If Arabs withheld oil...

[khilafah]

Ok, now a poll for the non-Muslims of the board.

If Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Gulf States etc. all of OPEC basically, got together and decided that they were not going to sell anymore oil to the West, and that they were nationalising all oil companies..

What do you think should be the response of the West to "protect" their interests?

Please feel free to specify why you voted how you did.

[USMC]

I voted to "Leave them to it"
Russia has plenty of oil but doesn't have the technology to get to it. We could go in there, get the oil out, and bring money into a region that would love to have economic development.
Besides that, the U.S. needs to develop alternate sources of fuel and this would be good incentive - beside the benifit of bankrupting Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and anyone else who choose to participate.

[Malcom]

How about one of the reasons it wont happen: "Weat" will raise oil prices, people will buy smallar cars & invest more money into nonfossil fules creating less of a demand and speeding up the day when oil is obsolete. Currently projected to be about 50 years from now, what are "oil nations" doing to prepair for that day? US welfair?

[khilafah]

What's interesting about this poll so far is that the choice nobody has yet voted for, is the one I think is most realistic in the event this happened.

[THHuxley]

What's interesting about this poll so far is that the choice nobody has yet voted for, is the one I think is most realistic in the event this happened.
Can't vote, since none of the choices are the one I would choose.

I would leave them be and watch their economies implode. It would hurt for a while, but since their total exports (minus oil) are less than that of the single European country of Finland, they couldn't keep it up for very long.

They tried it in the 70s, and we got throught that okay too.

[HelpingHand]

Asslamo Allaikum All,

I highly recommend all to read:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/House-Saud-Rise-Corruption-Coming/dp/0747578745/sr=8-1/qid=1166722837/ref=pd_ka_1/026-3573685-7206035?ie=UTF8&s=books