We would like to believe that there is plentiful oil in the ground throughout the world, and in regions of the world which are easily accessible. Yes, we would like this, but it is as yet largely unknowable. A now very famous American petroleum geologist, Marion King Hubbert, argued in the 1950s that the production of petroleum in the United States would peak in 1970 or so, and the production numbers – to the dismay of just about everyone in the oil industry – have proven his prediction correct. Of course, the question is why he was able to correctly predict the course of production of oil in the United States.

The most plausible answer is that the extraction of petroleum from the Earth follows a few very powerful laws and these laws can be largely explained using current scientific theory as it applies to physics and geology. I have been talking to prominent petroleum geologists for many years now, and I tend to accept the thinking and theorizing of Colin J. Campbell, a retired petroleum geologist now living in Ireland. He has been arguing for many years, since 1998 or so, that non-OPEC production of petroleum would begin to decline in the middle of this decade. The prediction has turned out to be largely correct. The International Energy Agency, for many years mute on the issue and intricacies of geophysics, now admits that we have a problem, in fact a grave problem. I interviewed in July 2007 the chief economist of the International Energy Agency in Paris – the organization with a mandate to study energy issues for the member states of the OECD – and he admitted as much.

It is clearly a sensitive issue, and this is mostly because Israel is in the Middle East, and of course it is in the Middle East – and Muslim countries – where we have found most of the world's petroleum. The United States and the Western countries will need to become friendly towards the major oil-producing nations of the Middle East, but the Zionists have precluded any possibility of friendship/commercial relations with the oil-rich nations of OPEC. The United States is of course now at war with the Muslim world – the so-called war on terror. That this is an unsustainable and tenuous situation is all too obvious. We will have to be allied with the Muslim oil-producing nations – at some point. And the reason for this is the sharp declines of oil production outside the OPEC zone.

The graph below amply illustrates why at some point in the future the United States (and indeed other large oil-consuming nations in the OECD) will have to become allied with the Middle East. I predict that this decision will have to be taken relatively soon, though it is also clear that the politicians in Washington are largely under the control of the Jewish/Zionist lobby. The Jews in the United States have immense political and economic power, and accordingly they have immense policy-making influence in Washington. The Palestinians do not exist, they have no rights, they are terrorists and in fact they should be exterminated – this is the mantra of Zionist-controlled Washington.

This is not to say that the economics of petroleum production is not important. I really have no ability at the moment to speculate as to how important economics is to oil production, but I will admit that it has to be something of an influential factor. But I would guess, and it is really only a guess, that economics plays a minor role in determining how much petroleum we get out of a typical oil reservoir. The most immediate question that comes to mind is the all important energy return on investment (EROI) and its application to the extraction of petroleum from the Earth. Indeed, there is evidence that there is quite a lot of petroleum in the Earth. It's just that we cannot economically (and physically) extract it. I am now planning to write a book about EROI, and I will consult Charles Hall, the American academic who apparently created and coined the term (and acronym).

I recently called up the head of research and energy trading at Alaron Trading Corporation in Chicago, Illinois to see how he might assess the current situation in the global energy markets. Phil Flynn was kind to agree to talk to me, and indeed the conversation is very illuminating. At the end of the discussion we both agreed that we might have found an ingenious solution to some of the intractable problems we now face. Flynn has a sense of humor and it is obvious that he is a shrewd analyst as well. **Click here or on the audio icon above to listen to the editor of World Affairs Monthly interview Phil Flynn. Alaron Trading Corporation can be found on the net at www.alaron.com.**

[Alaron Trading Corporation no longer exists, the web page is gone.]

It should be rather obvious that the United States should not be spending some $12 billion/month to pretend to prosecute the war in Iraq, but the Zionists [Ashkenazi Jews] are quite pleased. The world will, however, be quite dismayed by the result in a few years time. It is not going to be easy from here on out. The economy of the United States was built on cheap energy and cheap petroleum, and when this cheap energy runs its course the economic foundation of the economy will collapse. We are at the very early stages of this collapse, this is my guess. George Bush and Dick Cheney thought it was a doable operation to kill Arabs in Iraq, and take their oil (Iraq could have the largest reserves in the world, rivaling Saudi Arabia), but it is not doable. It is proving a costly and foolhardy operation, and it is one that will exact a terrible toll on the United States and its economy. Thanks so much Phil for the enjoyable interview. We will, I hope, do periodic updates.

**[I just talked this morning to Mr Flynn and will interview him very soon, so this will be the second interview with him. The audio recording of this May 2008 interview will be republished here at destructivecapital.com.]