PRES. OBAMA’S DRIVE TO FREE THE U.S. FROM TYRANNY OF OIL BENEFITS AMERICANS AND PAVES THE WAY FOR REUNIFICATION OF ARMENIA

By Appo Jabarian Executive Publisher / Managing Editor USA Armenian Life Magazine
February 13, 2009

Since its first discovery about 150 years ago, oil has made both
positive and negative impacts on humanity. Some would argue that
had there not been oil, the nearly seven billion inhabitants of this
planet could not have been fed properly, and that a sizeable segment
could not have survived without oil-supported food industry.

But oil has already "harvested" a great portion of the world’s
population by way of two major world wars, and a series of genocidal
campaigns starting with the Armenian Genocide, all the way to Darfur,
the catastrophic war in Iraq, and the miscalculated war against South
Ossetia/Russia instigated by Georgia’s oil-financed Pres. Mikheil
Saakashvili.

Dependence on foreign oil has undermined the interests of the
American people. According to several economists and other observers,
uncontrolled importing of oil has become one of the top reasons of
the weakening of the U.S. economy.

And now, the United States recognizes its need to transform its
economy from war-time to peace-time. In an effort to usher in the
latter, the issue of over-dependence on foreign oil has become part
and parcel of a set of problems that are being addressed.

As a petroleum over-consuming nation, the U.S. is in the process
of re-evaluating the pros and cons of oil as a dominant factor in
its economy.

Armed with healthier ideas on alternative energy policies, a home-grown
American political movement, led by Pres. Barack Obama, is actively
contemplating on ending oil’s political and economic dictates.

Speaking of oil’s negative impact on U.S. foreign policy in the former
Soviet block, George Gregoriou, Professor Emeritus, Department of
Political Science, Critical Theory and Geopolitics at The William
Paterson University in Wayne, N.J., wrote on Feb. 9 on The Greek News
Online: "Bush II’s White House’s … geopolitical strategy to encircle
Russia, control the paths to oil, and push the Russian borders to
Russia ‘proper’ seems not only troublesome, but costly as well. This
is due primarily to the United States spreading its resources and
energies too thin, maintaining 769 overseas bases and thousands of
facilities, and short-changing the American people of basic needs."

He added: "The country was exhausted, politically, militarily,
and economically, in two wars without an end in sight, the global
war on terrorism, and the requirements of maintaining spheres of
influence and access to markets and trade; borrowing billions or
trillions of dollars from banks and lending institutions, spending
this money without any return benefits to the American people, other
(than) the defense contractors connected to=2 0the White House;
the national debt leapfrogging to over 10 trillion dollars, with an
annual interest of $700 billion paid to banks and foreign investors;
and a collapsing economy due to a frenzy of deregulation policies in
the Clinton and Bush II years."

He continued: "The Wall Street financial meltdown and the collapse
of capitalism, globally, have yet to hit bottom. The Bush (II) White
House was really on a path to nowhere, at home and abroad, other
than warmongering, and bullying Russia to submit to US power and the
facts created on the ground. The Russian response to Washington was
given in the Georgian military adventure. The Bush plan to install
the radar system in the Czech Republic and the missile system in the
Poland to protect Europe from Iranian missiles (not now, but fifteen
years from now!), had credibility only inside the Bush White House
and among those still fighting the Cold War."

Prof. Gregoriou asked: "If Washington were to continue this path
towards Cold War II, could the US economy and the American people
sustain such a confrontational policy and the sacrifices, as in the
last 70 years?"

In the light of presidential promotion of the Stimulus Package to
resuscitate the economy, it is refreshing to learn that Pres. Obama
declared on Feb. 6 in Williamsburg: "This plan will begin to end
the tyranny of oil in our time. It doubles our capacity to generate
alternative sources of e nergy like wind, solar, and bio-fuels in
three years."

Speaking of oil’s other casualties; its dictates have also inflicted
so much devastation and deprivations on Armenia.

At the end of WWI in 1918, according to the Treaty of Sèvres,
Armenia, as an Associated Power, had entered into agreement with the
Allied Powers and then-defeated Turkey to recover the Turkish-occupied
Western Armenia also known as Wilsonian Armenia. Since the borders of
Armenia were drawn by President Woodrow Wilson of the United States,
"Ottoman" Armenia was also referred to as "Wilsonian Armenia." But
conniving U.S.-based oil interests sabotaged the implementation of
the Treaty and as a result, the reunification of Wilsonian Armenia
with Eastern Armenia has been delayed until now.

Post-WWI Turkey (1918-), benefiting from active support from
self-serving oil interests in the U.S.; and from the general apathy
actively promoted by these interests, went on to complete its
genocidal campaign against the Armenians. Kemalist Turkey not only
reneged on returning Western or Wilsonian Armenia, but additionally
occupied Kars and Ardahan regions that belonged to Eastern Armenia
(Armenia 1918-1920).

Pres. Obama’s drive to free the U.S. from the tyranny of oil will
benefit the American people. And it will also pave the way for the
correction of the historic wrong done to the Armenians through the
long overdue reunification of their homeland.