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Western Europe is almost entirely dependent upon Russia for energy needs

This is simply not true. Russia currently provides 25% of Europe's gas imports (which themselves represent about half its consumption)(note that the numbers can change significantly depending on whether you count Norway as in "Europe" or not, as it is not in the EU) and probably a smaller fraction of its oil.

The gas is a bilateral inter-dependency relationship, which had been stable for the past 40 years (until London started interfering).

Oil is a global market and Russia is only one potentially unfriendly supplier out of many.

Worries about energy dependency tend to look at future trends, whereby oil and especially gas demand goes up while domestic supply shrinks and Russian exports are expected to fill in the difference. So dependency might become an issue only if we continue our (insane) current policies.

In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes

by Jerome a Paris (etg@eurotrib.com) on Fri Aug 15th, 2008 at 06:59:13 AM EST
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