Gunder Frank Contributions to Public Discussions
on list-servers
On US/UN Iraq oil policy and the world & US price of oil
Date: Tue, 23 Oct 2001 20:31:43 -0400 (EDT)
From: Andre Gunder Frank
To: H-NET List for World History
Cc: franka@fiu.edu
Subject: iraq and and and
I. For more documentation provided in 1991 to back up what I wrote off the cuff yesterday
or whenever, see the long IRAQ piece in the NATO Section 7 of my web page.
Would that sanctions were an alternative to war. The US/UK have used both all the way
through the last decade. as to selling oil and all that, two facts only here:
1. Iraq has ben allowed to sell very little oil over the period of the 90s - for a reason
in # 2 below. but the oil earnings were of little use, since the stuff they had to buy was
alos embargoed, and particularly the stuff needed to rebuld the oil faciulities . catch
22.
2. since this is a world hist net, i suggest you all, but especially those on the other
side of this matter, go back and make a calender in two columns. A. the temporal ups and
downs of the supply/demand price of oil in the world market and the price of gas in the US
B. the ups and downs of stricter and '' for humanitarian reasons'' laxend embargo against
Iraq.
You will note a ''peculiar'' synchronization!
when oil/gas price goes down, the sanctions go up, so as to prevent the # 2 [excepting
SU/Russia] oil supplier from flooding the market and driving prices down even farther. the
90s were mostly a very low oil price years - and high sanctions!
when oil/gas prices rise - and become a political problem in the US - suddenly
''humanitarian '' reasons are discovered for laxaing the embargo and upping the supply of
oil to keep a lid on/drive down prices
What is the embargo about? the price of Oil! is it worth it? when embargo deaths got to
500, 000 Sect State Albright was asked about that, and answerd '' it has been worth it''
II. try another two columns of dates
Col A - recession/recovery cycles in the US since WW II
Col B - Pentagon buget ups and downs, matched - indeed led - by ecalation of belligerency/
war etc by the US.
Funny thing, you will find that in EVERY recession without fail B went up. of course
including the present one
III. If ya wanna do world history, it would be useful to look/see what drives it.
and not come on with all sort of false morality [not that good morality would not be a
good thing] but the stuff I have read in these pages definitely is not - that includes the
rise of the west stuff, about which the author and I have been correspo9nding bilaterally
without bathering you all.
But when I get REALLY PROVOKED by what I unfortunately read here thast is based on no
evidence whatsoever, I am driven to reply and supply some.
IV. If anyone on this list-serve would [could?] kindly supply some way of figuring out
where one civilization/society/culture/nationality/ethnicity ends and the next one begins
[both at the same time and/or chronologically]I would bve delighted to be so informed. So
far, I have only noted that ya cant tell the viv/soc etc players without a score card.
alas everybody seems to make up their own score cards to suit their conveniance [about
other civs etc and about ones own membership in a civ -- ethnicity] which changes from
place to place and time to time. Besides, all of these ''things'' are RELATIONAL, one to
the other.There could be no one ethnicity--- civ except in relation to another.
Another matter, while I am at it, and then I promise to quite.
V. I would be even more grateful if somebody on this list - or anywhere - would/could tell
me about any single idea/ideology that has ever in the course of WORLD history changed
anything of any moment in world history. Please do NOT confuse with or attribute to an
idea some REAL thing that itself generated or is manifest in any such idea/ideology. The
first one who succeeds is welcome to all of my worldy goods, which I grant you are not
many and probably not worth breaking your head about to find something that does not
exist.
ever curious and anxious to learn
gunder frank
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