When it comes to food, the United States is fairly
self-sufficient. Indeed, we export food to many nations across the
globe. The “agricultural sector” is a broad-spectrum entity. Even if
one component, say the poultry industry, or wheat production were to
take a hit, the other sectors are more than sufficient to take up
the slack. Although food production is a center of gravity, here in
the United States it is a highly resilient industry, and would be
very difficult for an opponent to directly attack - with the
exception of the energy necessary for development, processing and
transportation of food.
Agriculture depends on energy. Gone are the days when farmers
plowed their fields with mules. Today, farming is high-tech, with
tractors, sowers, reapers, and other mechanized methods of
production. Even fertilizer, which used to come from the southern
end of a north-bound mule (and other such natural sources) is highly
dependent on the energy sector for its production. Nitrogen
fertilizers, essential for high-yield crop production, are made from
petroleum. And this doesn’t even address the issues of getting the
product to market, packaging it, and shipping it to stores all over
the country so that you the consumer can hop into your car and go
and buy it. The common denominator here is ENERGY. Energy, that is
primarily in the form of oil.
Energy is the life-blood of any highly industrialized nation. The
United States is no exception. Everything we do depends on energy,
from lighting, heating, and air-conditioning our homes to the
production of everything we enjoy in this country - including food.
The United States meets its energy needs from many sources; oil,
coal, natural gas, nuclear, hydroelectric, wind, geothermal, and
solar. Some of these needs are met by domestic production, some by
foreign imports. That which we produce at home is fairly secure,
barring outright invasion of our land and airspace.
Of the energy sources that require natural resources occurring
within the borders of our nation, the US enjoys coal and natural gas
reserves sufficient to meet our consumption needs for quite some
time.
Australia is the Saudi Arabia of uranium, with 40% of the world’s
known reserves. Canada is the largest exporter. Although both
countries are allies of ours, should that happy circumstance ever
change, it is good to know that the United States has sufficient
reserves that interdiction of foreign sources would cause no
immediate hardship; even if we sharply increase the number of
nuclear power plants in operation.
Hydroelectric, solar, wind, and geothermal are energy sources
that are dependent on physical features of our country, not
materials we extract from the ground. In this sense, they are
“renewable” and not something we can run out of or that can be
embargoed or interdicted from abroad. (Unless someone figures how to
dry up our rivers, stop the wind from blowing, or shield us from the
sun). With the possible exception of hydroelectric, they are also
energy sources that can be considerably expanded in this country to
account for a larger share of our energy production than they
currently provide. All it takes is money, time, and space; lots of
space in the cases of solar and wind.
Time is the critical factor.
Anything we produce or purchase overseas is subject to
interdiction by hostile forces. The main energy source that fits
this description is oil. According to the CIA World fact book, the
U.S. consumes around 20 million barrels of oil each day. Of this
over 13 million barrels are imports. The top five suppliers are
Canada, Mexico, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, and Nigeria, accounting for
64 percent of US oil imports between them.
So is imported oil a good candidate for a U.S. strategic center
of gravity? Would an “attack” there “lead to our inevitable defeat”
or “force us to abandon aims or change behavior”?
Three dollar a gallon gas is pretty fresh in our minds. It has
been reported in papers quite recently that a threat of action
against Iran, or an interdiction of Iranian oil could cause the
world price of oil to spike to $100/barrel or more. Even though we
don’t import oil from Iran, the oil we do import is purchased at the
world price. Any idea how 4, 5, 6, or even, heaven forbid, 10 dollar
a gallon gasoline would affect the U.S. economy?
We have in the past been proponents of using embargos as a tool
to force other countries to accept foreign policy objectives of ours
which were contrary to their desires. Such embargos have met with
varying degrees of success, particularly when used against
totalitarian regimes. They tend to disproportionately affect those
who have the least capability to effect change; those at the bottom
rungs of society.
But what if such an embargo were used against a liberal
democracy? Particularly over an issue that did not fundamentally
affect the country’s continued existence? Particularly, an issue
that the public at large did not perceive as one worth their
suffering over?
What if it were used against us? Could even the threat of such an
embargo be enough to force the United States to “abandon aims or
change behavior”?
It is worth noting that China has been very busy lately buying up
energy supplies.
In 1997, China signed a deal with Iraq to develop the al-Ahdab
oil field. With a pre-war capacity of approximately 90,000 barrels a
day, the contract was valued at around $1.2 billion. At that time
the price of oil was much less than today, and China’s oil
requirements were also considerably less. Operation Iraqi Freedom
put an apparent end to this deal in 2003.
In
December 2004, China signed an agreement with Venezuela allowing
China to operate oil fields in Venezuela and to invest in new
refineries. The agreement allows Chinese firms to operate 15 mature
oil fields in east Venezuela, capable of producing up to a billion
barrels of oil. Exports began in 2005 at around 120,000 barrels per
day, with plans to increase that to 1.6 million barrels a day in
2007. During 2004, China imported 110 million tons of oil, 21% more
than she imported the previous year.
In August 2005, China signed an agreement with Venezuela to
develop and manage Venezuela’s Zumano oilfields, an area containing
an estimated 400 million barrels of light and medium crude and 4
billion cubic feet of gas reserves. China is also in negotiations
with Venezuela to help develop the Orinoco river belt, which
contains an estimated 235 billion barrels of heavy crude. This oil
is extremely difficult to extract and refine; estimates are that oil
would have to be over $40/barrel to make it profitable to do so. Of
course, oil is over $60/barrel now. In the near future, Venezuela
hopes to supply 15 to 20 percent of China’s oil imports.
In February 2006, they signed a $100 billion deal with Iran,
allowing a Chinese state-owned energy firm, Sinopec to develop
Iran’s Yadavaran oil field in exchange for the purchase of 10
million tons of liquefied natural gas per year for the next quarter
century. Sinopec holds a 51% stake in the project.
In
March 2006, Russia signed a deal with China to supply up to 80
billion cubic meters of natural gas per year, beginning in 2011.
In June 2007, the old deal China had signed with Saddam Hussein
was revived by the current Iraqi administration in Baghdad. They
have also welcomed the Chinese in for any other oil contracts to be
bid in the future. A dollar value has not yet been put on the
revised contract.
These are just a few of the energy deals China has struck over
the past decade. They have been very active in Africa and Asia as
well. In fact, it is safe to say that China’s quest for energy has
been world wide, with particular emphasis in South America, Central
America, and the Caribbean.
While America has largely ignored Latin America, China has been
investing millions, and not just in South America, but in the
Caribbean as well. Whereas the United States is viewed with
suspicion by many in the region, China is building lasting relations
and good will. Among other initiatives, China has poured hundreds of
millions of dollars in aid money into various Caribbean nations,
such as Grenada and Dominica. This money has already paid dividends;
both countries have recently cut their diplomatic ties with Taiwan.
As usual, the United States is doing poorly in the public relations
arena. The “hearts and minds” campaign in our hemisphere may be lost
before it is ever truly engaged.
Other Chinese investments in Latin America include:
•$1.3 billion deal with Brazil’s Petrobras to build a 2000 km
natural gas pipeline
•$5 billion in offshore oil projects in Argentina
•Purchase of oilfields in Columbia, Ecuador, and Peru
•Infrastructure projects in Argentina (railroads), Venezuela
(roads) necessary to transship the oil from the oil fields back to
China
•Chinese state-run companies currently manage the ports at both
ends of the Panama Canal.
China’s in-country oil reserves are very small, forcing her to
look abroad for her oil. This is forcing a dependency on foreign oil
as great as, or greater than our own. Currently, 58% of China’s
foreign oil comes from the Middle East. By 2015 that number is, at
its present growth rate, expected to increase to 70%. Oil is
becoming a strategic center of gravity for China as well, one
subject to interdiction by the U.S. Navy should conflict between the
two countries ever occur. As of now, we have the advantage there. We
could easily interdict Chinese supply lines while they can do little
to challenge ours.
China recognizes this, and the strategic picture is changing
there as well. China is becoming a blue-water navy, focusing on
submarines and anti-carrier surface ships; building a force that is
designed specifically to counter the U.S. Navy, keep its supply
lines open, and interdict ours.
The main Chinese strategy seems to be to secure the energy
resources it requires for both today and the future; resources that
are subsequently not available to the United States, or which can be
made non-available during time of increased tension or open warfare.
They are taking advantage of our preoccupation in the Middle East to
build bases of support in our own hemisphere, where they can also
take advantage of decades of mistrust by Latin America of the
“Colossus of the North”, and decades of neglect and lack of respect
on our part toward the region.
They are also in the process of building the military
infrastructure to defend their supply lines and investing heavily in
overseas operating locations and good will. The process of doing so
will, of necessity, make China a global power, much in the same way
as we became such ourselves.
It has been said that the best defense is a good offence. By
building the infrastructure necessary to protect its oil shipping
lines from the United States, it also makes it possible for China to
hold our oil shipping lines at risk. Whereas they do not have the
capability to do this globally at this time, given 20 years (or
perhaps less at their current rate of growth and our current lack of
concern), it is not inconceivable that they could be fully capable
of challenging us on the high seas. And given their current
population, they certainly have more than enough manpower to do so.
However, in keeping with Sun Tzu’s observation that the ultimate
in war is to win without ever having to fire a shot, perhaps we
should look not so much at their growing military strength, and
concentrate more on the socioeconomic aspects of their apparent
strategy. It is hard to fight a war without fuel. And it is hard to
project power across the globe if you are having problems in your
own back yard.
“If asked how to cope with a great host of the enemy in orderly
array and on the point of marching to the attack, I should say:
‘Begin by seizing something which your opponent holds dear; then he
will be amenable to your will.’ Rapidity is the essence of war: take
advantage of the enemy’s unreadiness, make your way by unexpected
routes, and attack unguarded spots.”
- Sun Tzu, The Art of War
Sources:
•“Short
Term Energy Outlook”, Energy Information Administration
•“Crude
Oil and Total Petroleum Imports Top 15 Countries”, Energy
Information Administration
•“Fueling the dragon: China’s race into the oil market”,
Institute for the Analysis of Global Security
•“The Axis of Oil – China and Venezuela”, Global Envision
•“Beijing’s Bolivarian Venture”, National Interest online
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