Courtesy of
ICasualties, comes this link to
Greg Palast's Report that there were actually 2 competing 'secret oil plans' for Iraq (pre-invasion, that is), one favored by the neo-cons and the other favored by the oil industy.
...there were two conflicting plans, setting off a hidden policy war between neo-conservatives at the Pentagon, on one side, versus a combination of "Big Oil" executives and US State Department "pragmatists."
"Big Oil" appears to have won. The latest plan, obtained by Newsnight from the US State Department was, we learned, drafted with the help of American oil industry consultants.
Not surprisingly, this all took place before 9/11...More below
It seems, so far, that the winner was creating an Iraqi state-run oil industry, which is the plan favored by 'Big Oil'. The other plan, however, was privatizing the oil fields...to DESTROY OPEC!
The new plan, crafted by neo-conservatives intent on using Iraq's oil to destroy the Opec cartel through massive increases in production above Opec quotas.
The sell-off was given the green light in a secret meeting in London headed by Ahmed Chalabi shortly after the US entered Baghdad, according to Robert Ebel. Mr. Ebel, a former Energy and CIA oil analyst, now a fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, flew to the London meeting, he told Newsnight, at the request of the State Department.
To destroy OPEC?? Was this ever our goal?? Is it now? WTF??
Also involved as players: an Iraqi-born oil industry consultant, Falah Aljibury; Ahmed Chalabi; Philip Carroll, the former CEO of Shell Oil USA; Paul Bremmer; (James) Baker Botts Law Firm.
Anyone else think this meeting got a footnote in Cheney's secret energy papers?