08 April 2010
Crude
(Russian Oil production in Siberia)
I think I would rather be the president of Kyrgystan than me today, though I would rather be me than Virginia’s Governor McDonald, who stumbled into issuing a proclamation declaring this month to be Confederate History Month.
Don’t get me wrong: I am proud of the ancestors who served in the armies of both sides in the Late Unpleasantness between the States, even if some of the pesky issues seem to be back again.
I do think it is a little insensitive- crude in fact- to honor the forces who fought to keep a good number of my fellow citizens in chains, though. There is quite enough of that already, since I will drive on the Lee Highway later today, and passed south on the Jeff Davis coming back from a friend’s retirement ceremony yesterday.
You can imagine Kyrgeses President Kurmanbek Bakiyev must be feeling exhilarated getting out of the capital of Bishkek just ahead of the mobs on his private jet. He launched into exile from Manas International Airport. Rising utility costs and corruption caused the riots, or so they say. Seventy citizens were killed in the unpleasantness, and there is still some seething going on.
The Presidential departure must have been a little awkward, since Ganci Field shares the runway and the US Air Force would have been watching him go, along with several of the millions that Uncle Sam ponied up last year to maintain his supply line into nearby Afghanistan.
The Yanks have been using the field since November of 2001, a remarkable demonstration of the agility of the ponderous Department of Defense when it is really compelled to do something.
Less than three months after the attacks on New York and the Pentagon, CENTCOM Commander Gen. Tommy R. Franks was empowered to use Kyrgyzstan as the forward APOD (Aerial Port of Debarkation) to support Operation ENDURING FREEDOM to topple the Taliban.
It was all sort of confused at the time, but the Kyrgese government was the only regional state to offer unrestricted overflight for combat, humanitarian and search-and-rescue air missions. The 13,000-foot runway at Ganci, with upgrades to the fuel and infrastructure are vital to the build-up that may turn the corner on the war in the mountains to the south.
The heavy stuff still comes slowly, by sea, mostly to the port of Karachi in southern Pakistan. But the light and lethal materials is best delivered by air, and that is why Ganci is so critical to the war.
No one seems to know what it means yet. The opposition to President , but the announcement this morning that the Russians and the Americans have decided to lower the level of nuclear madness. Presidents Obama and Medvedev inked the latest incarnation of the START Treaty, which will bring the atomic arsenals of the two former near-belligerents to the lowest level in a half century.
It is a remarkable turn-around, considering the ass-whipping the Russians administered to the American proxy government in their southern neighbor of Georgia. At that time, maybe coincident with the high price of oil, the Russians were pretty bold about throwing their weight around in the former empire.
The SOCOM guys were playing some cowboy games with the Georgians, which must have been no end of irritating to the Russians. They were flush with cash due to the sky-high oil prices that fueled seven yeas of economic expansion from the dismal Communist melt-down of the Yeltsin years.
Say what you want to about the Arabs, but Russia is the largest exporter of natural gas in the world, and the second largest producer of crude oil.
The American presenc at the base at Ganci was a key flash-point in all that tumult, but with the fall in oil prices some of the unwarranted exuberance of the Kremlin seems to be tamped down.
I heard that the OPEC considers the price of oil to be just about perfect right now: high enough to provide a nice profit, but not too high to kill the Western economies and the fragile recovery. It is low enough that the Russians have to start minding the checkbook, too.
Crude is going for $85.19 this morning, down about a buck from yesterday, and natural gas is at $4 bucks even.
Mr. Obama has spoken of “eventually ridding the world of nuclear weapons.” It is interesting to think that OPEC and the price of oil might be the salvation of us all.
Or not. I was talking to a fellow Cold Warrior lately about some of the looney things we used to do with nuclear weapons. I even got a sentimental tribute to “Minimal Interval Take Offs” by B-52s at Minot Air Base in lovely barren North Dakota this morning.
You can check out what used to be the opening act to the commencement of The End of the World As We Know It at:
http://www.fark.com/cgi/vidplayer.pl?IDLink=4632948
If I have the energy we will talk a little more about life in the world’s second largest nuclear Navy later this week, and the vast infrastructure that supported nuclear war-fighting.
In the meantime, I will cautiously honor my Confederate heritage, though I will keep my thoughts about it to myself. To do otherwise would just be crude.
Copyright 2010 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com
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