The War on Terror & Climate Change

I recently had a conversation with a young man who had just finished serving a tour of duty in both Afghanistan and Iraq.  I asked him what, in his opinion, was the reason we had become militarily involved in those countries.  Without hesitation he immediately said, "oil".  

U.S. intelligence officials revealed in September 2014 that they believed the Islamic State, also known as ISIS, was reaping as much as $3 million a day in revenue, making it one of the wealthiest terrorist groups in history

That report listed the main sources of ISIS funding.

1. WEALTHY DONORS

Much of the fundraising for Syria's extremist groups occurs in the Arab Gulf states, where wealthy private donors raise millions to hand over to Islamist fighters at the Turkey-Syria border. The governments of Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Kuwait also covertly provide millions in aid to radical Sunni groups fighting Assad.

2.LOOTING

"It's cash-raising activities resemble those of a mafia-like organization," a U.S. intelligence official told the AP last week. "They are well-organized, systematic and enforced through intimidation and violence."

3.  SMUGGLING AND TAXES

The Islamic State also levies taxes in the areas it conquers.

The group is also believed to have earned millions of dollars from illegally trading antiquities. The Guardian reported in June that the Islamic State had made at least $36 million in one particular Syrian region by selling items that were up to 8,000 years old.

4.OIL As reported in the Huffington Post 9/14.

Oil appears to be the largest source of income for the Islamic State today. The militants pump crude oil from about a dozen oil fields they have captured in Syria and Iraq. They either sell the crude oil directly or send it to small refineries to produce low-quality fuels. It is then transported via decades-old smuggling routes over the border and sold at low prices on the black market in Turkey and in smaller volumes to the Syrian regime.

The price the Islamic State group fetches for its smuggled oil is discounted—$25 to $60 for a barrel of oil that normally sells for more than $100 — but its total profits from oil are exceeding $3 million a day, said Luay al-Khatteeb, a visiting fellow at the Brookings Institution's Doha Center in Qatar.

In the early days of the Syrian civil war, the Islamic State group was funded in large part by donations from wealthy residents of Gulf States, including Kuwait and Qatar, American officials have said.

"A number of fundraisers operating in more permissive jurisdictions — particularly in Kuwait and Qatar — are soliciting donations to fund ... al-Qaida's Syrian affiliate, the Nusra Front, and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL)," David Cohen, the Treasury department's top counterterrorism official, said in a speech in March. ISIL is an alternative acronym for the Islamic State group.

That stream of funding has diminished in recent months as the group's violent tactics have drawn worldwide attention, U.S. intelligence officials say.

The group's reliance on oil as its main source of revenue could easily be disrupted by American airstrikes, officials say. But so far, no decision has been made to target Iraqi or Syrian oil infrastructure, which is serviced by civilian workers who may have been conscripted.

Well more recent reports point to that disruption in oil revenue coming true.  

As reported by Berlin (AFP):

The Islamic State group has lost control of "at least three large oil fields" in Iraq, depriving the jihadists of a crucial source of income, a German newspaper report said Thursday.

In the face of a large-scale Iraqi counteroffensive, the extremist group now controls just a single oil field in the country.

But the success has been achieved through military means. Military options continue to be our weapon of choice in the fight against terrorism since 9/11 and the limits with this method should be self-evident.

I would like to posit a new approach. What if the United States, along with our Western allies made a concerted and sustained effort to unplug from these Muslim countries?

This begs the question: why are we involved with them? Is it because we consider Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Iraq  our natural allies as we do Great Britain? I think not. I think it is because of oil just like the soldier who recently returned from Afghanistan said to me.

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