Max S. Dunn

Book - Resource Wars

Posted by: Max Dunn on March 28, 2008 12:35:21

Resource Wars: The New Landscape of Global Conflict
by Michael T. Klare
Read March 2008

In looking at the classes offered at Stanfords Continuing Education program this quarter, one caught my eye in particular. It was Resource Wars taught by Barry Schutz. This interested me since I have predicted that trouble will soon explode in Saudi Arabia and we will be forced to send in our military to assure our supply of oil - a war over oil resources. One of the books in the class curriculum was "Resource Wars: The New Landscape of Global Conflict" by Michael T. Klare. The most intriguing part of this book was that Klare brought up other resources besides that have caused conflicts in the past and will likely continue to be problematic, including water, shipping routes, timber and gems. He also makes a strong argument that many local conflicts that outwardly seem to be about political or ethnic issues, in reality the fighting is usually about control and exploitation of natural resources. Overall, a very informative read. A drawback to this book, however, is that it was published in 2001 and thus is a little dated. For instance, there is an entire chapter on the Caspian Sea Basin assuming that there would be prodigious oil fields and fights over control of it, but the oil there never materialized and it has largely been abandoned. Also, it was written before the Iraq war, and I would love to get Klare's take on that. I guess we will just have to wait for his next book which should be out next month.