My Blogs
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Our Dependence on Foreign Oil Is a National Security ThreatJuly 17, 2005It’s a known fact; proceeds from Middle Eastern oil sales get funneled directly to terrorist organizations such as Al Qaeda. Saudi Arabia will do nothing to stop the flow of funds to terrorist groups nor will they crack down on the extreme anti-American teachings that take place in their schools. So what is America to do? We import most of our oil from foreign countries, a bulk of it coming from Saudi Arabia. This is a major National Security concern for the United States. What is the answer? Clearly we need to eliminate our dependence on oil as an energy source.Many good things have been happening in the United States at the corporate level. Companies such as Shell, BP, and Chevron have been doing more research and investment into alternative energy resources. Car manufacturers such as Honda and GM are planning more and more rollouts of hybrid vehicles. But there is a fundamental underlying flaw in all of this. While we are working toward energy independence, we are also fighting forces that want to squeeze every last penny of revenue out of the oil industry.Just look at who is in charge of our government. Our President, GW Bush comes from a long time Oil Business Family with very close ties to Saudi Arabia. Vice-President Dick Cheney has very close ties to Halliburton. Do you honestly think these two powerful people really want to work toward energy independence? They do, but over a twenty year period. To me this is simply unacceptable, especially when it comes to our National Security. Right now we are competing with China for oil consumption. Rather than competing, we should be taking the lead in getting off oil. I believe radical change is needed in order to protect America’s status as a super power. We cannot afford to drag out our transition off of oil over a 10 or 20 year period. We need to do it in five years. Five years? I argue with people about this all the time. The standard argument is that rapid change causes major job losses and civil unrest. People argue we need to let capitalism takes its natural course; as oil gets prohibitively expensive, people will “naturally” seek alternatives. I think this is unacceptable. Where is our leadership? We built an atomic bomb in something like 3 years. We put a man on the moon in less than 10 years. We can come up with a viable alternative to oil if we focused our monetary resources, intellectual resources, and public support on this problem. And I believe we can do it in such a way that is non-disruptive to society by transitioning those people who depend on the oil industry for their living into jobs in the alternative energy field.I also believe that it makes more sense from a national security point of view to rid ourselves of our dependence on foreign oil. We know the terrorists are being fueled by profits from Middle Eastern oil. If we abruptly stopped importing oil this would severely cripple OPEC’s oil revenue thus there would be less money available to the terrorists. With less money, they cannot pay their members, buy them weapons, house, and feed them. I believe if we took this approach we would see a dramatic decrease in the level of insurgency in Iraq.Change is scary; we are all naturally resistant to it. But we need to rise above and overcome our fear if we are to survive as a country. We have done it before and we can do it again. It’s the American Way. |
