Here is a pertinent excerpt from a long essay on the military arm of corporate globalism, or we might say the triumph of the American-led globalising Military Industrial Complex. A link to the complete essay is provided below, along with other recent articles on the high stakes “new Great Game” being played for Caucasus oil loot.

What bets are there that Dick Cheney’s Halliburton Oil/Brown & Root companies waiting for the spoils? (Did anyone else see flatbeds parked outside the Pentagon on the 11th with “Brown & Root” emblazoned on them? Also, has anyone seen the President-Vice around since the 11th?)



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Stoking Conflict in the Caucuses /Caspian Sea Region

There is a growing contention between Russia and the West over the oil wealth of the Caspian Sea basin. This was manifested not only in the NATO war against Yugoslavia, but also increasingly in the Baltics, the Ukraine, the region of the Caucuses Mountains and among all the littoral nations of the Caspian Sea. The main pipelines for the Central Asian oil, the Baku-Novorossiysk pipeline and the Baku-Supsa pipeline, pass through the Caucasus. In the mounting disputes, Russia allies itself with Armenia and, it is suspected, with the Abkhaz separatists to "counterbalance NATO influence in Azerbaijan and Georgia". Chechnya and Dagestan are also critical in this struggle as the Baku-Novorossiysk pipeline passes through its territory.(73) That pipeline also passes through Dagestan which is located between Chechnya and the Caspian Sea and where conflict has exploded recently between secessionists and Russia.O

"For Russia, Dagestan retains an important strategic value. Dagestan commands 70 percent of Russia’s shoreline to the oil-producing Caspian Sea and its only all-weather Caspian port at Makhachkala. It provides the crucial pipeline links from Azerbaijan, where Russia maintains important oil interests..." (74)

The recently opened Baku-Supsa route through Georgia, favored by the West, by-passes Russia altogether,"undermining Russian influence on the region’s oil and Russian revenue from that oil. This route was opened following military maneuvers for training to defend the line by Ukrainian, Georgian and Azeri troops, as part of the GUUAM alliance.

Intensifying competition between Russia and NATO has escalated after a battle with heavy losses, June 14, between Azerbaijan and Armenia over Nagorno-Karabakh. (75)

Another pipeline route favored by the U.S. is between Baku and Ceyhan passing through Turkey. However this is more expensive and transverses the area of intense struggles by the Kurdish people. This is leading the U.S. oil companies to revive their interest in other routes. One of these is through western Afghanistan, the other, south through Iran. (76)



Other analysis of geopolitical maneuvering for control of Caspian oil can be found at these links:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0%2C3604%2C446490%2C00.html

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Columnists/Column/0%2C5673%2C438133%2C00.html

http://www.atimes.com/editor/BA12Ba01.html