Listening to all the happytalk about the US-Iran meetings all of a sudden I'm thinking this article (and no doubt many more to come) is done at the behest of the Bush administration. It's designed to ratchet the pressure on Iran and, later, when the talks are spun as "successful", make Bush look like some kind of hero for averting a nuclear war in the ME. And to justify his total flipflop on negotiating with the axis of evil tearisists.

FDR's response to progressive demands: "I agree. Now go out and make me do it."

To know what's going on you have to read everything Bhadrakumer writes:

Russia's energy drive leaves US reeling
By M K Bhadrakumar

And Gazprom seeks to buy exploration licenses in Nigeria and proposes to build a pipeline from there to Algeria, and with Algeria, Gazprom is developing a proposal on "joint" marketing of gas in Europe. US officials have gone ballistic. "The monopolistic Gazprom is behaving like a monopolist does. It tries to gain control of the market as much as possible and to stifle competition. And that's clearly what is going on," thundered Matthew Bryza, US deputy assistant secretary of state for Eurasian affairs. "The Kremlin wants Gazprom to be a dominant force in global energy, and the dominant force in global gas. Tying up gas resources in Central Asia and Africa is part of that," he added. The plan is for Gazprom to dominate "in every corner of the planet", he alleged.

Bryza's outburst is understandable. The good work he did lies now in ruins. Washington was relieved to see the back of Putin's presidency, but it now transpires that Gazprom may have only stepped up the pace of overtures under Medvedev's astute guidance. Besides, with its new assets in Africa, Gazprom will soon be knocking for access to the US market through supplies of LNG. The European and international companies which have been traditionally present in the African market will be compelled to play a role alongside Gazprom.

Washington hit back by ensuring that Russian companies are left out in the cold from the 30 contracts for lucrative oil deals that Baghdad is awarding. It is a big blow for Russia. In February, Moscow had written off US$12 billion or 93% of Iraq's debt to Russia in a move that was widely seen as aimed to help Russian oil company LUKoil regain the Saddam Hussein-era rights to develop Iraq's giant West Qurna-2 oil field. But under US pressure, the Iraqi government is now awarding West Qurna-2 to the US's Chevron.

The Kremlin didn't show any anger, but coincidence or not, Gazprom chief executive Alexei Miller suddenly arrived in Tehran on Monday and discussed with Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad the setting up of an organization of gas-producing countries. No doubt, with the Russian foothold in Libya (which has estimated natural gas reserves of 1.47 trillion cubic meters), in coordination with Algeria (which currently supplies over 10% of Europe's gas supplies), Qatar (with proven natural gas reserves of 25.8 trillion cubic meters) and Iran (which has the world's second-largest reserves after Russia), the time for a "Gas OPEC" is approaching.

The Iranian leader also suggested to Miller a market-sharing arrangement so that Russia and Iran could "collectively meet the demands of Europe, India and China in the gas sector". During the visit, an agreement was signed on the development of Iran's oil and gas fields by Russian companies; on Russian participation in the transfer of Iran's Caspian Sea crude oil to the Oman Sea; cooperation in the development of Iran's fabulous North Azadegan oil field; and, possible participation of Gazprom in the planned Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline project. Evidently, Moscow took a deliberate decision to press ahead with Iran in energy cooperation in the full glare of world publicity in complete disregard of US displeasure. Tehran loved it.

To quote a US expert, "Russia's strategic interest in Iran implicitly underscores the futility of hopes that Moscow would cooperate with Washington in imposing meaningful sanctions on Iran. While Western European companies are moving out of Iran or suspending agreements for fear of US sanctions (which penalize investments of more than $20 million a year in Iran's oil and gas sector), Gazprom is enlarging the already existing foothold."

Conceivably, the danger of losing out on the last energy frontier to Russia (and China) could be a factor in Washington's policy shift on Iran talks. Washington calls the u-turn "a strong signal to the Iranian government that the United States is committed to diplomacy". But according to The New York Times, Rice has decided to "test Iran's willingness to consider an international package of incentives meant to coax Iran into making concessions on its nuclear program". What we do not know is how close the Bush administration may be for involvement in Iran's energy sector, which is an element in the so-called "international package of incentives". (Halliburton, which Vice President Dick Cheney headed, was a very active player in Iran.)

he geopolitics of energy security are a highly sensitive subject for the Bush administration, whose profound links with Big Oil are legion. It is a tremendous loss of face for the Bush-Cheney-Rice combine that Moscow is outwitting the US on the energy front.

The strong possibility is that the Bush administration will press the pedal on multiple fronts on the Eurasian geopolitical landscape and create a fait accompli of US-Russian mutual antagonism for Senator Barack Obama, should he become president. The haste behind the Prague deal on missile defense smacks of such thinking.

whole article worth reading:
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Central_Asia/JG19Ag02.html

Banned but hopefully not forgotten.