A barrel of crude broke another barrier Wednesday $123 on international markets, and the talk is now of the sort of superspike in pricing (only yesterday unimaginable) that might break the $200 a barrel ceiling within two years.<\/em>\u00bb On mesure comme le temps passe, et dans quelles conditions, lorsqu’on se rappelle le p\u00e9trole \u00e0 $20 le baril, le 11 septembre 2001.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n\tKlare trace donc son portrait des USA, sur le fond du constat historique que le p\u00e9trole a constitu\u00e9 le principal instrument de la puissance brute des USA, transform\u00e9e en capacit\u00e9s \u00e9conomiques, industrielles et militaires, transform\u00e9e au-del\u00e0 en capacit\u00e9 politique d’influence et d’h\u00e9g\u00e9monie, tout cela sans pr\u00e9c\u00e9dents dans l’Histoire. Fort justement, Klare fait remarquer que l’inversion de la tendance de puissance (d\u00e9pendance du p\u00e9trole venu de l’ext\u00e9rieur franchissant le seuil des 50%, avec l’augmentation des prix du p\u00e9trole comme facteur compl\u00e9mentaire), conduit dans ces conditions de l’importance centrale du p\u00e9trole pour la puissance US, \u00e0 une \u00e9rosion de plus en plus rapide de la souverainet\u00e9 nationale \u00e0 mesure de l’augmentation de cette d\u00e9pendance.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\t\u00abWhen it came to reliance on imports, the United States crossed the 50% threshold in 1998 and now has passed 65%.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n\t\u00bbThough few fully realized it, this represented a significant erosion of sovereign independence even before the price of a barrel of crude soared above $110. By now, we are transferring such staggering sums yearly to foreign oil producers, who are using it to gobble up valuable American assets, that, whether we know it or not, we have essentially abandoned our claim to superpowerdom.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n\t\u00bbAccording to the latest data from the U.S. Department of Energy, the United States is importing 12-14 million barrels of oil per day. At a current price of about $115 per barrel, that’s $1.5 billion per day, or $548 billion per year.<\/em>\u00bb<\/p>\n<\/p>\n\tCette question de la souverainet\u00e9 est \u00e9videmment mise en \u00e9vidence par le ph\u00e9nom\u00e8ne des fonds souverains, constitu\u00e9s pour une part tr\u00e8s importante par la richesse des pays producteurs. Les fonds souverains, agissant comme une cons\u00e9quence indirecte de l’\u00e9volution que d\u00e9crit Klare, constituent un facteur indirect suppl\u00e9mentaire important dans l’\u00e9rosion de cette souverainet\u00e9 nationale. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\t\u00bbWhile our economy is being depleted of these funds, at a moment when credit is scarce and economic growth has screeched to a halt, the oil regimes on which we depend for our daily fix are depositing their mountains of accumulating petrodollars in sovereign wealth funds (SWFs) state-controlled investment accounts that buy up prized foreign assets in order to secure non-oil-dependent sources of wealth. At present, these funds are already believed to hold in excess of several trillion dollars; the richest, the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA), alone holds $875 billion.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n\t\u00bbThe ADIA first made headlines in November 2007 when it acquired a $7.5 billion stake in Citigroup, America’s largest bank holding company. The fund has also made substantial investments in Advanced Micro Systems, a major chip maker, and the Carlyle Group, the private equity giant. Another big SWF, the Kuwait Investment Authority, also acquired a multibillion-dollar stake in Citigroup, along with a $6.6 billion chunk of Merrill Lynch. And these are but the first of a series of major SWF moves that will be aimed at acquiring stakes in top American banks and corporations.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n\t\u00bbThe managers of these funds naturally insist that they have no intention of using their ownership of prime American properties to influence U.S. policy. In time, however, a transfer of economic power of this magnitude cannot help but translate into a transfer of political power as well. Indeed, this prospect has already stirred deep misgivings in Congress. In the short run, that they [the Middle Eastern SWFs] are investing here is good, Senator Evan Bayh (D-Indiana) recently observed. But in the long run it is unsustainable. Our power and authority is eroding because of the amounts we are sending abroad for energy.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n\tUn autre volet de cette situation de d\u00e9cadence acc\u00e9l\u00e9r\u00e9e de la puissance US \u00e0 cause de l’\u00e9volution de la question du p\u00e9trole est l’aspect militaire. Klare fait remarquer que la puissance militaire US, bas\u00e9e sur une capacit\u00e9 unique de projection de force, d\u00e9pend du p\u00e9trole dans une mesure \u00e9galement unique parmi les puissances militaires existantes. La d\u00e9pendance des forces arm\u00e9es US du p\u00e9trole est consid\u00e9rable (\u00abthe U.S. Department of Defense is the world’s single biggest consumer of petroleum, using more of it every day than the entire nation of Sweden.<\/em>\u00bb). Par cons\u00e9quent l’\u00e9volution de la situation p\u00e9troli\u00e8re a un effet direct sur la capacit\u00e9 de ces forces. L’avenir est prometteur \u00e0 cet \u00e9gard, avec les deux tendances qui s’ajoutent l\u00e0 aussi, du co\u00fbt en augmentation constante de la d\u00e9pendance du p\u00e9trole et de l’augmentation constante de cette d\u00e9pendance \u00e0 cause des choix de structuration et de modernisation des forces US.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n\t\u00bbEvery day, the average G.I. in Iraq uses approximately 27 gallons of petroleum-based fuels. With some 160,000 American troops in Iraq, that amounts to 4.37 million gallons in daily oil usage, including gasoline for vans and light vehicles, diesel for trucks and armored vehicles, and aviation fuel for helicopters, drones, and fixed-wing aircraft. With U.S. forces paying, as of late April, an average of $3.23 per gallon for these fuels, the Pentagon is already spending approximately $14 million per day on oil ($98 million per week, $5.1 billion per year) to stay in Iraq.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n\t()<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\t\u00bbWorse yet, the U.S. military will need even more oil for the future wars on which the Pentagon is now doing the planning. In this way, the U.S. experience in Iraq has especially worrisome implications. Under the military transformation initiated by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld in 2001, the future U.S. war machine will rely less on boots on the ground and ever more on technology. But technology entails an ever-greater requirement for oil, as the newer weapons sought by Rumsfeld (and now Secretary of Defense Robert Gates) all consume many times more fuel than those they will replace. To put this in perspective: The average G.I in Iraq now uses about seven times as much oil per day as G.I.s did in the first the Gulf War less than two decades ago. And every sign indicates that the same ratio of increase will apply to coming conflicts; that the daily cost of fighting will skyrocket; and that the Pentagon’s capacity to shoulder multiple foreign military burdens will unravel. Thus are superpowers undone.<\/em>\u00bb<\/p>\n<\/p>\n\tKlare termine par le tableau concurrent d’une Russie en pleine affirmation de puissance gr\u00e2ce \u00e0 ses capacit\u00e9s de producteur d’\u00e9nergie. Il donne ainsi une r\u00e9ponse \u00e0 la question qu’il posait implicitement au d\u00e9but de son analyse, en rappelant la chute du Mur de Berlin (\u00abNineteen years ago, the fall of the Berlin Wall effectively eliminated the Soviet Union as the world’s other superpower<\/em>\u00bb) et les cris de triomphe qui accompagn\u00e8rent, du c\u00f4t\u00e9 US, l’\u00e9v\u00e9nement que personne, \u00e9galement du c\u00f4t\u00e9 US, n’avait vu venir Finalement, 20 ans plus tard, qui a gagn\u00e9 la Guerre froide?<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\tMis en ligne le 9 mai 2008 \u00e0 09H21<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
L’universitaire Michael Klare, sp\u00e9cialiste des questions d’\u00e9nergie, analyse sur le site TomDispatch.com, ce 8 mai, la question de la d\u00e9pendance du p\u00e9trole des USA, et plus encore la question de la puissance et de la souverainet\u00e9 des USA \u00e0 cette lumi\u00e8re. Evidemment, cette analyse est encore plus pertinente \u00e0 l’heure de la mont\u00e9e des prix… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"neve_meta_sidebar":"","neve_meta_container":"","neve_meta_enable_content_width":"","neve_meta_content_width":0,"neve_meta_title_alignment":"","neve_meta_author_avatar":"","neve_post_elements_order":"","neve_meta_disable_header":"","neve_meta_disable_footer":"","neve_meta_disable_title":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[3106,2645,4500,3600,2779,2730],"class_list":["post-69884","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bloc-notes","tag-froide","tag-guerre","tag-klare","tag-petrole","tag-puissance","tag-russie"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69884","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=69884"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69884\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=69884"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=69884"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=69884"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}