Iranian Oil Bourse

Earlier in this blog, we have looked at the interests of the Israel lobby in the current standoff between Iran and the US . However, the Israel's wish for military campaign against Iran is not new. Whereas Ahmadinejad's blundering comments have provided the crisis-making ink for the Zionist propaganda leaflets, it is not the security of the Jewish state, nor the Zionist regime that motivates America. We should not forget the Petro-Dolldar Warfare!

I am of firm conviction that Israel's existence in the Middle East is owed to the "empires" design for a trigger to ignite crisis where a crisis is needed to mask out the colonial and military presence of the empire: "We are here to protect Jews!" ...Yah right!

Americans have been threatening to not tolerate Iran's stubborn refusal to halt its legal and peaceful pursuit of nuclear energy technology , aimed at addressing energy and fuel problem for the growing economy and the growing population of Iran, who is well aware of the oil reserves running out. However, the most defying gesture of Iranians in warding off America's influence has been the Iranian Oil Bourse.

As Krassimir Petrov wrote last year in the Energy Bulletin

The Iranian government has finally developed the ultimate “nuclear” weapon that can swiftly destroy the financial system underpinning the American Empire. That weapon is the Iranian Oil Bourse slated to open in March 2006.

So how is the Iranian Oil Bourse a danger to the American economy?

Iranian Oil Bourse is based on a euro-oil-trading mechanism. Therefore, it will allow anyone willing either to buy or to sell oil for Euro to transact on the exchange, thus circumventing the U.S. dollar altogether.

I have summarized Petrove's comprehensive description:

A nation-state taxes its own citizens, while an empire taxes other nation-states. The imperial ability to tax has always rested on a better and stronger economy, and as a consequence, a better and stronger military. Historically, imperial taxation has always been direct: the subject state handed over the economic goods directly to the empire. However, for the first time in history, in the 20th century, America began to tax the world indirectly, through inflation:

It distributed the U.S. Dollar, to other nations in exchange for goods with the intended consequence of inflating and devaluing those dollars and paying back later each dollar with less economic goods—the difference capturing the U.S. imperial tax.

A time line of this process provides an interesting perspective:

• Early 20th century: The U.S. dollar was tied to gold, so that the value of the dollar neither increased, nor decreased, but remained the same amount of gold.
• 1932: The great depression of 1929 led Roosevelt to decouple the dollar from gold. Because, up to that point, although US was a great economic power, but it was not an empire. The fixed value of dollar tied to gold did not allow for ripping empire worthy benefit from exchange with other economies.
• 1945 : The Bretton Wood system is established. Although the U.S. dollar was not coupled to gold, but it was made convertible to gold only to foreign governments; thus established the dollar as the reserve currency of the world. This was made possible because of the WWII! [the US had supplied its allies with provisions, received gold as payment, thus accumulated significant portion of the world’s gold. Thus the rest of the world didn't have a choice but to use US$ as reserve]
• 1960’s : the dollar supply was relentlessly increased to finance Vietnam and Johnson’s Great Society. Most of those dollars were handed over to foreigners in exchange for economic goods, without the prospect of buying them back at the same value. (thustaxablity from inflation.)
• 1970-1971 : foreigners demanded payment for their dollars in gold, The U.S. Government defaulted on its payment on August 15, 1971. The denial to pay back in gold was an act of bankruptcy by the U.S. Government but the U.S. also declared itself an Empire. (we saw a recent example of this in defiance of the UN and attack on Iraq!)
• 1972-73 : an iron-clad arrangement with Saudi Arabia to support the power of the House of Saud in exchange for accepting only U.S. dollars for its oil. The rest of OPEC was to follow suit. Because the world had to buy oil from the Arab oil countries, it had to hold dollars as payment for oil, thus abandoning demand for gold-payment.
• 2000 : Saddam Hussein demanded Euro in exchange for oil. The danger to the dollar was clear and present, and a punitive action was in order: the Shock and Awe operation.
• 2005 : Iran initiates the Iranian Oil Bourse to be opened in March 2006.
• 2006 : US Federal Reserve stops to publis information about the M3 money supplies, that represent US dollar's strengt. Ron Paul the republican representative from Texas protests .
  

What are the implications of the Iranian Oil Bourse for America?

It will bring the American hegemony to an end. And in fact, the Iranian shiite hegemony that they claim they are fighting, is precisely the Iranian-initiated anti-dollar hegemony that will be embraced by most of the world, to date kept hostage to America's inflated dollar!

1. The Europeans will no longer have to buy and hold dollars in order to secure their payment for oil. The adoption of the euro for oil transactions will provide the European currency with a reserve status that will benefit the European at the expense of the Americans.
2. The Chinese and the Japanese will be especially eager to adopt the new exchange, because it will allow them to drastically lower their enormous dollar reserves and diversify with Euros, thus protecting themselves against the depreciation of the dollar.
3. The Russians have inherent economic and nationalist interest in adopting the Euro – the bulk of their trade is with European countries, with oil-exporting countries, with China, and with Japan. The Russians seemingly detest holding depreciating dollars and prefer to replace them with gold. Russians have also revived their nationalism, and embracing the Euro will serve as revenge.
4. The Arab oil-exporting countries will eagerly adopt the Euro as a means of diversifying against rising mountains of depreciating dollars. The regional anti-American anti-israeli sentiments add to the incentive of distancing themselves from America.
5. The British will find themselves squeezed: They have a strategic partnership with the U.S. but they also have their natural pull from Europe. Furthermore, the two leading oil exchanges are the New York’s NYMEX and the London’s International Petroleum Exchange (IPE), even though both of them are effectively owned by the Americans. Thus, it seems more likely that the British will go down with the sinking ship, unless they pull the plug on the London IPE interests and their century-old partner.

Also see Rudo de Juijter's analyses in Dollar Contributions, Wars and Collapse and How can the Dollar Collapse in Iran? He provides figures and numbers for a more quantitative understanding of the situation.

This again, confirms my opinion that the Zionist lobby is not the cause of the American hostility towards Iran, it is just (as it has been over the past century) the agent in the service of the empire! This is what I call systematic anti-semetism!

I like to thank Dave on Fire for reminding me of this much forgotten discourse! It is frustrating at times, how intelligent bloggers like Fanonite are so focused on Zionism that they miss the bigger picture!