Afghanistan and the TAPI Pipeline : A Discussion.

There seems to be this myth that the West's military forces are withdrawing in 2014. They are not. They are being 'drawndown', the new weasel cant term for keeping the military, though not regular troops, on the ground as part of the 'Afghanistanisation' process

With news that thousands of Afghan interpreters for the British army being allowed to settle in the UK for fear of reprisals from the Taliban it has been said that,

 ...no such escape route is on offer to the 325,000 members of Afghanistan's combined security forces, who are at vastly more risk. Most of Britain's interpreters don't live in places like Paktia. The Ministry of Defence says the majority are recruited in Kabul.

 The ANSF are still needed to protect Western geopolitical interests in Afghanistan such as the railroads and the construction of the TAPI Pipeline ( 'the new Silk Route').

A certain Mr Brownly objected stating the usual stock arguments whenever the TAPI pipeline is mentioned,

The ANSF is needed because the Taliban still exist - they always will to some extent. The point of COIN ops is to keep them at bay so that the Afghans can build a world that has no room for the Taliban in it. Where they're diminished to not much more than an Afghan equivalent of the EDL or somesuch.

Well, the ANSF is obviously needed because the Taliban still exists because they will do what they do with other infrastructure projects which is threaten to blow them up, unless they get some sort of financial remuneration.

The entire geopolitical ambition behind securing the construction of the TAPI pipeline is about 'nation building' and securing millions of dollars for reconstructing Afghanistan along with already built railroads and infrastructure projects.

A stable and more prosperous Afghanistan is in everyone's interest, especially the Afghans - they want to be a part of the wider world. If (and it's a bloody mahoosive if - for a decade, at least) TAPI ever emerges, it will bring much needed work, energy supplies and transit fees into the country.

The point is that the attempt to secure the TAPI Pipeline could very well destabilise Afghanistan even more while the Taliban continues to fight against it and because the TAPI pipeline could indeed , in theory, mean that Kabul would be able to build a state without it's involvement.

But this is precisely why the US has sought to negotiate with elements of the Taliban to try to bring them to heel and why "liberal interventionists" have gone rather cold on the war that is either not discussed properly in Parliament or else sold as being about anything other than what it has been primarily about-geopolitics.

"Public Diplomacy" , a pleasant euphemism for propaganda, has tended to emphasise that the Afghanistan War is "all about", human rights, women's rights or else other pretexts that were officially rejected by those such as David Miliband in 2009 ( i.e the "war on terror").

Then, as soon as casualties started to mount in 2010 and 2011, the new "Conservative" government started to resurrect this idea about Al Qaida or vaguely mentioned 'terrorists' being the reason to maintain troops in 2014.

This was quite simply a pretext to get public support and not debate the actual war objectives as the war dragged on.

TAPI isn't a secret or a conspiracy! It was first mooted about 20 years ago. No-one's stumped up the money for it yet though - there isn't a single metre of pipeline to protect in any of the four countries that would be involved.

It's fairly obvious to most who take an interest in the Afghanistan War, that TAPI is not a "secret or a conspiracy". Yet it a majort war objective that has barely been discussed either in importance or in it's centrality to the decision making of the USA and other NATO Powers.

The means to build the pipeline financially are already there. It is backed by the Asian Development Bank, a cousin of the World Bank and in which the majority of the financial interests are, curioisly, not in Asia but in the US, Canada, and Europe.

The fact of there not being a pipeline is to fail to understand that the gap is only between intentions and their realisation. The fact is that most British troop casualties are in Helmland where the TAPI pipeline is destined to run, should it ever get built.

It is deeply ironic that advocates of this futile war do not understand the difference between 'actual and intended consequences', to borrow Karl Popper's words, and if there is a 'conpiracy' it is the one of silence over the geopolitical significance of the TAPI pipeline beyond Afghan borders.

The most important is to complete the isolation and encirclement of Iran from the West, through curtailing Iranian influence by knocking out Assad even if it means quite obviously arming jihadists and overcoming the need for such annoyances as actual diplomacy.

From the East, the TAPI pipeline will finally be used to integrate Pakistan with India and, in so far as this geopolitical fantasy is believed to be acheivable, thus isolate Iran whose rival "peace pipeline" ( the IP ) is already being built on the Iranian side.

The TAPI pipeline is thus essential to the attempt to get "regime change" in Tehran as, the goal behind the Afghanistan conflict which will extend beyond 2014 anyway and, of course, Syria. The West's strategy is a messianic blend of Utopian wish thinking and shoddy realpolitik.

It is a convenient rationalisation that the TAPI pipeline is merely part of an enlightened policy of self interest when any mention of it as often denigrated as a "conspiracy theory" or that its only some form of infrastructure project disconnected from wider geopolitical war objectives.

A certain "Dr" Chris waded in,,

 Complete baloney. Nobody takes this pipeline seriously and the US is set to become self-sufficient in oil and gas. 

- Nobody ?

US Ambassador to Pakistan Richard Olson has said that America wants to help Pakistan to overcome its energy crisis.

He said that they had clear a policy regarding Pakistan-Iran gas pipeline project.
Pakistan and Iran have recently signed an agreement in Islamabad to complete the project while President Asif Ali Zardari has also paid a visit to the neighbouring country last week to discuss the pipeline and to extend relationships with Iranian leadership.

“We have a clear policy over Pakistan-Iran gas pipeline,” Olson said, addressing a gathering during his visit to Tarbela Dam on Tuesday.

He said that the US was in favour of Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) gas pipeline project, adding that it would also continue to help the country to reduce the energy crisis.

American’s State Department spokesman Patrick Ventrell while commenting over the project on Wednesday said it is in Pakistan’s best interest to avoid any santionable activity.

Pakistan is facing a severe energy crisis which has damaged its industrial setup specially the textile industry.

“We will help Pakistan to complete Gomal Zam and Sadpara dams,” he said and added that the US wanted the Pakistanis to spend a better life.

Baloney ?

Turkmenistan, a post-Soviet Central Asian country of 5.5 million which borders Afghanistan and Iran, holds the world’s fourth-largest natural gas riches after Russia, Iran and Qatar.
British auditor Gaffney, Cline & Associates has estimated the reserves of Galkynysh, named after the Turkmen word for “renaissance,” at 13.1 trillion to 21.2 trillion cubic metres.

Li Xiaoning, deputy director general at China Petroleum Engineering & Construction Corporation, told the Ashgabat gas congress this volume would be achieved in 2020. Since the start-up of the China-bound pipeline in December 2009, Turkmen gas exports to China have totalled almost 50 bcm, he said. Turkmen data show 2012 gas exports to China stood at 20 bcm.

Turkmenistan, which also exports smaller amounts of gas to Iran, plans to build an alternative pipeline to Afghanistan and further to Pakistan and India, which is named TAPI after the countries it will eventually cross.

Daniel Stein, senior adviser to the Bureau of Energy Resources at the U.S. Department of State, told the Ashgabat gas congress Turkmenistan needed to move faster on its pipeline projects, because instead of its natural gas China and India could import liquefied natural gas from elsewhere.

What actual research have such people done on the New Great Game ?

The Afghanistan War: Pipeline, Energy Corporations and Baking Interests.

Why is the US and UK still in Afghanistan ? What are the real war objectives beneath the "Public Diplomacy" that spins this as a war of Defence" against international terrorism ? What geopolitical ambitions does the US have in Central Asia ?

The strategic significance in securing the construction of the TAPI pipeline is the ambition that underlies the West being in Afghanistan. A war to advance a pipeline seems less heroic than a war against terrorism and difficult to justify. Yet it is the reason US and British troops have stayed the course.

There is almost nothing in the Western media about this.It is not regarded as news but the TAPI pipeline is crucial to the nature of the USA's foreign policy in Central Asia and it has to be asked whether it is right that British troops be asked to die for a geostrategy that is about protecting energy supplies.

Western journalists need to set the Afghanistan War in context.Resource Struggles over access to oil and gas are set to become increasingly common with the rise of China and India and the need of the west to retain control of supplies against the competition.

Here are some facts.

1) The Aghanistan War is about energy diversification away from Russian and Chinese control of Turkmen gas.

2) The Afghanistan War is part of a strategy to block off a rival Iranian IPI pipeline by forcing the TAPI Pipeline on Pakistan.

3) The TAPI pipeline is strongly backed by the US as a way of integrating south Asian nations under Western auspices.

4) The TAPI pipeline is likely to benefit Western financial interests and energy corporations.

This is news in Asia. It is not news in Britain. It does not fit in with the narrative the public is to be fed, though many people in Britain are still at a loss to know what the war is about. Responsible journalism ought to be be probing into the TAPI pipeline and its role in the Western nation's decision to "stay the course".

The Nation reported today,

The Hindu/Business Line referred to sources close to the negotiations and Shell is amongst the companies that have expressed an interest in the project. According to reports, the project which has US backing had initially seen interest from Chinese and Russian firms. Road-shows were also held to invite financiers to the project.

According to The Hindu/Business Line, the participants included amongst others, SBI, US EXIM, Citigroup, Morgan Stanley, Deutsche Bank and Macquarie Bank. The decision with regard to the consortium leader and investors which will be made jointly by member countries in consultation with the Asian Development Bank (ADB), is expected to be completed in a year’s time.

“The work on the network is expected to start in 2015,” The Hindu/Business Line said. ‘The pipeline is expected to be operational in 2018 and supply gas over a 30-year period.”

The Turkmen side conducted several international road shows for TAPI in September with the participation of the Asian Development Bank (ADB). It was reported that Chevron, Exxon Mobil, BP, BG Group, RWE, Petronas and other companies became familiarised with the main terms of the project implementation and expressed an intention to participate in it.

The Asian Development Bank is a cousin of the World Bank and predominantly it reflects the investments of Western nations ( despite its convenient title as an Asian bank ). The central role of the TAPI pipeline in the US and UK strategy in Afghanistan provides the missing explanation for why we are still there.

Clearly British newspapers do not think British people should know that.

The Afghanistan War in a Nutshell.

What is the reason for the Afghan War? Women's Rights? Nation building ? "War on Terror" ? All have been put forth at one stage or another as the reason for "staying the course" there after a decade of conflict since the US invaded in 2001.All official pretexts are half truths and rationalisations. More "Public Diplomacy".

It has always been the strategic goal to bring about the construction of the TAPI Pipeline first and foremost:without it none of the secondary goals, even if the US was not espousing them for propaganda reasons, would be difficult without integrating Afghanistan into the regional economies through the pipeline project.

The value of it to the US and NATO is that "energy independence" means, effectively, not relying on Iran's IPI rival pipeline. By blocking off Iranian interests to the East whilst now also attempting to destabilise and overthrow the pro-Iranian Assad regime in Syria, the geopolitical game plan is clear.

This truth is never made available to the British public who are spun a set of half truths and kitsch about "our boys", as if their sacrifice is about protecting us at home. Hence the use of "the war on terror" intermittently to rationalise the sacrifice. The electorate is too fickle to understand the real

In fact, the US was colluding with the Taliban before the events of 9/11 made that strategy impossible to back. It had been parts of Pakistan's political elites which created the Taliban in the 1990s in the first place so as to control Helmland and secure the pipeline route.

It should be remembered that Helmland, this low lying region in which most British troops have been killed by Taliban roadside IEDs, is the only possible transit route for Turkmenistan's gas south towards the Indian subcontinent. British troops have been used to secure a pipeline route on a "The Grand Chessboard"

Now, if that is considered "worth it", do remember that the US is at the same time trying to negotiate with the Taliban and Vice President Joe Biden does not regard the Taliban as "terrorists". The goal is constant: the pipeline. US companies are bidding at present to win the contract to build it.

Turkmen Gas is the Strategic Prize at Stake in Afghanistan

Turkmenistan, which holds more than 4 percent of the world's natural gas reserves, expects within the next few months to host a new round of talks with participants in the U.S.-backed TAPI project to link Turkmen gas fields with India...

This fact is something Reuters of London fails to link with the fact that there is a war going on in Afghanistan, as if the TAPI Pipeline was wholly divorced from the strategic interests that NATO nations have in being in this benighted land. 

....BP data show Turkmenistan's natural gas reserves equal to those of Saudi Arabia and behind only Russia, Iran and Qatar. The Central Asian state supports the pipeline as part of its plans to diversify sales from Soviet-era master Russia.

It aims to supply natural gas from its Galkynysh field, better known by its previous name, South Iolotan, to Pakistan and India. British auditor Gaffney, Cline & Associates has said the gas field is the world's second-largest.  

What Reuters fail to mention is that the diversification of supplies away from Russia also has as it's aim the blocking off of the rival proposed Iranian-Pakistan-India (  IPI  ) Pipeline that would deliver gas to energy hungry Pakistan some four times cheaper than TAPI. 

The reality is that NATO is in Afghanistan to provide the security environment for the construction of the pipeline as the failure to achieve this would ensure a decade of war would end with no tangible benefit to the West. 

With Afghanistan linked to other regional economies such as India, Iran can be excluded from expanding its interests in Central Asia and encircled and contained. With major markets in India and China blocked, Iran can be weakened economically along with the sanctions policy and "regime change" promoted.

These are the strategic realities seldom mentioned by politicians when the Afghanistan War is mentioned. Whether the TAPI Pipeline can ever be built, and the stakes are very high, is open to doubt. Yet the fact remains that it is a goal for which British soldiers are dying and in which money is being spent.

It's unlikely that these realities will be openly discussed. Only so much reality can be borne when the reality of conflicts over the supply of resources and the power politics connected with it is understood. And it is not meant to be one the electorates in the West, i.e. the children, are to be informed about.

"The Importance of Regional Projects"-The Chicago Summit and the TAPI Pipeline.

The Western nations after 2014 will maintain a military presence there even if front line soldiers have been withdrawn. Most will be in a security and training role so as to ensure the construction of the TAPI Pipeline, the real geopolitical interest NATO has in being in Afghanistan. It's not about corporate profit only, but about diversifying supply away from Russia and Iran.

Trend Magazine gave some indication as to the real stakes making a complete withdrawal improbable ( TAPI pipeline project to greatly contribute to stability in region 13 April 2012 )

The implementation of the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) pipeline construction project will make a significant contribution to the stability in the region, expert on energy policy and security, Baku State University (BSU) teacher Bakhtiar Aslanbayli said at the conference "Chicago Summit - new opportunities for Euro-Atlantic Partnership" in Baku today.

Speaking about the contribution of NATO member states and partners in the security and stability in Afghanistan, he emphasized the importance of regional projects.

He added that the intergovernmental agreement in connection with the TAPI pipeline was signed by official representatives of four countries on December 1, 2010.He stressed that in the case of the TAPI implementation, the prospects of the Iran-Pakistan-India pipeline will be zero.

He underscored that the close strengthening of economic and political ties between Central Asia and South Asia will lead to further weakening of Russia's position in the region.

He said that TAPI regional energy project, having geo-economic advantages, can seriously affect Afghanistan's economic development and energy supply, the future format of the Pakistani-Indian relations and the settlement of regional conflicts.

The base document for the TAPI project promotion is the Ashgabat interstate agreement of the member-states about the beginning of the practical implementation of the TAPI project signed in late 2010. The agenda has a key issue of gas pipeline security which will pass through turbulent Afghanistan.

The TAPI Pipeline is never mentioned as the real reason for NATO being in Afghanistan as invading nations to secure natural resources is illegal. Plus the idea is that the war was for moral and humanitarian reasons only. Hence the use of euphemisms such as "security", "Development" and "stability".

Why Won't the Guardian Talk About the Geopolitics of The Afghanistan War

Here's an idea for the Guardian's Online "Comment is Free" site, one I've advocated many times before without success. In response to it's question about "what you would like us to cover" I wrote,

Before another British soldier gets killed in Afghanistan and self important opinion formers appear to advise Obama what he 'could', should or must do, why not report on the actual reality of the war which is crucially concerned with NATO providing the security environment for the TAPI Pipeline and trying to force Pakistan to accept it over Iran's planned alternative ?

Put simply, NATO is in Afghanistan to secure goals, such as the TAPI Pipeline and access to resources, that are never publicly talked about as the reasons for "staying the course". As Joshua Kucera reported on EurasiaNet in March, there was a meeting ( not mentioned in The Guardian ) which is actually quite significant,

Dushanbe hosted the fifth meeting of the Regional Economic Cooperation Conference on Afghanistan, and the U.S., as expected, used the occasion to promote its "New Silk Road" vision of a future in which Afghanistan is a hub of commerce between Central and South Asia.

"The region’s wealth of natural resources, nascent trade agreements, and a burgeoning network of transport and energy connections underscore the great economic promise of a more integrated South and Central Asia," said Robert Blake, assistant secretary of State for Central and South Asia, the U.S.'s senior representative at the meeting. "but achieving greater economic cooperation – the essence of the New Silk Road vision – will not be easy or happen overnight. It will require strong buy-in and coordination by governments in the region, its international partners, and investment from the private sector."

In other words, Western troops could be in Afghanistan for longer, indeed have been already, than politicians have said they would as the withdrawal date has consistently been pushed back. and to achieve goals that are never mentioned in the mainstream media.

The fact that securing the integration of south and central Asia is connected to the sanctions policy on Iran is worthy of mention as it broadens the perspective that obsessively focuses on Iran's purported nuclear weapons programme. The endgame in Afghanistan is about blocking off Iranian influence from the west and the rival IPI Pipeline that would deliver gas cheaper to Pakistan and India.

These strategic realities, ones that would shine fresh light on both Western involvement in Afghanistan and the tensions with Iran, are being screened out of the discussion. Perhaps CiF editors could be brave enough to commission a piece that looks at this angle on events in Central Asia. Instead of the tedious humbug that clutters up these opinion pages every day.

Robert Blake, TAPI and Afghanistan's Geopolitical Value.

Further evidence of what is really at stake in Afghanistan was elucidated in a piece by Joshua Kucera for EurasiaNet ( US-We're for the New Silk Road if it Bypasses Iran, March 29 2012 ),

This week, Dushanbe hosted the fifth meeting of the Regional Economic Cooperation Conference on Afghanistan, and the U.S., as expected, used the occasion to promote its "New Silk Road" vision of a future in which Afghanistan is a hub of commerce between Central and South Asia.

"The region’s wealth of natural resources, nascent trade agreements, and a burgeoning network of transport and energy connections underscore the great economic promise of a more integrated South and Central Asia," said Robert Blake, assistant secretary of State for Central and South Asia, the U.S.'s senior representative at the meeting. "but achieving greater economic cooperation – the essence of the New Silk Road vision – will not be easy or happen overnight. It will require strong buy-in and coordination by governments in the region, its international partners, and investment from the private sector.

Hence Blake outlines precisely what the US's interests are in Afghanistan, even if this is always curiously disconnected to the fact that NATO is in Afghanistan to provide the necessary security for such projects to come to fruition.

TAPI as part of the Sanctions Policy on Iran.

The rival Pipeline to the TAPI is now targeted as part of the sanctions on Iran. After all, 10 years in Afghanistan has to be of some use and "worth it".

As the Express Tribune reports 9 The Iran Pipeline 28 March 2012 ),

'With Pakistan’s energy crisis becoming ever more grave, the need for power has never been more acute. It was heartening, then, that the president insisted that Pakistan would go ahead with both the Iran gas pipeline and the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) pipeline. As welcome as these words are, there is every chance that they will collide with the immovable forces of superpower politics and the threat of militancy. Of the two proposed pipeline projects, the Iran gas pipeline is by far the more viable option. It is more affordable than the TAPI pipeline and also faces less threat of being blown up by extremists. The TAPI pipeline would run through Herat and Kandahar in Afghanistan and Quetta in Pakistan, which makes the chances of sabotage more of a certainty than a possibility.

'The Iran pipeline, on the other hand, faces the equally deadly American veto. The US, through Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, has already floated the threat of sanctions should Pakistan go through with the proposal. The US has also been making use of back channels to put funding for the project into peril. A Chinese bank withdrew its promise of money for the pipeline after quiet US intervention'. ( my italics ).

Also reported is US interest in securing for US firms a stake in constructing the TAPI Pipeline,

'“A couple of major US oil companies are interested,” said Daniel Stein, senior advisor to the special envoy for Eurasian Energy in the United States. “We would like to see a US company involved at some point in TAPI.” He declined to name the companies. TAPI is considered to be consistent with US’s declared policy of linking Central and South Asia and diversifying export routes for Turkmen gas'...

Still No Mention of the TAPI Pipeline in Explaining the Afghanistan War.

The death of another six British troops in Afghanistan ( taking the death toll so far to 404 ) has led to the usual flurry of media concern over the war that such deaths usually occasion without any further insight being shed on it. The usual windbag editorials fail even to grasp the reality of what the war is about.

The Guardian stated today ( Dash for the Exit ),

There is every indication that the end of Britain's fourth war in Afghanistan will be as politically driven as its disastrous entry was.

It was not really "politically driven". It was caused partly by the need to act against a Taliban regime in Afghanistan that contained prominent Al Qaida terrorists ( though 9/11 was organised mostly in Europe ) and also by the need to secure Afghanistan for the West's geopolitical strategies as regards Central Asia.

The endgame is to secure the construction of the TAPI Pipeline. The reason NATO is there is that it still has yet to secure the pipeline route which is intended to run from the Dauletadbad Gas Field in Turkmenistan through both Afghanistan's and Pakistan's most volatile regions on to India.

One thing never mentioned by politicians is that TAPI runs right through Helmland where the vast majority of British troops have been killed since 2007-2008. The Taliban has to derail the pipeline project as it has no stake in the central government dominated by ethnic groups from the north.

NATO intervened on the side of the Northern alliance back in 2001 in what was a civil war in order to defeat the Pashtun dominated Taliban. It has been unable to achieve this for a number of reasons and one is that the writ of the regime in Kabul has never extended to the south of the country through which the TAPI Pipeline will run.

The official withdrawal date of troops by 2014 is merely "public diplomacy". Leading US generals have already admitted that the West will retain a presence in Afghanistan after that date. The aim is to provide security for the construction of the pipeline that is due to be completed by 2016 by optimistic estimates.

The TAPI Pipeline is significant as it means that Turkmenistan gas is diverted southwards and away from Russia which previously had a monopoly of pipeline routes westwards, of crucial concern for new NATO states in the former Eastern Europe that are wary of Russia's control over it's energy supply.

Richard Boucher, US Assistant Secretary of State, made that clear in 2007: “One of our goals is to stabilize Afghanistan,” and to link South and Central Asia “so that energy can flow to the south. The reasons for this lie not only with Russia.

It is also essential for NATO to secure TAPI in order to block off Iranian influence to the east and the export of its gas to Pakistan and India via the rival IPI Pipeline. Not only would such a pipeline supply gas to Pakistan at four times a cheaper price, it would tend to negate the purpose of western strategy.

The first is to encircle Iran from both West ( Iraq) and the East. The TAPI Pipeline's construction means that the signatories are bound to a project that unites Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and India in a community of mutual interest from which Iran is cut off and excluded.

It is a policy that dovetails with the ultimate goal of "regime change" in Iran which controls the third largest reserves of gas on the globe and copious oil. If Afghanistan is not under Western control, then other regional powers can deal directly with Iran without Western interests being considered.

This is considered particularly ominous when the US is obsessed with securing energy diversification when 60% of its oil comes from abroad. The gas from TAPI is a potential source of Liquified Natural Gas ( LNG ) and the last thing it or European states want in China to gain prominent stakes in the flow of gas.

In 2009, George Krol, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State, said to Congress that a prime US interest in Central Asia was “to increase development and diversification of the region’s energy resources and supply routes.”.

The war in Afghanistan was launched in the wake of frosty relations between the US and China in 2000 at the outset of the Bush II Administration. The Shanghai Cooperation Treaty between Russia and China demonstrated that both these large land empires were prepared to collude if they deemed it necessary.

The war in Afghanistan is concerned with the conflict for hegemony in Central Asia. Whatever the auxiliary goals as regards democracy and women's rights, the TAPI Pipeline is and will remain crucial to the creation of what US diplomats and Hillary Clinton herself call "The New Silk Road".

When the history of the Fourth Afghan War is written, historians will find the Western media replete with shallow delusions, liberal wish thinking and a complete lack of comprehension as to what was at stake. But by that time the world could be racked with resource wars that will breed terrorist blowback and consequently lead to a reduction in liberty at home.

And journalism will have failed miserably to do what it was supposed to do in free societies: to inform and educate.

The US Warning to Pakistan over the Rival Pipeline

Trend of Azerbaijan has an interesting news feature on the pressure that the US government is putting on Pakistan to scrap the IP pipeline project and choose the TAPI pipeline that runs through Afghanistan instead. Naturally, this has not been given any prominence in any Western media outlet yet.

State Secretary : US Strongly Supports the Construction of the TAPI Pipeline.

'The United States strongly supports the idea of construction of the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) gas pipeline. At the same time, Washington strongly opposes meeting of Pakistan's needs in energy resources by constructing pipeline to purchase "blue fuel" from Iran, ITAR-TASS quotes U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton as saying on Wednesday.

Speaking at hearings in one of the subcommittees of Appropriations Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives, she assured that Obama administration recognizes Islamabad's "essential energy needs". However, construction of a gas pipeline from Iran to Pakistan, either as a separate project of Tehran, or as a joint venture of the two sides would mean a "violation of our (that is, the U.S.) legislation on sanctions" against the Islamic Republic, Clinton said.

"We all know what would be the consequences of this. And it would have particularly devastating effect on Pakistan, because its economy is already fragile. Additional pressure to which the United States would have been forced to resort, would undermine their (that is Pakistanis) economic situation even more," Clinton added.

She said the U.S. "clearly" stated its position on this issue to Pakistan. "We urge Pakistan to seek alternatives (to purchasing natural gas from Iran)," Clinton added.

From her point of view, it is "a little inexplicable" why Pakistan now "tries to negotiate (with Iran) on the construction of the pipeline," knowing that Washington is trying hard to "increase pressure" on Tehran in connection with its refusal to clarify nature of nuclear activities. "And there is an alternative, which we strongly support - Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India the gas pipeline. We believe that this is a better alternative in terms of both predictability and avoid doing business with Iran," U.S. Secretary of State said'

Militarism and Popular Culture

A superb article in the Guardian here from George Chesterton ( Britain's Love Affair with the Military is Dangerous, December 23 2011 ),

....Britain has been drawn into a deep sleep about war and nowhere is this slumber more pernicious than in the militarisation of popular culture.

Dedicated servicemen and women should be respected and those who suffer deserve the very best support and care. But it is our fault we allowed our politicians to send them to conflicts that served little purpose other than to cling on to some amorphous notion of national power. Now the debate about why they are still dying – and killing – in Afghanistan has disappeared from public life. Instead, an acceptance that the military is an agent for good has become the norm, and we are told to love our soldiers as if they are members of an extended family. This year, from the The X Factor to football, from Radio 2 to the tabloids, we have been encouraged to welcome the military into our homes and hearts. There are, potentially terrible, consequences for this love affair.

Tough questions about a conflict that has cost, at the time of writing, 344 British combat deaths have been replaced by an invitation to demonstrate our gratitude to the military (BBC3's Our War aside). But what we are supposed to be grateful for has rarely, if ever, been mentioned in 2011. It's as if, in a scary and bankrupt world, we've been invited to take consolation wherever we can find it. In this case our consolation is the last refuge of the scoundrel. It's easier than thinking about a decade of fighting that has cost billions of pounds and at least 30,000 Afghan lives, and let's not forget six years in Iraq during which 100,000 people died.

We have turned the reality of war into an emotionally nourishing theatre – this year the home-counties Valhalla, Wootton Bassett, was rewarded with royal patronage for its role at the vanguard of our delusion. A key part of this is the politically stultifying Help for Heroes campaign, which, of course, serves an ideological and financial function for a broke government....

Iran and Afghanistan Break US Sanction Stranglehold.

The bizarre nature of global politics being played out in the oil and gas rich region of Central Asia was confirmed as news is coming out of the Iranian-Afghan oil deal. The Express Tribune reports,

“Iran has exported gasoil to Afghanistan over the past years but the export of gasoline and jet fuel will begin next year,” Irna quoted Ali Reza Zeighami, managing director of the National Iranian Refining and Oil Products Distribution Company, as saying.

Zeighami said the price of the products will be determined based on International prices.

In April, trade sources said Iran had struck a deal to sell gasoline to Iraq but that the rare cargo did not mean the Islamic Republic had became a net exporter and free from its dependence on gasoline imports.

Shipping data obtained by Reuters in November showed Iran’s October gasoline imports rose more than 21 percent to 63,279 barrels per day from 51,986 bpd in September.

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Wednesday his country would become a major gasoline exporter by 2013, despite the West’s toughest-ever sanctions on the Islamic state.

The sanctions have targeted a vulnerability caused by Iran’s lack of refining capacity, and many foreign companies have been forced to withdraw from Iran’s energy sector.

The United States, Britain and Canada announced new measures against Iran’s energy and financial sectors last month and the European Union is considering a ban, already in place in the United States, on imports of Iranian oil.

NATO has spend a decade in Afghanistan trying to create a client state. It has invested in trying to stabilise the country so as to get the TAPI Pipeline constructed, integrate it into the regional economies to the north and south and exclude Iran by blocking the rival IPI project, one that Pakistan has had to be steered away from by US pressure.

Then Iran simply strikes an oil deal with Afghanistan. Whichever way it is looked at, the NATO occupation of Afghanistan cannot yield the results it wants to impose. The attempt to enforce a NATO settlement on Afghanistan without the regional players condemns it to pumping Western money into this land without sure economic benefits and increases regional tensions.

Mineral Wealth in Afghanistan.

Another liberal interventionist fantasy is the one where instead of becoming a focus for pathological conflicts, the discovery of mineral wealth and natural resources will be used to raise Afghanistan out of poverty at a time where it's undergoing protracted war.

A Guardian report makes clear that, apart from the TAPI Pipeline, other interests are at stake,

"Afghanistan houses rich seams of copper, iron, gold, lithium and rare earth deposits worth up to $3 trillion, according to the Afghan government. Unsurprisingly, the government and international community are eager to see these resources exploited. The plan is to sell off rights to access many of the country's mineral deposits over the next three years in the runup to transition in 2014 – potentially releasing a vast amount of revenue for the Afghan economy"

The fact that this is being rushed through as part of a "transition" will only intensify the existing level of corruption. The beneficiaries may well be Western corporations gaining the extraction rights. Yet despite being told the Bonn conference of December 2011 discussed this, there have been few details so far.

It is curious how such news is filed under "Global Development". In fact, these interests are part of the reason NATO is still in Afghanistan. The public has the right to know how important such mineral wealth is in the decision to continue the war and whether those resources really do have any chance of being extracted for the benefit of Afghan civilians.

This is all the more relevant when it seems likely that it will be China that will benefit from exploiting Afghanistan's minerals. As Charles Wallace reported in Daily Finance,

Although the U.S. government has spent more than $940 billion on the conflict in Afghanistan since 2001, a treasure trove of mineral deposits, including vast quantities of industrial metals such as lithium, gold, cobalt, copper and iron, are likely to wind up going to Russia and China instead of American firms.

The New York Times reported Monday that U.S. officials and American geologists have found an estimated $1 trillion worth of mineral deposits that have yet to be exploited in the country. The paper said a Pentagon report called Afghanistan potentially "the Saudi Arabia of lithium," a key component in batteries for cellphones, laptop computers and eventually, a plug-in fleet of electric cars.

But while the United States and other North Atlantic Treaty Organization countries are providing the bulk of the security for Afghanistan.... the firms that are profiting from the resource boom are primarily Chinese, and to a lesser extent, Russian.

"China has an absolute advantage in Afghanistan as far as resource development goes," says James R. Yeager, a Tucson, Ariz., consultant who worked as an adviser to the Afghan Ministry of Mines.

In December, 2007, China's state-owned China Metallurgical Group Corp. (MCC) signed a $2.9 billion agreement with the Kabul government to extract copper from the Aynak deposit, one of the world's largest unexploited copper deposits with an estimated 240 million tons of ore.

The Washington Post, quoting a U.S. intelligence official, reported that the Afghan minister of mines was accused of taking approximately $30 million in bribes from the Chinese company in exchange for the contract. The minister denied the charge and said the Chinese firm had offered the best deal.

Given these facts it can be said that even on the grounds of "enlightened self interest", the war in Afghanistan has been neither that enlightened, in being a huge waste of western expenditure, nor even for the benefit of western states. The war has cost 393 British soldiers lives, turned NATO into an offensive power block and damaged the credibility of Western states.

NATO forces have spent a decade in Afghanistan only for corruption amongst Afghan elites to remain endemic and for the mineral wealth to go to Chinese and Russian companies. This war has been a complete waste of time, money, effort and lives. Nothing can or will be achieved by NATO by military occupation.

Prospects for 2012. Resource Struggles.

In his round up of international developments, The Guardian's correspondent Simon Tisdall omits any mention of the looming problem of resource conflicts in 2012.

A senior US military official said recently that he woke up every morning worrying that Israel might attack Iran's suspect nuclear installations. The US, he said, was talking to Tel Aviv "every day" about the inadvisability of such an attack. But pressure to "do something" about Iran will build through 2012 and could become fatally entangled with US election politics.

The general strategy of encircling Iran, strangling its economy and bringing about 'regime change' is held by most leading Democrats and Republicans. They differ only about the way of bringing it about. The goal is control over it's oil and gas, one reason why the War in Afghanistan will drag on till 2014 ( officially ).

The 'transition' between NATO protection of the New Silk Route ( aka the TAPI Pipeline ) and that of Afghans trained to protect it will do nothing to prevent the instability caused by Pakistan being forced to choose the TAPI Pipeline over the IPI one from Iran that would provide gas four times cheaper.

This strategy of blocking off Iranian gas exports is part of the sanctions policy being imposed on Iran. As the Express Tribune reports,

While Iran has massive gas reserves, the Iran-Pakistan gas pipeline project seems unlikelier by the day, given the current geo-political scenario. The US is strongly opposed to the pipeline and has been nudging Pakistan towards the hopelessly complicated TAPI pipeline project instead. On December 23, the National Bank of Pakistan refused to finance the IPI pipeline because of the threat of sanctions by the US. A recent purchase agreement signed with Turkmenistan has given some hope that a steady supply of gas may be achieved via TAPI by 2016, but that project is marred by numerous security threats.

Iran is now funding the Taliban in the absence of any regional peace plan for Afghanistan and the blatant attempt to destroy Iranian markets for gas. The result is that Iran is now threatening to cut off Western oil supplies at the Straits of Hormuz in reaction to this stranglehold.

The prospects for war with Iran are being ratcheted up as a consequence of NATO states being lethally overdependent upon supplies of oil and gas in far off and dangerous lands riven with sectarian and ethnic enmities and hatreds. Unless this reality is confronted the alternative is darkness.

Britain's Global Mission is to Control Natural Resources.

The doctrine of 'liberal interventionism' is largely concerned with security in regions where Western interests are at stake. In 2012 those will be as they have in 2011-access to oil and gas. Some journalists as Simon Jenkins, however, often tend to think the elites who apparently form British Foreign Policy are suffering from deluded visions of its former imperial role.

Writing in The Guardian, Jenkins opines,

....troubling is the foreign secretary, William Hague's, declaration on Facebook of a Christmas ambition to increase "international pressure on Syria … push Burma in the right direction … improve the situation in Somalia … and protect women's rights in the Middle East" among other uplifting goals.

His tour of the horizon boasted of "saving lives" in Libya, but he was more detached over Syria. He glided past Iraq, Iran and Afghanistan, preferring the clearer ethical waters of Sudan, Somalia, Burma and Muslim women's rights.

None of the areas of Hague's concern had anything to do with Britain, let alone being within Britain's sovereign domain, nor have they been for over half a century. The power has gone. The legitimacy has departed. Only the language of implied command echoes through the Foreign Office's post-imperial dusk.

These areas are of concern to Britain. In democracies much of the presentation of foreign policy aims is "public diplomacy". This entails selling war or 2intervention " to bemused citizens and voters by promoting "our values" as being better than those other Powers such as China vying for control over minerals and oil.

The intervention in Libya was about securing oil supplies once Gaddafi's regime no longer seemed stable. As the invasion of Iraq in 2003 had backfired in opening up the oil concessions to Chinese capital as the dollar weakened along with the US economy, Libya was a relatively easy "regime change".

The mistake is to think of Britain having a foreign policy as an independent state. The diplomacy may have differed along with interests but essentially all twenty first century western wars are wars over diminishing resources such as oil and over the geopolitical quest for control over supply routes.

The security of zones which lie near to the resources that consumers demand ,whilst being indifferent as to where they come from, is the essential reality behind war irrespective of the claim to have a policy of 'liberal intervention'. China intervenes in Africa, especially Sudan, but makes no claim for 'human rights'.

One reason those such as Jenkins are against British foreign policy is because they are trapped in the mentality of the Cold War. Conservatives who detested the Communist threat are at a loss to know what purpose NATO has served since 1990.

The reality is that NATO is committed to energy security as a vital interest. Afghanistan is crucially now a conflict over securing the region for the construction of the TAPI Pipeline. The failure to grasp this fact is behind the sense of indignant outrage many feel at their state's foreign policy.

The claim to protect "Women's Rights" is public diplomacy: it makes interventions and meddling seem moral for citizens in liberal democracies who might otherwise feel uneasy about it. If Hague said we needed to intervene to preserve our consumer lifestyles he would be vilified for being honest.

Few want to confront unpleasant facts. If Libya was a war for oil, it is because it was a way to diversify oil supply when faced with the catastrophe of Iraq and Iran resisting Western pressure over its supposed nuclear programme. The reality in fact being that Iran is being targeted because of it's resources and position.

One unmentioned aspect of the Afghan war is that the TAPI Pipeline-the New Silk route-is designed as part of the policy of cutting off export markets for it's gas in neighbouring Pakistan. In turn, Iran then gives support to groups such as the Taliban to sabotage the plan to 'stabilise' the country to the advantage of it's clients.

The reason why the West does not want a regional peace settlement is that it does not want Iran to have any influence in using its gas and pipelines to exert clout in Central Asia or the Middle East. The West needs the pipeline to block off Chinese, Russian and Iranian collusion over energy.

If there is going to be talk over Britain's 'Imperial ethos', then reference should be made to the nineteenth century Great Game. Britain is a bit player in a new struggle for hegemony in energy rich Central Asia in which it supports the US in preserving its energy security.

Any omission of the strategic realities makes any commentary on foreign policy irrelevant, unenlightening and obsolete. The Guardian promotes delusional wish thinking on foreign policy by failing to mention the overdependence of Britain on diminishing fossil fuels.

The Absence of Public Dissent On the War Objectives in Afghanistan.

The omission of any stated and coherent war objectives in Afghanistan is the most sinister aspect of the way the war has become normalised. So too the way discussions about what's actually at stake are infantilised by celebrity culture and TV "awards" and trivialised by mingling the position the soldiers have been put in with prime time entertainment.

The death of 391 British troops is low by historical standards but almost every week another soldier is killed and made for bad PR about the war. So the ritual of Wootton Basset welcoming home funeral corteges was stopped and the coffins rerouted to avoid public attention and the town renamed Royal Wootton Basset.

Instead, there is the subtle propaganda inherent in interweaving the virtues of selfless military endeavour with the notion of Afghanistan as unquestionably a 'Good War' , one implanted in popular culture and entertainment through Help for Heroes Concerts and ITV's A Night of Heroes ( "the millies" ) which gives Oscar style awards for bravery.

At the same time as this entertainment extravaganza, the British government seldom makes any attempt to explain why the troops are in Afghanistan beyond vague statements about 'terrorism', even though Al Qaida has not been present in Afghanistan for a long time. Nor does it explicitly use "The War on Terror", the War on Drugs or Women's rights to sell the war any more.

The subliminal message behind The Sun sponsored awards is that support for 'our brave boys' by extension also means mean support for the mission they are on. That this should be put beyond mere politics. It's curious that this has taken place at a time when the media and politicians remain silent on the war objectives and there is virtually no coherent opposition.

A J P Taylor in The Trouble Makers wrote that dissent over British foreign policy had ensured that there was never a time between the French Revolution and World War Two when it had followed a broad line of national interest that transcended the ordinary controversies of domestic policies.

In that light never in British history has there been such a lack of principled objection to a futile war where one essential geopolitical ambition-the security of the route along which the TAPI Pipeline is planned to be constructed by 2016-is not mentioned in Parliament nor press.

The fact that Britain is part of a NATO led coalition dominated by the US tends to lead to the belief that it is a war "in the notional interest". In fact, the interests are stated in documents and press releases and 'think tank' publications as clearly being related to the TAPI Pipeline

Almost every British soldier since 2007 has been killed in the most intense fighting in Helmland. The TAPI pipeline is planned to run through this traditional low lying Taliban dominated region. Now they cannot be defeated, US Vice President has stated peace talk will happen with them.

Indeed Mr Biden even made it clear that the Taliban now must not be referred to as 'the enemy of US Interests'. No mention of NATO here nor even 'the allies or 'western'. Those interests are clearly less to do with the prospect of Al Qaida returning to Afghanistan as to the unfinished business of the TAPI Pipeline.

The soldiers are dying for a pipe dream as the strategy of building a 'pipeline of peace' that will unite all the regional powers-Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India-together is fraught with problems. Pipeline transit states are notoriously unstable.

The plan to construct a New Silk Route is intended to diversify Turkmenistan's gas away from monopoly Russian control ( hence the special interest of Central European powers such as Poland which had five troops killed yesterday ) . It is also conceived as a plan to encircle and destroy Iran economically.

The TAPI pipeline ensures that Pakistan is brought under Western influence as well as getting the supplies of gas it needs and blocking off Iran's export of gas to the east and potentially to India and even Chinese markets. Despite the fact this is causing problems in Pakistan.

The Pakistani elites are not happy at being threatened with sanctions if Pakistan opts for the IPI pipeline which would bring in Iranian gas at a price four times as cheap than would be gas the more risky TAPI pipeline. Funding and support from the Taliban thus comes from Iran and certain factions in Pakistan.

The potential for increased as opposed to diminished conflict in Central Asia and the Middle East is a result of the lack of realism inherent in NATO's botched war and one that ought to have ended with the destruction of Al Qaida's base after 9/11. As Jason Burke has pointed out, Al Qaida is a global 'network of networks' that can operate from anywhere in the world.

The TAPI project and vast mineral deposits have ensured that NATO, and hence Britain, is 'staying the course' along with other objectives that have been euphemised as "mission creep"-the War on Drugs- and others used as pretexts to stay the course-women's rights, school building, aid work etc.

Whilst the humanitarian objectives were worthy, the fact remains it has never been the reason why NATO remained as no war is ever exactly fought for one reason alone. But the idea British soldiers are risking their lives in a selfless humanitarian mission is simply untrue. They fight to protect one another from the Taliban: the organisation the US wants to cut a deal with.

The public have the right as well as a need to know why this war was fought.