Last year, Saudi exports to the United States fell to 989,000 barrels a day, the lowest level in 22 years, from 1.5 million barrels a day the previous year, according to the Energy Information Administration. Meanwhile, Saudi sales to China surged above a million barrels a day last year, nearly doubling from the previous year. The kingdom now accounts for a quarter of Chinese oil imports. <...> "Oil flows are shifting from West to East, and Saudi supplies that used to go to Europe and the United States are now headed for Asia," said Jean-Jacques Mosconi, the senior vice president for strategy at Total of France. Brad Bourland, a former State Department official who heads research at Jadwa Investment in Riyadh, said: "Saudi Arabia used to be very much an American story, but those days are gone forever. That's just a reflection of a globalized world and the rise of Asia. They now see their relationship with China as very strategic, and very long term."
Meanwhile, Saudi sales to China surged above a million barrels a day last year, nearly doubling from the previous year. The kingdom now accounts for a quarter of Chinese oil imports.
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"Oil flows are shifting from West to East, and Saudi supplies that used to go to Europe and the United States are now headed for Asia," said Jean-Jacques Mosconi, the senior vice president for strategy at Total of France.
Brad Bourland, a former State Department official who heads research at Jadwa Investment in Riyadh, said: "Saudi Arabia used to be very much an American story, but those days are gone forever. That's just a reflection of a globalized world and the rise of Asia. They now see their relationship with China as very strategic, and very long term."
The implications for Middle East politics would be interesting:
"We know the Saudis and others have delivered the message to the Chinese that instability in the gulf is not in their interest," Douglas C. Hengel, the deputy assistant secretary for energy, sanctions and commodities at the State Department, said last week during a conference in Houston. But Jon B. Alterman, a Middle East expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, said that the falling dependence of the United States on Saudi oil could turn into a problem for the Saudis, because the United States guarantees their security in the Persian Gulf.
But Jon B. Alterman, a Middle East expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, said that the falling dependence of the United States on Saudi oil could turn into a problem for the Saudis, because the United States guarantees their security in the Persian Gulf.
Gabon's green ambition for Africa | Ali Bongo Ondimba | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk
Hardly a month goes by when new deposits of oil and gas are not uncovered somewhere in Africa. Uganda and Ghana are set to join the club of major oil producers in the next couple of years. The US plans to source almost 25% of its annual crude oil imports from Africa over the coming years.
I think that China has always been inward-looking and that their military posture is essentially defensive - cf Great Wall of China - and also aimed at internal security against threats to the regime.
I do not believe that China will ever take an expansionist military approach to secure resources, although it suits the US military-industrial complex to suggest that they would. China is quite happy to achieve their purposes through economic power, and let the US waste $ gazillions, and thousands of young lives, on keeping the world secure for Chinese mercantilism.
marco:
"We know the Saudis and others have delivered the message to the Chinese that instability in the gulf is not in their interest,"
I think that the Chinese are well aware that Gulf instability is not in their interests which is IMHO why China will continue to veto not only an attack, but also any energy sanctions on Iran.
But note here that (based on my personal contact with some of the key players, who genuinely believe that US sanction policy is either mad or dumb) the Iranian leadership would actually welcome gasoline sanctions, since it would enable them to cut their unsustainable and increasing energy subsidies and blame the Great Satan in the process. "Any economic unit can emit money. The serious problem is to get it accepted" Hyman Minsky
