September 13, 2012 - Foreign Policy in Focus
A year ago, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton signaled a major transformation in U.S. foreign policy in an article titled “America’s Pacific Century,” which announced the U.S. “pivot” toward Asia, the Pacific, and the strategically important Indian Ocean. “One of the most important tasks of American statecraft over the next decade,” she wrote, will be “to lock in a substantially increased investment — diplomatic, economic, strategic, and otherwise— in the Asia-Pacific region.” The increased engagement, she wrote, would be underwritten in part by “forging a broad-based military presence.”
Shortly thereafter, the Pentagon published its new “strategic guidance” paper, which, signaling at a shift away from Iraq and Central Asia, named the Asia-Pacific region and the Persian Gulf as the nation’s two geostrategic priorities. To emphasize the new commitments, Clinton, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, and President Barack Obama made high-profile visits to allied Asian and Pacific nations. Republicans, in Mitt Romney’s foreign policy white paper, upped the ante, insisting that the United States “expand its naval presence in the Western Pacific” and pressure its allies to “maintain appropriate military capabilities.”
Terry Rockefeller of Families for Peaceful Tomorrows hosted a book party July 26 featuring Greg Muttitt talking about his book "Fuel on the Fire: Oil and the Iraq War". A wide ranging discussion followed. Greg focused on the role of oil in the war on Iraq. About 60% of the world's oil reserves are in the Middle East, with about 10% in Iraq. British and American companies pretty much had their way with Middle East oil production during the first half of the twentieth century, but political shifts eventually led to the Iraqi Baath government nationalizing Iraq's oil in 1972. Soon thereafter, other Middle East countries nationalized their oil resources with Iran being the last in 1979.
