For Immediate Release: March 22, 2003

San Francisco, CA — As war with Iraq commences, anti-war voices on the Left are becoming more strident.

At protest marches and in left-wing publications like The Nation, the rallying cry of "no blood for oil" is once again in vogue. This charge collapses under scrutiny and is based upon the flimsiest of reasoning.

Years ago, President Bush was in the oil business. Iraq has the world's second-largest oil reserves. America imports a lot of oil and Bush seems likely to go to war with Iraq, so the war "must" be about oil.

Implicit in this shaky logic are two contradictory explanations for President Bush's alleged motivations.

On the one hand, he is said to be acting to protect American access to Iraq's oil.

At the same time, he is supposedly promoting the financial interests of American oil companies. But greater access to Iraqi oil would only drive down prices, helping consumers but hurting energy companies.

If America's true concern was access to Iraqi oil, the most effective way to get it would be to persuade the United Nations to drop the sanctions against Iraq imposed after the Gulf War.

Iraq wants to sell more oil to the U.S., which we are refusing, not the other way around. Logic and international economics suggest that the long-term effect of toppling Saddam would benefit American consumers, not producers of oil.

Given that Iraq's potential for producing oil is significantly underutilized, due to the understandable reluctance of companies to invest in such an unstable country, the likely effect of Saddam's ouster would be increased production of Iraqi oil. This would lower oil prices – benefiting American consumers at the expense of the oil companies.

The likelihood of this scenario is confirmed by trends in the futures market for oil, which shows high prices for the next few months, anticipating conflict, followed by steadily declining prices.

America, of course, would not stand to benefit uniquely from access to post-Saddam Iraq's oil. Companies from Europe, Russia, and many other countries will compete in the open marketplace for those contracts. But one nation's response to the Iraq crisis does seem to be influenced by existing oil contracts.

France reportedly has some $60-billion – not million – in clandestine oil contracts with Iraq. The strident charges of the Left ignore the lessons of history, economics, and politics, as well as the clearly stated reasoning of President Bush and Prime Minister Blair.

There are, of course, real questions about conflict with Iraq. Reasonable people may wonder whether a desperate Saddam, on the eve of his destruction, might lash out at America and its allies in some horrific manner.

Certainly war will have its costs in American and allied lives (few, we hope) and innocent Iraqis (many, we fear) whom Saddam has deliberately made into human shields by stationing his weapons next to – or even within – schools, hospitals, and mosques.

Some argue that Hussein's aggression has been effectively contained in the last decade of sanctions. These arguments may or may not be persuasive, but they are legitimate concerns worthy of serious examination.

But the reasons for war with Iraq, should it come, are clear: Protecting the American people from the threat of terrorists armed with Saddam's weapons of mass destruction; upholding the power of the United Nations and the terms of surrender that Iraq agreed to in 1991; and freeing the Iraqi people from one of the most brutal and repressive dictators the world has ever seen.

Whether American and allied forces should launch a "preemptive" strike to overthrow a tyrant and mass murderer is worthy of a serious and honest debate – but certainly one undistracted by the mindless mantra of "no blood for oil."

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