Alright, I will be kind, history lesson of the Afghan pipeline:
http://www.alternet.org/story/12525
It is rather long, so just the begining:
"Where the "Great Game" in Afghanistan was once about czars and commissars seeking access to the warm water ports of the Persian Gulf, today it is about laying oil and gas pipelines via the untapped petroleum reserves of Central Asia, a region previously dominated by the former Soviet Union, with strong influence from Iran and Pakistan. Studies have placed the total worth of oil and gas reserves in the Central Asian republics at between $3 and $6 trillion.
Who has access to that vast sea of oil? Right now the only existing export routes from the Caspian Basin lead through Russia. U.S. oil companies have longed dreamed of their own pipeline routes that will give them control of the oil and gas resources of the Caspian Sea. Likewise, the U.S. government also wants to dominate Central Asian oil in order to reduce dependency on resources from the Persian/Arabian Gulf, which it cannot control. Thus the U.S. is poised to challenge Russian hegemony in a new version of the "Great Game."
Construction of oil and natural gas export pipelines through Afghanistan was under serious consideration during the Clinton years. In 1996, Unocal -- one of the world's leading energy resource and project development companies -- won a contract to build a 1,005-mile oil pipeline in order to exploit the vast Turkmenistan natural gas fields in Duletabad. The pipeline would extend through Afghanistan and Pakistan, terminating in Multan, near the India border."
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"However, from all records, relationships became strained. The Taliban had demanded that the U.S. should also reconstruct Afghanistan's infrastructure and that the pipeline be open for local consumption. Instead, the U.S. wanted a closed pipeline pumping gas for export only and was not interested in helping to rebuild the country.
In turn, the U.S. threatened the Taliban during the negotiations. The directive of "we'll either carpet you in gold or carpet you in bombs" was bantered about in the press to underscore the emerging willfulness of the U.S." <<<<< summer of 2001
http://www.alternet.org/story/12525
It is rather long, so just the begining:
"Where the "Great Game" in Afghanistan was once about czars and commissars seeking access to the warm water ports of the Persian Gulf, today it is about laying oil and gas pipelines via the untapped petroleum reserves of Central Asia, a region previously dominated by the former Soviet Union, with strong influence from Iran and Pakistan. Studies have placed the total worth of oil and gas reserves in the Central Asian republics at between $3 and $6 trillion.
Who has access to that vast sea of oil? Right now the only existing export routes from the Caspian Basin lead through Russia. U.S. oil companies have longed dreamed of their own pipeline routes that will give them control of the oil and gas resources of the Caspian Sea. Likewise, the U.S. government also wants to dominate Central Asian oil in order to reduce dependency on resources from the Persian/Arabian Gulf, which it cannot control. Thus the U.S. is poised to challenge Russian hegemony in a new version of the "Great Game."
Construction of oil and natural gas export pipelines through Afghanistan was under serious consideration during the Clinton years. In 1996, Unocal -- one of the world's leading energy resource and project development companies -- won a contract to build a 1,005-mile oil pipeline in order to exploit the vast Turkmenistan natural gas fields in Duletabad. The pipeline would extend through Afghanistan and Pakistan, terminating in Multan, near the India border."
-------------------------------------------
"However, from all records, relationships became strained. The Taliban had demanded that the U.S. should also reconstruct Afghanistan's infrastructure and that the pipeline be open for local consumption. Instead, the U.S. wanted a closed pipeline pumping gas for export only and was not interested in helping to rebuild the country.
In turn, the U.S. threatened the Taliban during the negotiations. The directive of "we'll either carpet you in gold or carpet you in bombs" was bantered about in the press to underscore the emerging willfulness of the U.S." <<<<< summer of 2001
