Caspian Sea Oil Expansion Yields Downwind Droughts

Afghanistan, Iran, Pakistan, & etcStan.

Caspian Sea Oil Fields & Nations	Central Asian Nations (China low right, brown color)

Since the 1930's US Dustbowl that was downwind from the worlds's first massive oil fields discovery/delveopment (Pithole being a mere pittance) each explosive exploration has caused downwind droughts with economic, social and political chaos. The latest and greatest is world terrorism. Central Asia is seasonally buffeted from oil-drought winds from two sources: China's Permian Basin and the Caspian Sea. (China's massive western oil fields occupy most of the brown area of the above right map.) The multi-national droughts in Central Asia have the harbingers of border strife over water rights: "Kazakstan accuses China of depriving it of vital water supplies" 010419

The Caspian Sea's development is summarized in the above graph and following articles which show a time correlation, like the other major oil fields and drought areas as well as the mode of the modern black plague: flaring natural gas.

1. "The Caspian Sea region contains the third largest reserve of oil and natural gas in the world, behind the Gulf region and Siberia .... Another problem is the flaring of natural gas; about 4.5 million cubic meters a day. American-EDU
2. "Kazakh gas production has been hampered by the lack of infrastructure, with many oil producers flaring the gas instead of using it." DOE report 2000 April
3. Kazakistan is in boom times from the promise of oil riches. 010725
4. "The Caspian Sea region is important to world markets because it has large oil and gas reserves that are only now beginning to be fully developed. Developing these resources has resulted in competition both between companies to get the contracts to develop this potential, and between nations to determine the final export routes." 2000, June, DOE Report:
5. "Hunt for Oil on Caspian Sea Stokes Border Feuds and Arcane Theories" 2001, August, WSJ:
6. "Drought-hit states facing famine. Rising temperatures and low rainfall add to suffering.  011030 Guardian
   • "While the world's attention is focused on war in Afghanistan, three successive years of severe drought have created conditions for a famine which is threatening neighbouring Central Asian countries."
   • Triggered by the lowest rainfall in living memory, vast tracts of Iran, Uzbekistan, Pakistan and Tajikistan are being reduced to desert as the water table sinks, long-established wells dry up and herds of livestock perish.

The droughts in Central Asia are summarized in the following headlines and text.

• Afghanistan

  1. "Drought causes famine in Afghanistan" 0105
  2. "In Asia, A Third Year Of Drought. Severe Food Shortages Caused By Lack Of Water.Afghanistan Among Countries Suffering Most." 010928AP 
  3. "We don't want to plant poppy, but we have no choice," said Mohammed, 60, munching a handful of tender, dandelion-like poppy shoots. "There is so little water that the wheat won't grow well, and cotton prices have fallen by half. But with poppy, we can get 50 times the money. Everyone is starting to grow it again." .... the deep wells dug by wealthier farmers last year have also run dry.  020121

• Azerbaijan

• Iran

  1. "Iran is experiencing the third consecutive year of extreme drought. Ninety percent of the urban, rural, and nomadic populations are being severely affected." 010710

  2. "A severe drought, now in its third year, has killed about 15,000 head of livestock since March in northeast Iran .... A recent U.N. report described the drought as the worst to hit Iran for 30 years and estimated that it had caused damage worth $2.6 billion." CNN/Reuters 2001-07-15

  3. "Drought and Flood Plague Iran's Rice Crop" 010928 "A third consecutive year of drought has severely affected Iran’s rice-producing regions"

  4. "The drought that has devastated southeastern Iran and Afghanistan has wreaked its own peculiar havoc on Isfahan, in north-central Iran. For two years, its river has been bone dry, except for brief periods when man or nature managed to make the water flow again. Where once water beckoned, there is only a sandy, rocky plain stretching as far as the eye can bear to look." NYT 2001-12-05

• Kazakhstan

  1. "Kazakstan accuses China of depriving it of vital water supplies" 010419

• Kyrgyzstan

• Pakistan

  1. "Pakistan warned of another drought" 010130

• Tajikistan

  1. 'Tajikistan drought continues" 010112 BBC
  2. "Successive crop failures have left 1 million people in Tajikistan in need of urgent food aid, the International Red Cross ....'We have seen children digging among rat holes in wheat fields, searching for grain hoarded by the rodents for the winter,' said Roger Bracke, a Red Cross official who recently headed a mission to Tajikistan ... the crisis was caused by a shortfall of grain, caused by two years of drought and worsened by a dilapidated irrigation system." WashPost 2001-08-21
  3. "Tajikistan, considered the poorest of the republics that formed part of the Soviet Union until 1991, faces its fourth consecutive year of drought" 010821.
  4. "Food aid plea for 1m in Tajikistan. War and drought hit border state" 011017 Guardian UK.

• Turkmenistan

• Uzbekistan

  1. "The federation has appealed for an additional $602,000 to help neighboring Uzbekistan, which is also hit by a drought and food crisis." WashPost 2001-08-21

The Caspian sea is no exception to the rule.

The above analysis was completed before the World Trade Center Terrorism. Would it have happened without the modern black plague of oil? Oil provided the money for Osama Bin Laden to traipse from drought-stricken country to drought-stricken country recruiting victims of upwind oil fields: Yemen, Sudan, Kenya, Afghanistan, Pakistan, etc. Each act of terrorism funded by oil dollars and fueled by oil droughts increases the timistic losses of each barrel of oil.