Evan Coyne Maloney went to New York and interviewed protesters on camera. The resulting movie is, like, hilarious, man, especially when he asked them why the US didn’t seize the Iraqi oil fields after the 1991 Gulf War.
In their own words
Evan Coyne Maloney went to New York and interviewed protesters on camera. The resulting movie is, like, hilarious, man, especially when he asked them why the US didn’t seize the Iraqi oil fields after the 1991 Gulf War.
The US didn’t seize the Iraqi oil fields after the 1991 Gulf War for political reasons and a calculation of cost vs. benefit.
Political Reasons: The Gulf War was called by some a War for Oil, just as GW2 is. Why would Bush tip his hand when he can get the job done with a combination of sanctions, inspections, and no-fly zones to protect the people in Iraq who could possibly mount an insurrection? Let the Kurds in the north and Shiites in the south take all the casualties, and wait for them to hand the oil fields over to us.
Cost vs. Benefit: Schwarzkopf was restrained by his President just like MacArthur, who wanted to roll up the Korean peninsula and right on in to Peking (with nukes if necessary), and Patton, who would have taken Moscow if given the order. In each case, the cost of defending conquered territory was judged too great compared to the benefit we would have reaped.
Maybe it was more about making sure Kuwaiti oil continued to flow than about seizing Iraqi oil; that was the end result, after all.
Oh! What morons! I loved this–how did he get people to sound so dumb?
The US didn't seize the Iraqi oil fields after the 1991 Gulf War for political reasons and a calculation of cost vs. benefit.
Political Reasons: The Gulf War was called by some a War for Oil, just as GW2 is. Why would Bush tip his hand when he can get the job done with a combination of sanctions, inspections, and no-fly zones to protect the people in Iraq who could possibly mount an insurrection? Let the Kurds in the north and Shiites in the south take all the casualties, and wait for them to hand the oil fields over to us.
Cost vs. Benefit: Schwarzkopf was restrained by his President just like MacArthur, who wanted to roll up the Korean peninsula and right on in to Peking (with nukes if necessary), and Patton, who would have taken Moscow if given the order. In each case, the cost of defending conquered territory was judged too great compared to the benefit we would have reaped.