"Real-Politik": Why the USofA Is Engaged In War In Central Asia

I have been saying this all along: It's the Caspian oil, stupid!

1. The Caspian Sea Basin (Kazakstan, Turkmenistan etc.) holds between 11 and 12 TRILLION dollars in oil and gas resources.

2. There are only three ways to get it out:

- East to China

- West through Iran, Russia, and Turkey to Europe

- South through Afghanistan and Pakistan

3. The Taliban who controlled Afghanistan before 9/11 made pipeline deals with non-US companies and refused to change them to give control of the region's resources to the US.

Remember Bush famously threatening the Talibs about permitting/protecting a proposed pipeline consortium (led by Hamid Karzai): "'At one moment during the negotiations, the U.S. representatives told the Taliban, 'either you accept our offer of a carpet of gold, or we bury you under a carpet of bombs'," Brisard said in an interview in Paris." http://www.truthout.org/docs_01/11.17A.Oil.Taliban.htm