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Topic: $14.6 Billion of Missing Oil
| Author | Message |
| UGoGirl | Posted – 5/13/2007 2:44:20 PM | show profile Where did it go? To terrorists? Smugglers? Or was it never there to begin with? **** A draft of a new American government report says that between 100,000 and 300,000 barrels a day of Iraq's declared oil production over the past four years is unaccounted for and could have been siphoned off through corruption or smuggling, the New York Times reported Saturday. Using an average of $50 a barrel, the report says the discrepancy was valued at $5 million to $15 million daily, the paper said. The draft report comes as the U.S. and Iraqi governments are under pressure to show progress in Iraq by raising oil production levels, which have been well below the U.S. goal of 3 million barrels a day. Virtually the entire economy of oil-rich Iraq is dependent on oil revenues. It does not conclude what happened to the missing fraction of the roughly 2 million barrels pumped by Iraq each day, but its findings are expected to reinforce long-standing suspicions that smugglers, insurgents and corrupt officials control significant parts of the country's oil industry, the paper said. It said the draft report also covered alternative explanations for the billions of dollars worth of discrepancies, including the possibility that Iraq has been overstating its oil production. |
| Nikongirl | Posted – 5/13/2007 6:20:39 PM | show profile Check Cheney's back pocket. |
| Nikongirl | Posted – 5/13/2007 6:23:08 PM | show profile cont.... Now you know why he's so slick..... |
| mailbag | Posted – 5/13/2007 7:59:04 PM | show profile | email poster feeds the USA's reserves I thought everyone already knew it was going into our own reserves. That is why we have the steady stream of oil tankers between Iraq and the Gulf of Mexico. Free oil to the usa and its gas stations for as long as we can get away with it. |
| UGoGirl | Posted – 5/13/2007 9:30:49 PM | show profile It could be anything and probably no one will ever know for sure. That's a hell of a lot of oil and money. The most benign reason would be simply that they were trying to make their oil production "look good," and appear that that they were making progress getting the energy infrastructure up and running. If not that, then all that oil (and money) could've been used toward any number of sinister purposes, and could easily have been used to fund terrorists and line many pockets. God knows we could use some of that oil to increase our reserves (we're supposed to have enough in those reserves to cover about 90 days of imports but I think we only have about 60 days of imports). |
| ninian.reid | Posted – 5/14/2007 3:20:51 PM | show profile Oil is a good deal thicker than blood. |
| mailbag | Posted – 5/14/2007 3:39:31 PM | show profile | email poster credibility problem If the USA gov't was upfront, showed any hint of honesty, and had at least admitted to faults in Iraq, perhaps we'd know more ugo. But since we make no mistakes, and are not accountable for anything in Iraq - it might be true indeed the numbers are made up. So.... $15 billion missing, only 1,000 or so Iraqis killed since the USA invaded... (since we don't keep track who knows) it is all up for guessing and debate. That keeps the White House clean all around. |
| UGoGirl | Posted – 5/14/2007 10:04:13 PM | show profile No accountability whatsoever. Here's where you'll also find no accountability. By the end of June the National Petroleum Council will come out with their study (requested by energy secretary Bodman) on global oil and gas supplies. Don't expect anything earth shattering, they'll say countries have to open up their markets to Exxon, Chevron, and other big oil companies and that there's plenty of oil left but investments must be made, blah blah blah. Of couse they are being led largely by a lot of the bad guys in big oil. But connect the dots. Bodman is telling OPEC that they need to start producing more oil. OPEC is saying they're in no rush to produce more oil. At the same time, OPEC is telling its asian customers they'll be supplying them with 10 percent less crude oil than contracted. Bush came up just today to again talk about reducing gasoline consumption (largely under the guise of talking about global warming, which we know he could give a rats ass about). Gasoline inventories are at 7 percent below levels a year ago. The system is in trouble, big trouble. If Saudi Arabia's oil production has peaked (as folks at theoildrum provide some excellent data to support) then the world has peaked. And we are very vulnerable, due to our tremendous dependence on oil, our reliance on just-in-time delivery of gasoline, food, and everything else, and the large lead-time required to "get off" oil. |
| keltoi2 | Posted – 5/15/2007 12:30:09 PM | show profile Since I'm guessing there are a limited number of distribution points from Iraqi oil pipelines, and since the US and its mercs control the Iraqi oil fields, refineries, and ports, perhaps, just perhaps, not all the smugglers are Iraqi. |
