AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman, with Juan González, with Part 2 of our look at war and oil with Antonia Juhasz, independent investigative journalist, regular Rolling Stone politics reporter, author of several books on the fossil fuel industry, including The Bush Agenda and The Tyranny of Oil.

I want to begin this continuation of our discussion by playing you a clip of the well-known war hawk, Republican Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, being interviewed on Fox News over the weekend.

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM: Venezuela and Iran — 

MARIA BARTIROMO: Yeah.

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM: — have 31% of the world’s oil reserves.

MARIA BARTIROMO: Yeah.

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM: We’re going to have a partnership with 31% of the known reserves. This is China’s nightmare.

MARIA BARTIROMO: Yeah.

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM: This is a good investment. And we should applaud our men and women in the military who are doing something I’ve never seen done before —

MARIA BARTIROMO: Yeah.

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM: — decimating a brutal enemy in nine days.

AMY GOODMAN: That’s Senator Lindsey Graham. Antonia Juhasz, as he responds to oil for — wars for oil, from Venezuela to Iran, if you can lay out oil geopolitics and what is actually happening here?

ANTONIA JUHASZ: Yeah. I mean, let’s remember that after Iraq, Iran was always next on the Bush administration’s agenda for war. Bush was building up to a second wave of the war in Iran for years, and planning for it and meaning to go forth with it. But then the Iraq War was so disastrous, and particularly the public was so done with war and done with that war, and certainly had no stomach for a second front, that the Republicans could not move on into Iran. And the war probably cost the Republicans the presidency.

U.S. oil interests lobbied aggressively to pursue oil on their terms in Iraq and Iran, driving the invasion of Iraq, lobbying aggressively to see a second front in the war in Iran. As I have written repeatedly about war in the Middle East, oil is a key agenda. But, of course, driving a country like the United States to war is never a simple thing, and it’s never just one thing. And, of course, Israel and the interests of Israel go side by side with that agenda. It’s how do you — how do the pressures that want to see a military invasion take place get that invasion to go? It’s meeting a series of interests by a series of players. That’s certainly oil and oil companies, not necessarily securing oil wealth, quote-unquote, “for the United States,” but securing oil wealth for oil companies has driven the wars in Iraq, has driven a war in Iran, and certainly helped drive the war in Venezuela, where Trump has now, you know, literally — said literally, “We’re going to take the oil.”

What has happened in Venezuela is actually sort of fascinating, and you can somewhat understand, based on Trump’s, you know, I guess, limited worldview of how he can accomplish the things he wants for himself and the people who support him and whose interests he’s trying to support — thought perhaps that because Venezuela worked easily for him, that Iran would work similarly. And one of the ways that Venezuela worked easily was that all Trump cared about was getting in a pliable government. And that’s what he has said he also wants in Iran. And pliable means a lot of things, including — when the U.S. invaded Iraq, one of the goals was getting the Iraqis to change their national oil law to essentially privatize the industry — not totally, but sort of. The Iraqis wouldn’t go along with it. U.S. oil companies got the type of contracts that they want, and they got into Iraq, so they did OK.

But in Venezuela, right after Trump removed the president of Venezuela, within two weeks’ time, the Venezuelans implemented a very similar new national oil law. And one of the reasons why that happened was, after Trump removed the president of Venezuela, he had that now-historic gathering of oil company executives at the White House. A lot of press was paid to one word that Darren Woods, the CEO of ExxonMobil, said, that Venezuela is uninvestable. What got a lot less attention was the words that followed that, which he said, “But we think it would be fine if we can get the terms that we want. And one of those key terms we want is a new national oil law in Venezuela.” And the Venezuelans quickly agreed and put in place a new law, and now U.S. oil companies are lining up and getting ready. Some are already in and signing deals and increasing production in Venezuela, because they were able to get what they wanted on their own terms.

The idea that Iran could be that simple is, you know, frankly, ludicrous. But you could see that perhaps the Trump folks, persuaded by Netanyahu to go to war, felt that perhaps this is something they could also accomplish, and I think Trump still thinks he can accomplish. I think he is obviously speaking with Putin. Putin has influence over the Iranians. Perhaps they’re figuring out some sort of deal, because what Trump clearly, clearly underestimated was the power that the Iranians have, and how that is so significantly different from the Venezuelans. And part of that is, of course, their control within the region, not only, one, their military, but their control within the region in their ability to control not just their own significant oil reserves, but the reserves of almost the entire region, and what the impact of that would mean globally. I think the Trump administration mostly didn’t care and thought that it could weather whatever these harms might be. But I’m not sure that that is going to be the case that plays out.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Antonia, I wanted to ask you about something that’s not directly connected to oil but is certainly influenced by it, or energy, which is that the Middle East has also emerged, and especially the Gulf states, as a major center of the developing worldwide artificial intelligence infrastructure. In December, the State Department issued what they call Pax Silica, which was supposedly a declaration by 11 countries, mostly in the Gulf states, but also including Israel, that they were coordinating the development of artificial intelligence infrastructure. And most people are not aware that Saudi Arabia is home to 61 data centers, and the UAE to 57 data centers. So, this whole region has emerged as a major center for the buildout of artificial intelligence infrastructure. And the Iranians, knowing that, targeted several data centers in their attacks, sort of sending a signal to the worldwide investment community that there is another weakness in the chain of imperial domination, which is not just oil but also their artificial intelligence buildout. I’m wondering your thoughts about that.

ANTONIA JUHASZ: No, I mean, I think that’s very interesting. I think, obviously, artificial intelligence takes an enormous amount of fossil fuel, so it’s not surprising that you see these two, you know, interests align. It takes an enormous quantity of fossil fuels, fossil fuel power, fossil fuel energy, to power these data centers. And they are — you know, they go hand in hand.

The fossil fuel industry has also, by the way, I think, used the belief in the necessity of the vast expansion of data centers as a justification for its continued existence, if it can convince the world that it needs all of these data centers, and it can convince the world that it needs the power to keep them going, and that fossil fuels have yet another reason to continue on, when we know that in most other circumstances, we have excellent ways of moving past fossil fuels entirely to more sustainable, significantly less frail and fragile systems that fossil fuels clearly offer. So, I think, you know, it’s not surprising that these two power bases are being built up side by side, but also present another weakness, a weakness that the Iranians are taking advantage of in their retaliation.

AMY GOODMAN: I’m wondering, Antonia Juhasz, if you can talk about Russia and China right now. Some have even suggested that attacking Iran was a way to prevent China from continuing to get cheap Iranian oil. And then you have Trump apparently saying he’s going to be lifting sanctions on India, which they forced not to take Russian oil, which now rides on oil tankers around the world, and now saying they can, because of his fear of the markets plummeting. Can you talk about how much oil China uses, what this means for Russia, on the one hand, relying on Russian oil, then, on the other hand, getting anti-drone technology from Ukraine — they’re the experts in it — because they’re trying to attack the drones that Russia is sending over Ukraine and bombing them?

ANTONIA JUHASZ: Sure. So, there’s been significant sanctions placed on Iranian oil, sanctions that the U.S. oil industry has been anxious to see removed, and if not the sanctions removed, then the regime removed, so that U.S. oil companies could get in and start taking advantage of Iranian oil. But the only nation that currently is able to primarily receive Iranian oil is the Chinese. I honestly think the removing oil from the Chinese is certainly probably an interest of some people who have backed the war, but I don’t believe it to be a real dominant interest, because let me just give one example.

In Venezuela, for example, one of the key benefits of removing Maduro for ExxonMobil and Chevron was that Maduro was blocking their biggest pot of oil, one of their biggest pots of oil in the world, which is in Guyana, waters that Venezuela claims as its own. Exxon and Chevron are developing, and it’s a critically important pot of oil for them. And Maduro had literally gone after that oil with warships and trying to claim that oil as his. And now he’s gone, and that area is now presumably going to be opened up.

Well, guess who they’re partnering with in that big pot of oil in Guyana. The Chinese. The Chinese are their primary partner. U.S. oil companies partner with Chinese oil companies all the time, all over the world. They’re not in competition with the Chinese. They are literally partnering with the Chinese. Trump said, when he went to Venezuela, you know, one of the things he was going to do was start selling the oil, and he was ready to sell it to the Chinese and sell it to the Russians.

Trump has clearly aligned himself with Putin, and one of the key elements of their alliance is the dedication to a continued fossil-fueled economy. So, Trump has relieved sanctions on Russia already to make sure that its oil can continue to flow, because sanctions placed on Russia as a result of the invasion of Ukraine to try and lessen its ability to fund its war machine have been succeeding. They have weakened the economic wherewithal of the Russians. Of course, it’s important to say the people who suffer the most from sanctions are the people of Russia, because the economic cost gets most aggressively placed on them. But it is also taking — it’s taking its toll on the Russian budget to continue to fund its continued war against Ukraine. So, it is very good for Russia to come up with a deal with Trump that alleviates those sanctions, which is a key goal. And Trump actually said yesterday — you know, first he said these are short — it’s a short-term relief on those sanctions. Then he said, “But maybe there’ll be so much peace that the sanctions can be removed altogether.” That’s what he said. So he’s obviously talking with Putin about how to try and bring an end to this conflict in whatever way works best for the two of them, and then, of course, with Netanyahu. And so, who knows what that’s going to look like? Nothing good, I would imagine.

So, what I think is that the bottom line for Trump and Putin — and also, I would add Mohammed bin Salman into this threesome of power, of Saudi Arabia — is a world that remains committed to fossil fuels. And that is clearly an interest that aligns these three governments. The Iranians know this, and they are using that as a tool to go right at the heart of that fossil fuel reliance. And again, this shows just the weakness of fossil fuel dependence, because fossil fuels are concentrated. They’re very easy to attack. They’re very frail. They are sensitive to things like weather, instability, wars. And you can go after them and also cause great harm to people, the environment and the climate as a result.

They’re also, as we’ve seen with oil markets, again, very, very volatile. The movement, the extreme movements in the price of oil, shows that the price of oil is set not really by supply and demand, because right now there hasn’t been a significant reduction in actual supply. To certain places, there have been, but not globally. And the market is responding to an expectation of future supply loss. And that’s why we’re seeing the price go up and down, go up and down so rapidly.

Well, those up-and-downs have real impacts on real people’s lives. So, the price of gasoline has also skyrocketed with that price of oil, and that is impacting consumers in the United States who are already suffering from rising electricity costs, that are also the result of the Trump administration’s rejection of renewables, the adoption of data centers that need more energy, Juan, as you’ve indicated, and now a war that is causing gas prices to spike dramatically. And that impacts real people. Of course, a rise in the price of gas is nothing compared to the death and destruction that’s happening to Iranians across the Middle East, but it’s a real price that, again, is being borne because of the way that fossil fuels are so easily manipulated and so easily used as bludgeons of war and are, you know, the chosen tool of autocrats everywhere.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Antonia, war itself, in terms of this — the long-term view of humanity’s efforts to reduce the planet’s reliance on fossil fuels, every time one of these war mobilizations occurs, especially by the United States — all these ships sent to a region, all these planes moved and constantly attacking, the need to replenish ammunition supplies — what does this say in terms of the ability to control or to reduce the climate catastrophe we face?

ANTONIA JUHASZ: Yeah, of course. There’s an enormous climate toll just of the functioning of militaries in their regular operations. And, of course, as you say, you know, this mass mobilization causes significant use of fossil fuels and release of climate-destroying pollution. And, you know, we saw that quite visually on display again with these attacks by the Israelis, backed by the Americans, of the oil depots in Tehran, releasing those toxic clouds of smoke. People in Iran reported day turning to night because the clouds were so thick, and then, as I said, the rain then pouring through those clouds, bringing the acid, toxic rain. Those are also climate-destroying chemicals being released into the air, and significantly more intensely when it’s burned.

As we all know, the Trump administration has worked aggressively to eliminate as much as possible the tools that have been put in place over decades to combat the worsening climate crisis, and, of course, to remove the tools for renewable energy. The Big Beautiful Bill, as it’s known, solidified a lot of that work by the Trump administration and by the fossil fuel industry to remove regulations and legal tools that have been used to reduce their pollution, both their immediate human health-causing pollution and also their climate-causing pollution.

So, members of the Trump administration are repeating almost word for word, actually, justifications that were used, explanations that were used by the first Bush in the first Iraq War, H.W. Bush, and also by the second Bush administration, where they stated, “One of the things we’re trying to do is remove the power that control over fossil fuels gives our enemies.” And the Trump administration is saying the same thing. Well, that power, that ability to abuse power from fossil fuels, is also being wielded by the Trump administration. Trump continually reiterates, you know, “Now the United States produces enough oil and gas that we don’t have to worry about changes in supply coming from around the world.” So, our production of fossil fuels is a power that we have, but that power is just as weak as it was in the ’70s, when the United States was more reliant on imports and the Israeli — Arab-Israeli War and the nationalizations of oil in Iran caused great harm in the United States, including lines for gasoline.

Well, now we don’t have to worry necessarily about supply, although I will say that ExxonMobil has just shipped a significant amount of refined gasoline from the U.S. Gulf Coast to Australia, because they have a contract with the Australians and they can’t get their product out of the Middle East to Australia, so they’re shipping it from the United States to Australia. So, if we see more of that, we could see issues related to supply. But even if we have that supply, we’re still reliant on a global price of oil that impacts the price of gasoline and could have the same effect. If people are priced out of being able to purchase gasoline or home heating, then it’s the same effect of an actual reduction and reliance on supply.

So, that power gets wielded primarily against people who are the weakest, you know, in society, but also against governments that think it’s going to be a tool that’s going to strengthen them, but can also expose a tremendous weakness. And then, of course, the costs of a worsening climate are borne by absolutely everybody.

AMY GOODMAN: Antonia Juhasz, we want to thank you so much for being with us, independent investigative journalist, regular Rolling Stone politics reporter, author of several books, including The Bush Agenda and The Tyranny of Oil. To see Part 1 of our discussion with Antonia, go to democracynow.org. I’m Amy Goodman, with Juan González. Thanks for joining us.