SUMMARY

       Cheap oil is the foundation of a new United States foreign policy.

       The next president should CHANGE our foreign policy to get cheap oil to boom the economy and bring back cheap gasoline greatly needed by working-class Americans. A booming economy will hugely increase tax revenues with lower taxes to fund a stronger defense and health insurance.

       The next president should persuade the Saudis to permanently glut the oil market to drive the price to under $20 a barrel. Cheap oil will defund an Iran bomb and Islamist terrorists, and break OPEC. And cheap oil, by plummeting Iran’s massive food and fuel subsidies and welfare payments, could trigger the Iranian people to overthrow the Islamic terror-supporting regime.

       The CIA has changed hostile regimes to friendly regimes; for example in Iran and Guatemala. The next president should strengthen the CIA so it is able to help liberate the long-oppressed Shia in the Saudi eastern oil province to establish a democratic Shia state there completely dependent on the U.S. for its defense in return for long-term cheap oil with maximized production, and long-term bases -- if the Saudis don’t permanently glut the market.

       Under a cheap oil policy, Iraq would be divided into Kurd, Sunni and Shia autonomous regions with a U.N.-mediated agreed border between the Kurd and Sunni regions to include a Sunni-acceptable share of the Mosul and giant Kirkuk oil fields so the Sunnis have physical control of their own oil. The Iraq constitution strongly supports division of Iraq. Each region’s income would primarily depend on maximizing production and securely piping their own oil. U.S. financial support would end except to a weak central government in Baghdad. This cheap oil policy will win a low-cost victory in Iraq.   

      Cheap oil will block Iran’s bomb. The December 2007 National Intelligence Estimate stated: “Our assessment that Iran halted the [nuclear weapon] program in 2003 indicates Teheran’s decisions are guided by a cost-benefit approach.” Economic costs surely played a major role. Nuclear weapons are very expensive. The U.S. nuclear arms’ cost is over $5 trillion. The cost of the Manhattan Project through August 1945 was $20 billion.

       In 2003 the average oil price was about $31. The 2007 average was about $72. In 2008 the projected average price is $94. Each dollar in the price of a barrel of crude sold by Iran equals a billion dollars per year. Overflowing with oil money, Teheran can finance its nuclear weapon program without reducing vastly expensive food and fuel subsidies and welfare payments. Cheap oil will block its nuclear weapon financing by reducing Iran’s oil revenue by about $74 billion, from around $94 billion to about $20 billion.

       Iranian nuclear missiles also will be blocked by a universally-binding test ban treaty which legislatively outlaws all nuclear tests everywhere by anyone, including nonsignatories like Iran and North Korea. The U.N. Charter similarly binds nonsignatories. The treaty has strong teeth to block those two rogue states from necessary testing to perfect nuclear warheads for their missiles. Iran’s uranium enrichment is likely to be transferred to Russia or another country because, with nuclear missiles blocked, continued enrichment in Iran is not worth the economic, political and possible military costs to Teheran.

       China and Russia, among other countries, support a universally-binding test ban treaty but not the Bush administration because it does not like multilateral treaties. With support by the next president, a UBTBT can quickly be enacted.   

       Palestinian-Israeli violence can be ended by an international Middle East Free Trade Area (Mefta) along the Gaza Strip coast beginning with a 2.5 sq. mi. (7 sq. km.) prototype Port Mefta. The key is jobs for business peace. If Palestinians have good lasting jobs they will prevent militant violence from ending those jobs by driving away investors and tourists. Palestinians and Israelis would do business together though real peace is presently blocked by intense hatred between the two sides, especially by Palestinians. Hamas has opened the way to a 10-year business peace with their offer of a 10-year hudna (cease-fire), starting in the Gaza Strip. After 10 years the Palestinians will probably want to continue peace and prosperity rather than renew the armed struggle, whoever is then governing them.

       The Sharon government in 2003 found such a Gaza Free Trade Area to be of “great interest.”

       A primary goal of this book is to have our next president elected on a platform of some or all of this new U.S. foreign policy, especially the challenging but hugely beneficial cheap oil to boom the economy and achieve victory in Iraq, and the easier universal test ban to block Iranian nuclear missiles. The end of Israeli-Palestinian violence through Mefta would be a blessing.