”
By a very odd coincidence, someone else has said we have until about 2017, give or take a couple of years (2015 through 2019) to resolve our relationship with Nature.
Looks to me like we’re being given plenty of warnings to get our act together, and those of us who heed them will be fine, whereas other people who aren’t paying attention will be holding the s–t end of the stick.
Been wondering about this for a while. These oil fields should have been bombed immediately.
But, that would require a President with an actual spine …
I wonder if the Russians are purchasing any oil?
I would be unsurprised if they were.
Russia’s oil reserves are quite large, enough to offset any need to purchase anything. It’s more likely that the ISIL/ISers are selling it to China, India, Malyasia or even Morocco or Ethiopia.
Whatever, it goes on the commodities markets if they can’t find a buyer otherwise.
You surprise me once again.
It’s not environmentally correct.
Seriously. For this administration, it’s unthinkable.