There is a sufficient amount of petroleum for countries to significantly reduce their oil purchases from Iran. This is what Donald Trump said in a presidential memorandum on Wednesday. His comment comes as US sanctions are about to take effect on Iranian oil exports.
Sputnik discussed Trump’s claims that there is enough oil to replace Iranian crude with Sami Hamdi, geopolitical risk consultant, and editor-in-chief of the International Interest.
I think one of the biggest issues is that even if there is some sort of oil that can be put online in order to bring the prices down, at least steady the prices, this cannot be put up in a day or two, this needs at least six months, maybe a year, and even then it’s very questionable how much oil can actually be flooded into the market.
Not only that, but when you see that there’s antagonism between Saudi Arabia and the Western world, we see Saudi Arabia now trying to weaponize its economy, let’s remember Turki Aldakhil’s article, the head of Al Arabiya channel during the Khashoggi case, he set out a series of measures that Saudi Arabia could take in order to punish the world for the way, that he perceived, is attacking Mohammed bin Salman over his role, or perceived role, or alleged role, in the Khashoggi case. Part of these threats was weaponizing the oil, making the oil price go higher and higher in order to handcuff the Western governments.
During the OPEC meeting in Algiers, it was well known that Saudi Arabia was the country designated by the US to try to convince everybody to bring the oil prices down, even though it would not be in the interest of these OPEC nations, who are suffering economic crisis and who would prefer a higher oil price in order to have more revenue to tackle some of these economic crises.
I think with regards to the issues, in terms of putting the oil up on the market and in terms of the implications that it would particularly have, the global economies are looking at an economic crisis now, and I think Donald Trump himself may feel betrayed or may have felt that he was sold false promises before he announced that he would withdraw from the Iran deal.
