India, the world's fourth largest oil consumer has informed the US and Europe that it will not participate in the embargo on Iranian oil scheduled to start - if it starts - this summer.
"It is not possible for India to take any decision to reduce the imports from Iran drastically, because among the countries which can provide the requirement of the emerging economies, Iran is an important country amongst them," Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee told reporters on a visit to the Unites States.
Yeah, sanctions'll work. Sure they will.
In a related item, India and Iran have agreed to drop the use of the dollar as a reserve currency for oil trading between the two countries. They're using gold.
According to the report it is "unconfirmed", however, given the situation, I think it is safe to conclude beyond a reasonable doubt that the report of India and Iran trading oil for gold is accurate. Due to reckless spending and debt practices by the US over the past few years the US dollar will likely lose its role as world reserve currency within the next six months to a year. Prudent American leadership wouldd be preparing for how they are going to respond when the inevitable happens.
ReplyDeleteIn one of the debates, I'd like to hear the moderator ask the candidates how they plan to respond to this when it happens. Of course that would be a serious question. First of all the moderators are not serious people and secondly the American people are not serious people right now.
If America had simply developed all of its oil and gas reserves and built more refineries over the last 10 years or so, we might have enough excess capacity to be able to supply India's needs or at the very least we could offer meaningful assistance to them in this area. Simply developing all of our own oil and gas reserves and building the necessary refining capacity to handle this increased oil production would give us greater utility for our national security interests than any thing we are currently doing.
For the US to even think of a moon base, it must first acquire the sc
For sanctions to work, everyone has to be on board. I've always been a skeptic of sanctions. There's usually to many holes in them and they are simply to easy for the nation being sancitioned and those wishing to beat the sanctions for whatever reason or reasons to beat the sanctions.
ReplyDeleteAs such, sanctions have negative utility. The nation being sanctioned is able to beat them with impunity and they are able to cry foul about how badly they are being hurt by the nation or nations implementing the sanctions. This can be and generally is used to turn world sentiment agains the nation or nations trying to implement sanctions and turn such opinion in favor of the nation being sanctioned. On top of this the sancitons are laughably easy to beat and have no adverse effect on the nation's economy or otherwise that is being sanctioned. At least they don' effect the leaders of those countries. The leaders can always withhold things from the populace of the sanctioned country and blame the sanctioning country or country. This garners them even more support at home!!
Sanctions are worthless. Why do we even try such nonsense.
Optimally we should have developed more of our own oil and gas reserves. We might have been able to use some of our surplus to supplement what India gets from Iran. Alas, we did not do that. This leads to the question of what can be done?
Clearly without the support of nations like India sanctions cannot work. What can be done to get India and others on board. Perhpas if we appeal to human decency. If Iran is able to make good on their threats against America and Israel, Indians will have American and Israeli blood on their hands. Perhaps they can sacrifice something economically in order to do the right thing.
Iran poses a far greater threat to America than Nazi Germany or Imperial Japan ever did or likely ever could have. We are going to need massive support to confront and defeat Iran. We need to change the narrative on this conflict in order to get this kind of support. This would take time to get though.
Again, what can be done here? In any event, this goes to show that "Democracy" as India supposedly has is not necessarily what it is crackecd up to be. Give me a dictator who will support us in our hour of great need any day of the week over a democratic country who is willing to sacrifice us for economic or ideological interests. At a minimum, America will need to rethink its foreign policy.
85% of the purchasers of Iranian oil will not engage in the embargo - that will work - NOT!
ReplyDeleteGiven that Western Europe depends heavily on Russia to supply their oil needs, it gets mighty cold in those winters up there, and Russia is closely allied with Iran by the time this all works itself out there is going to be 0% support for an embargo against Iranian oil. Since the media has worked tirelessly these last few years to undercut any military option America may have had and America is hamstrung by massive national debt, a worn down military, and lack of financial ability to address any of this, America's best option is to withdraw all forces and personnel from the Middle Eastern region, redeploy them to defensible positions along America's borders, and pray for the best. Due to gross mismanagment by both major political partiers over the last few years this may be the only viable option we have left.
ReplyDeleteFirst of all we have to understand that the threat posed to us by Iran is far greater than the combined threats of Nazi Germany or Imperial Japan ever were or likely ever could have been. Due to false reporting about this in the news media very few Americans understand the gravity of the situation.