The real reasons for the invasion of Iraq seem to be based more on maintaining the dollar as the world's de facto reserve currency than simply securing strategic oil supplies. Just running a simple search string on Google threw up dozens of articles that discuss the Iraq war as economic warfare based upon maintaining dollar hegemeony. It seems this isn't about military supremacy per se, it's about the very basis of the US economy, the mighty petrodollar. Further evidence of economic warfare with Europe can be seen in the baffling failure to prop up the dollar. It seems to be a way of damaging European
exports, eventually weakening the euro thus making it less to be adopted as a reserve currency.
These articles span a period of roughly 18 months but there is a similar thread across all of them...if the dollar ceases to be the world's de facto reserve currency the party is over for the US.
This article is the oldest of those I've posted having been written in April 2003. I've included it because it is uncannily prescient in discussing the likelihood of Iran being targetted on the spurious premise of having nukes.
http://home.austarnet.com.au/mickdenley/anarchy/articles/TheRealReasonForWar.html<snip>
Once in Iraq, the US would also quickly move to revert Iraq’s foreign currency reserves back into US dollars and take steps to discourage further use of the Euro as a petrodollar (ie, follow the invasion of Iraq with an invasion of Iran - the groundwork is already being laid with stories of Iranian nuclear developments - and with the overthrow of the Chavez government in Venezuela).
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http://www.uslaboragainstwar.org/article.php?id=7077<snip>
The Iranians are about to commit an "offense" far greater than Saddam Hussein's conversion to the euro of Iraqs oil exports in the fall of 2000. Numerous articles have revealed Pentagon planning for future military operations against Iran as early as 2005. While the publicly-stated reasons will be Iran's nuclear ambitions, there are unspoken macroeconomic drivers explaining the Real Reasons regarding the 2nd stage of petrodollar warfare -- Iran's upcoming euro-based oil Bourse.
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http://www.dedefensa.org/article.php?art_id=1286<snip>
The second pillar of American dominance in the world is the dominant role of the U.S. dollar as reserve currency. Until the advent of the Euro in late 1999, there was no potential challenge to this dollar hegemony in world trade. The Petrodollar has been at the heart of the dollar hegemony since the 1970’s. The dollar hegemony is strategic to the future of American global pre-dominance, in many respects as important if not more so, than the overwhelming military power.
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