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If anyone still harbored any doubts that there is an urgent need to resolve the Middle East crisis one needs only look at the events that unfolded two weeks ago off the coast of Gaza when Israeli commandos stormed a Turkish relief vessel heading for the besieged Palestinian territory.

The end result of that operation, one which turned out to be a monumental public relations fiasco for Israel, was that it raised the level of animosity between Israel and Turkey, a level which was already dipping well into the red zone - pushing it another notch deeper into the danger zone.

One must not forget that Turkey is a full-fledged member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and that further schism between the Jewish state and a NATO country could have serious implications on the Alliance.

The North Atlantic treaty stipulates very clearly that an attack against one member of the Alliance is equal to an attack on all members. It is this unshakable tenet that has kept Western Europe - and Turkey - safe during the Cold War, acting as a strong deterrence and a reminder to the Warsaw Pact countries that any act of aggression against any member state would be regarded as an act of aggression against the entire Alliance. In essence NATO offered all its members the unwavering support military and political support of the United States of America.

So what would be the consequences in the unfortunate event that Israel found itself in an armed confrontation with Turkey? In which directions would the loyalty of the United States likely to turn? Will the United States respond to the obligations of the NATO charter, one which Washington was instrumental in establishing and rush to defend a country engaged in a military confrontation with a country which every administration has described as America's staunchest ally in the region, or would the United States risk fracturing NATO and offer assistance to Israel?

This is the dilemma which the Obama administration today could very well face should the situation in the Middle East continue to deteriorate as it has been doing so gradually, ever since the start of this crisis some 60 years ago.

There is an idea that has been around for a long time, at least since the fall of 1973: All that stands between the United States and an abundant energy future is a lack of spending on research and development. It is as though the Knights Templar could find the Holy Grail, if only the Pope would commit just a few more resources to the hunt.

Tens of billions of dollars have been spent on energy research, many of them fruitlessly; and some advances have been made, not the least in the kind of drilling technology that enables us to drill miles below the sea floor in the Gulf of Mexico. (Oops!)

Much else has been researched and not come to market. Wind and solar have taken giant strides, but still require tax breaks and subsidies. Nuclear energy has been researched, even as its deployment has languished. Worldwide hundreds of billions of dollars have been spent on nuclear fusion with nothing to show for it. Other programs have gone by the board, from coal liquefaction to magnetohydrodynamics and ocean-thermal gradients.

The thing about energy research has been that there are many promising lines, but seldom a big success. The big successes, too, have been happenstantial. One such is the aeroderivative turbine; essentially, a fighter-jet engine operating at very high temperatures in steady state on the ground, and burning natural gas instead of kerosene.

On June 10, a new set of highly qualified persuaders came to Washington to exhort the government to increase energy research and development funding from $5 billion to $16 billion a year, and to set up new organizations to channel and manage basic research on energy.

Some of the nation's industrial savants, including Bill Gates late of Microsoft, Jeff Immelt of General Electric and Ursula Burns of Xerox, appeared at a press conference here as members of the American Energy Innovation Council. The chairman of the group, Chad Holliday of Bank of America, told the press: "Up until now energy investments have gotten short shrift."

That is debatable. The problem with energy research has not been that it has been short-changed, but that it has often been directed at the wrong thing; it has often been diluted or spread out for political purposes. Farmers want ethanol research, coal states want carbon management, and the populous eastern states want carbon-free energy--so long as it is not nuclear.

New strategic brinkmanship by the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK); a now-clear determination by the People's Republic of China (PRC) to "more aggressively assert its territorial claims in regional waters"; the near-collapse of Japanese strategic cohesion during 2010; and the increasing signs of US political caution in North-East Asia, all point to a period of strategic concern for the Republic of China, particularly in its maritime responsibilities.

What is of particular concern is that the casus belli -- the legitimate cause and act of war -- thrown down by the DPRK with the March 26, 2010, sinking of the South Korean Po Hang-class corvette, ROKS Cheonan, highlighted the lack of readiness of the ROK, the US, and Japan to be able to handle any major regional crisis. This in turn highlights the extreme vulnerability of the Republic of China, given that the US is showing great reluctance to support the Republic of Korea, and would be even more reluctant to take major steps to support the ROC at this particular time.

As well, the sinking of the Cheonan highlighted the vulnerability of the ROK Navy to even fairly basic submarine attack, emphasizing the concern which all navies -- including the US -- must have for improving anti-submarine warfare (ASW).

As a result, the naval and maritime strategies, doctrine, and options of the Republic of China Navy (ROCN) face a period of great challenge, and the need for serious review. The ROCN has grown to become a highly-professional, technologically-advanced, world-class navy, but it must now function in a new ocean of uncertainty, and in the expectation that it will not have a reliable network of alliances.

The ROC is at a watershed, a pivotal point, in its history, and this transition point has been a long time in coming. Finally, however, both the ROC and its allies must face serious decisions, and, inevitably, the ROC Navy is very much at the heart of this great challenge.

The strategic circumstances surrounding the ROC have changed, even in ways which might not, at first glance appear to have been determined solely by the end of the Cold War in 1990-91. Some of the changes in the Republic of China's overall strategic position were, of course, determined during the Cold War, first by the move in late 1971 by the United Nations to transfer the Chinese membership in the world body, of which Chiang Kai-shek's ROC was a founder in 1945-46, from the ROC, and grant it to the People's Republic of China (PRC).

Next came the initiative in 1972 of US Pres. Richard Nixon to open ties with the People's Republic of China (PRC) as a means of breaking Beijing away from Moscow. Following that, US Pres. Jimmy Carter on January 1, 1979, recognized the People's Republic of China as the sole government of China, and unilaterally moved the US away from its alliance the ROC. Essentially, Carter unilaterally broke a binding alliance structure, a fact which should not go unnoticed by the United States' many other allies around the world. Carter's initiative to abandon the ROC was a move of appeasement toward the PRC, but, in many respects, it could have been seen as inevitable, given the strategic mass of the PRC in comparison with that of the ROC.

Even earlier, as well, the policy of the US John F. Kennedy Administration (1961 to 1963) was to restrain the Republic of China from taking advantage of the disarray at that time on the mainland. The Kennedy Administration policy at the time was to ensure that the ROC did not launch a military assault against the communist forces on the mainland, perhaps starting a major conflict in which the US could become embroiled at a time in which Washington was already engaged in brinkmanship with the USSR.

Middle East oil countries should increase production of heavy oil as oil prices remain higher and improved technology makes it easier, those attending an industry conference in Bahrain were told.

Bahrain's oil minister, Abdulhussain Mirza, told the Heavy Oil World MENA conference that heavy oil reserves in the region were estimated at 1 trillion barrels, or 28% of total world reserves, but historically accounted for little more than 10% of production.

"The vast reserve demonstrates the importance of heavy oil as a future energy source, one that cannot be overlooked and, therefore, companies that position themselves early in the heavy oil business are likely to win the game," Mirza said, according to local news reports.

Bahrain recently signed an agreement with Mubadala Development, an Abu Dhabi state-owned firm, and Occidental Petroleum of the U.S., to boost heavy oil production in the Awali field, one of the oldest in the region and Bahrain's only oilfield.

As the United States edges closer to issuing a fresh round of sanctions against Iran, foreign investors so far unmoved by international pressure will end up doing business with a Revolutionary Guard that makes even local firms nervous, an analyst warns.

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, known as the IRGC or Revolutionary Guard, is a military branch set up after the 1979 revolution to protect the regime and has become more ingrained in the Iranian economy particularly under President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's administration.

In recent weeks, the Revolutionary Guard has declared that it can assume control of the energy industry if Westerners flee under the crush of coming U.S. sanctions. Over the last two-and-a-half decades, the powerful force has gradually moved into sectors like construction, energy and telecommunications, said Alex Vatanka, a scholar at the Washington-based Middle East Institute.

Given Iran's oil and gas reserves and the country's reliance on revenues from crude exports, "it's very logical for the IRGC's economic arm" to seek an even stronger footing in the energy sector as U.S. and United Nations financial penalties against firms operating in Iran pick up steam, Vatanka told OilPrice.com.

The IRGC has the "political muscle to push political contracts" through, but it is questionable whether the group is best-suited to coordinate these efforts on a domestic level, he said. "We know their intentions in the Iranian oil industry, and [local firms are] very often hesitant when they see IRGC involvement," he noted.

Foreign companies would be "equally, if not more hesitant, to deal with the IRGC" because the organization is at the forefront of any U.S. government or U.N. attempt to apply new sanctions, he said.

"So it really just raises the stakes for any foreign participant in these projects," Vatanka said.

The overriding challenge is whether a firm, domestic or otherwise, can ever have a "fair struggle with the IRGC, if I can put it this way," Vatanka explained. "They are politically so powerful that they can nullify, change terms and take the credit for anything that's done positively and claim it to be their own. And if you stand up to them, they would basically label you against the Islamic Revolution."

He said questions also linger about the kind of revenue-sharing the Revolutionary Guard would offer international companies.

And whether the Revolutionary Guard can even fulfill Iran's "very big intentions" in the gas sector remains to be seen, Vatanka said, noting "there's no evidence to suggest that they have, in any way or shape, invested technologically in energy. If it was about missiles, it would have been a totally different matter."

In March, Iranian Oil Minister Masoud Mirkazemi said the Islamic regime is seeking a $200 billion investment in oil, gas and refinery industries over the next five years.

Iran has only waning pools of oil but may become a "huge provider of natural gas on a global scale," Vatanka said.

Iran holds the world's third-largest proven oil reserves and the world's second-largest natural gas reserves, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. This includes the South Pars gas field, the "largest natural gas deposit in the world, which Iran shares with the state of Qatar," added Vatanka.

The Iranian oil industry has traditionally been aligned with "pragmatic conservatives," he added, but there has been a shift toward "principalists, the people around Ahmadinejad," particularly in "this pivotal" sector of the Iranian economy.

In an exclusive for Oilprice.com, the Wayne Madsen Report (WMR) has learned from Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers sources that U.S. Navy submarines deployed to the Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic Ocean off the Florida coast have detected what amounts to a frozen oil blob from the oil geyser at the destroyed Deep Horizon off-shore oil rig south of Louisiana. The Navy submarines have trained video cameras on the moving blob, which remains frozen at depths of between 3,000 to 4,000 feet. Because the oil blob is heavier than water, it remains frozen at current depths.

FEMA and Corps of Engineers employees are upset that the White House and the Pentagon remain tight-lipped and in cover-up mode about the images of the massive and fast-moving frozen coagulated oil blob that is being imaged by Navy submarines that are tracking its movement. The sources point out that BP and the White House conspired to withhold videos from BP-contracted submersibles that showed the oil geyser that was spewing oil from the chasm underneath the datum of the Deep Horizon at rates far exceeding originally reported amounts. We have learned that it was largely WMR's scoop on the existence of the BP videos that forced the company and its White House patrons to finally agree to the release of the video footage.

The White House is officially stating that it does not know where the officially reported 10 miles long by 3 miles wide "plume" is actually located or in what direction it is heading. However, WMR's sources claim the White House is getting real-time reports from Navy submarines as to the blob's location. We have learned that the blob is transiting the Florida Straits between Florida and Cuba, propelled by the Gulf's Loop Current, and that parts of it that is encountering warmer waters are breaking off into smaller tar balls that are now washing ashore in the environmentally-sensitive Florida Keys and Dry Tortugas.

Corps of Engineers and FEMA officials are also livid about the cover-up of the extent of the oil damage being promulgated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and its marine research vessel in the Gulf, RV Pelican. NOAA stands accused by the aforementioned agencies of acting as a virtual public relations arm for BP. NOAA is a component of the business-oriented Department of Commerce.

Similarly, the Coast Guard, which takes its orders from the cover-up operatives at the Homeland Security Department, is denying the tar balls washing up on the Florida Keys are from the oil mass. WMR has been told the Coast Guard is lying in order to protect the Obama administration, which has thoroughly failed in its response to the disaster. The White House's only concern is trying to limit political damage to its image in the electorally-important state of Florida while the Pentagon has spent between $25 and $30 billion on oil spill operations in the Gulf and the Atlantic to date.

While the oil spill from a sunken drilling rig in the Gulf of Mexico threatens to become an environmental disaster, plans are proceeding for opening up new drilling territories in the iceberg-infested waters off Greenland.

The island, an autonomous territory under Danish sovereignty, this week conducted an auction for 14 blocks in Baffin Bay, off the northwest coast of Greenland near Canadian territorial waters. Results will be announced in August.

In the meantime, Cairn Energy will this summer begin drilling off Disko Island in Baffin Bay on the basis of leases awarded in earlier auctions. Exxon Mobil and Chevron also hold existing leases, while Royal Dutch Shell and Norway's Statoil were among the bidders in this week's auctions.

The U.S. Geological Survey has estimated that some 50 billion barrels of oil may be found offshore Greenland, where ice covers four-fifths of the surface territory for a good part of the year. Some in Greenland, which has a population of only 57,000, hope that oil will be the ticket to independence from Denmark, which has controlled the island since the 18th century.

KYRGYZSTAN TODAY

Kyrgyzstan's interim government, having toppled the corrupt regime of former President Kurmanbek Bakiyev in Bishkek on April 7-8, faces many daunting challenges, from the economy gutted by Bakiyev's insiders to reestablishing security in the country. It is in the interest of the three major outside players there - Russia, U.S. and China, to assist Otumbayeva's administration, but it seems problematic at this point whether they will be able to lay aside their traditional rivalry to do so. Such being the case, it would seem that Kyrgyzstan faces a long, hot summer.

The new Kyrgyz provisional government is caught between a rock and a hard place, trying to gain international legitimacy while maintaining its domestic popularity. Bakiyev left behind a state bankrupted by massive corruption and crime, which generated deep public resentment. For outside powers, the suddenness of the collapse of the Bakiyev administration collapsed is a stark reminder, particularly for Washington, of the inherent risks of focusing obsessively on Western security concerns in framing policy towards the region while ignoring the democratic values proclaimed at each and every opportunity.

LAW AND ORDER

The first priority of the interim administration was to re-establish law and order against wide-scale looting and anarchy. On 8 April, the first day of its ascension to power, the interim government's Interior Minister Bolot Sherniyazov said on state television, "Today I have permitted weapons to be used against looters. I appeal to people of the capital to join people's militias and rise to the defense of the property of the city, companies and people." The harsh measure apparently worked, as no deaths were reported.

After noting that on 7 April the Kyrgyz Armed Forces "took the side of the people and started to tackle their tasks obeying demands and orders issued by the interim government," Acting Defense Minister Ismail Isakov stated that "army units and divisions have been put on high alert. Apart from fulfilling their own duties, they are playing a huge role in the Interior Ministry's efforts to bring order back both to Bishkek, Osh and Jalal-Abad." Seeking to identify the rioters and looters on 30 April interim government First Deputy Prime Minister Almazbek Atambayev said that the government was prepared to pay a bounty to those assist authorities to catch suspects facing criminal charges in connection with the 6-8 April events.

As if to underline the fragility of the situation however, the same day that Atambayev spoke 300 Kyrgyz police officers visited the Interior Ministry to demand a meeting with the ministry administration, with one demonstrator noting, "We demand the payments that were promised to us by the interim government to compensate for the physical damage done to the police officers hurt in the 6-8 April events."

A NEW CONSTITUTION

During a 29 April interview with Interfax Otumbayeva laid out her administration's priorities. Topping the list is the drawing up of a new constitution, to be submitted to the electorate in a national referendum on 27 June. The Kyrgyz electoral commission plans to spend almost $3 million on the referendum. The new draft constitution envisages transforming Kyrgyzstan into a parliamentary republic with a multi-party democratic system. Interim government deputy Prime Minister Omurbek Tekebayev said that the new document substantially reduces presidential powers and that the Prime Minister will be the key figure in the new political system.

A lack of formal recognition is hobbling the new administration, as it precludes approaching major international investment agencies for assistance. Otumbayeva said, "Our power is still not legitimate. Not legitimate in the sense that we have still not covered the entire path necessary for a law-governed state that would permit us to declare our government a people's government, and our state -- democratic. Formally we are still members of all the international organizations: the United Nations, the Commonwealth of Independent States, the Collective Security Treaty Organization, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and so forth. But the absence of legal formalities prevents us from exercising all the rights that membership in these organizations offers. For example, international financial institutions, to put it politely, are in no hurry to issue the credits that we need so much. Unfortunately that is the case."

HOLDING THE BAKIYEV REGIME ACCOUNTABLE

The interim government is moving swiftly to document the political crimes and economic corruption of the previous administration. On 28 April the General Prosecutor's Office issued a list of those to be charged with criminal responsibility for the 7 April shootings in Bishkek's Ala-Too central square, which killed 85 and wounded more than 1,000. The list includes Bakiyev's brother Zhanybek, former head of the State Security Service (SSS); Marat Bakiyev, the President's eldest son and former State National Security Service (SNSS) Assistant Chairman; former deputy SSS chief Daniyar Dunganov; former SSS First Deputy Chairman Nurlan Temirbaev; Bakiyev's cousin, former Minister of Defense Baktybek Kalyev, former SNSS Chairman Murat Sutalinov; former Prime Minister Daniyar Usenov; Bakiyev's former advisor on defense and security Elmurza Satybaldiev and former Minister of Internal Affairs Moldomusa Kongantiev. Dunganov, Kalyev and Kongantiev are in the SNSS pre-trial detention center and Satybaldiev is cooperating with authorities. Zhanybek and Marat Bakiyev, Temirbayev, Sutalinov and Usenov have all been charged in absentia and the government is seeking them.

We have been informed by sources in the US Army Corps of Engineers, Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), and Florida Department of Environmental Protection that the Obama White House and British Petroleum (BP), which pumped $71,000 into Barack Obama's 2008 presidential campaign -- more than John McCain or Hillary Clinton, are covering up the magnitude of the volcanic-level oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico and working together to limit BP's liability for damage caused by what can be called a "mega-disaster."

Obama and his senior White House staff, as well as Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, are working with BP's chief executive officer Tony Hayward on legislation that would raise the cap on liability for damage claims from those affected by the oil disaster from $75 million to $10 billion. However, WMR's federal and Gulf state sources are reporting the disaster has the real potential cost of at least $1 trillion. Critics of the deal being worked out between Obama and Hayward point out that $10 billion is a mere drop in the bucket for a trillion dollar disaster but also note that BP, if its assets were nationalized, could fetch almost a trillion dollars for compensation purposes. There is talk in some government circles, including FEMA, of the need to nationalize BP in order to compensate those who will ultimately be affected by the worst oil disaster in the history of the world.

Plans by BP to sink a 4-story containment dome over the oil gushing from a gaping chasm one kilometer below the surface of the Gulf, where the oil rig Deepwater Horizon exploded and killed 11 workers on April 20, and reports that one of the leaks has been contained is pure public relations disinformation designed to avoid panic and demands for greater action by the Obama administration, according to FEMA and Corps of Engineers sources. Sources within these agencies say the White House has been resisting releasing any "damaging information" about the oil disaster. They add that if the ocean oil geyser is not stopped within 90 days, there will be irreversible damage to the marine eco-systems of the Gulf of Mexico, north Atlantic Ocean, and beyond. At best, some Corps of Engineers experts say it could take two years to cement the chasm on the floor of the Gulf.

Only after the magnitude of the disaster became evident did Obama order Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano to declare the oil disaster a "national security issue." Although the Coast Guard and FEMA are part of her department, Napolitano's actual reasoning for invoking national security was to block media coverage of the immensity of the disaster that is unfolding for the Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic Ocean and their coastlines.

From the Corps of Engineers, FEMA, the Environmental Protection Agency, Coast Guard, and Gulf state environmental protection agencies, the message is the same: "we've never dealt with anything like this before."

The Obama administration also conspired with BP to fudge the extent of the oil leak, according to our federal and state sources. After the oil rig exploded and sank, the government stated that 42,000 gallons per day was gushing from the seabed chasm. Five days later, the federal government upped the leakage to 210,000 gallons a day.

However, WMR has been informed that submersibles that are monitoring the escaping oil from the Gulf seabed are viewing television pictures of what is a "volcanic-like" eruption of oil. Moreover, when the Army Corps of Engineers first attempted to obtain NASA imagery of the Gulf oil slick -- which is larger than that being reported by the media -- it was turned down. However, National Geographic managed to obtain the satellite imagery shots of the extent of the disaster and posted them on their web site.

The oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico from a collapsed offshore drilling rig could affect White House plans to extend offshore drilling, press secretary Robert Gibbs acknowledged as the oil slick threatened onshore sites from the Louisiana wetlands to the Sarasota beaches and disrupted fishing and energy industries.

As oil giant BP mobilized resources to try to stop the leak and to mitigate its damage, President Barack Obama called the spill "potentially unprecedented environmental disaster."

However, some critics charged that the administration's slow response to the rig accident and Obama's decision to take part in the humorous proceedings at the White House Correspondents Dinner as the disaster unfolded has been as bad as the Bush administration's sluggish response to Hurricane Katrina and the subsequent flooding of New Orleans.

As Syria aggressively courts foreign investors to rescue its dwindling oil and gas sector, government corruption and problems settling disputes remain sticking points for some interested international players. But experts are divided over how contentious these obstacles truly are.

Foreign oil firms face "some bureaucracy" in the petroleum industry but the situation has improved quite a bit, said Hisham Yazigi, a 30-year veteran of the Syrian oil industry. Yazigi argued there is no "major hindrance for investment" since Syria's national petroleum company now has the expertise to deal with international capital.

In the past, Syria has "honored" all of its financial obligations to oil-producing firms, "otherwise, Royal Dutch Shell and Total, believe me, they won't be there," said Yazigi, now retired. He was the former deputy general manager of Royal Dutch Shell and the general manager of Petro-Canada in Syria. He added that he is not a spokesman for the government.

Yet Andrew Tabler, a Syria expert at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, argued the country's legal structures must be reformed. The government must fix problems associated with resolving disputes and a court system that "doesn't work very well," he said. While Syria is drawing more foreign investment than in previous years - mainly from Persian Gulf countries -- "it's still among the lowest in the Middle East" due to corruption, he said.

Earlier this month, the Syrian government announced that oil production will likely rise this year following 13 years of steady decline. Under the plan, eight new blocks will be opened for exploration, development and production, with international companies invited to bid for production-sharing agreements before a September 15 deadline.

Oil production in Syria currently stands at around 383,000 barrels per day, below the all-time high of 583,000 barrels per day reached in 1993, according to an April report issued by the Oxford Business Group.

The Damascus government is now more assertively marketing its oil fields because it's "running out of oil and that's how the regime funds itself," Tabler told OilPrice.com. "So it's a matter of survival for them, for the regime, that is."

Syria has also sought to restore previous contracts with the northern Iraqi government in an effort to be a transport hub moving product to ports and terminals in Turkey, noted Molly Williamson, a consultant and scholar at the Middle East Institute in Washington focused on Middle East and energy issues.

The promise of green energy has intrigued the Middle East, where concern about future reserves runs deep, but Saudi Arabia's recent plan for a multibillion-dollar investment in traditional oil projects underscores lingering concern about betting on renewables.

Riyadh plans to spend $170 billon over the next five years on energy and oil refining efforts; the country's state-owned oil company, Saudi Aramco, will bankroll little more than half this endeavor, according to the Saudi Gazette. The energy giant called it unrealistic for Saudi Arabia to plow into alternative energy sources when the No. 1 cash crop of oil has built its wealth, the report states.

"I don't think that's surprising," said Eurasia Group energy analyst Will Pearson of the guarded approach, adding that Saudi Aramco has long been hesitant given the state's status as the world's leading oil producer.

Without a "huge, revolution[ary], game-changing technology," an abrupt shift in the "fuel mix" is doubtful, said Pearson, who puts more stock in green technologies gradually scooping up market share. Given the abundance of other resources, the Saudi government is more likely to make such nascent energy sources a smaller part of its overall budget, he argued.

Despite trepidation, the Gulf country has been drawn to the "relatively unproven technologies" of biofuels and electric vehicles even though, for the most part, "people are going to be dependent on the oil sector for transport," Pearson told OilPrice.com. Given its access to sunlight, Saudi Arabia has great potential to become a major solar player but has not made "too much concrete progress so far," he said.

Saudi Arabia is also taking aim at clean water. In a nation where water is scarce, Riyadh plans to build a desalination plant to deliver cheaper, cleaner water.

Yet growing pains are bound to accompany this push away from traditional oil and gas, analysts warn.

"You have to come up with the right regulatory regime," Pearson said. While some companies are already doing "quite well" in this young energy category, traditional fossil fuels are still a less costly option, he said. An international carbon price would help but "I don't think there's been a lot of progress on that," he said.

The bottom line is that the new industry has to beat traditional hydrocarbons, said Molly Williamson, a consultant and scholar at the Middle East Institute in Washington focused on Middle East and energy issues. "If you develop an alternative energy source that is effective, that is available, that is reliable, but it is the equivalent of $12 a gallon for gasoline, it's not going to make it," she charged.

Though it's uncertain how much these new technologies will cost, "what we know is it isn't cheap," Williamson told OilPrice.com. "You're looking at a long-term projection of unknowable cost. The people that can do that now are the people who can afford it." This includes not just Gulf nations, she explained, but countries with hard-currency reserves.

On April 7, 2010 the President of Kyrgyzstan Kurmanbek Bakiyev fled the capital city of Bishkek that was under a state of emergency after antigovernment protesters started clashing with security forces following incidents that started in the Northern city of Talas, close to the Kazakhstan border. By the end of April 7, Radio Free Europe Radio Liberty was reporting 40 dead and 400 wounded, numbers that have over doubled since. In this context, one can only wonder which country in Central Asia could be next, if any, and which Central Asian leader could find himself out of a job and possibly on an airplane.

The ongoing events are monitored very closely as Central Asia is a very sensitive region: it is rich in natural resources, notably energy (oil & gas and a large hydropower potential), and as Kyrgyzstan hosts two military based on its soil - one U.S., the Manas Air Base (now called the "Transit Center at Manas International Airport"), and one Russian, the Kant Air Base. The U.S. base plays a critical role with operations in nearby Afghanistan and will stay in place according to Kyrgyz interim leader Roza Otunbayeva.

Manas constitutes a financial bonanza of tens of millions of dollars in addition to all the jobs created around the daily operations of the base. In 2009 the U.S. and Kyrgyzstan signed an agreement, renewing the right for the U.S. to use the facilities for $60 million/year, which is over three times more than what was paid before.

These events are also closely monitored inside the presidential palaces of neighboring Central Asia countries as this revolution, like some that took place in Eastern Europe and Eurasia since 2000, did not take much to topple the government.

All Central Asian leaders where elected through elections that the OSCE considers as failing at different levels to meet international democratic standards which prevents the development of a pluralistic political system. In this context, there is no real way for the opposition, or the people espousing the view of the opposition, to express utter dissatisfaction other than by demonstrating in the streets.

Protesters can be shot at and quieted temporarily like in Andijan, Uzbekistan in May 2005, or they can succeed in ousting their government like in Kyrgyzstan. The fact that the people can go down in the streets to voice their discontent with their government is a dire reminder that a silent or silenced public opinion is not one without an opinion and a that a little spark can launch an entire sequence of events, even more so as there are many worms in the Central Asian apple, fruit which is supposed to have originated from Central Asia.

Why Kyrgyzstan?

The events in Kyrgyzstan do not come as a surprise, except for those who wondered why news about the return of Tiger Woods was occasionally being bypassed in prime time news by events in a mostly unknown country. What was a true surprise is the speed at which events unfolded. They were triggered by an increase in fuel and electricity rates but the spark came in an explosive climate of latent and massive dissatisfaction with the regime in place.

This is not the first time Kyrgyzstan experiences a spring-cleaning revolution. Almost exactly five years ago, the 2005 Tulip Revolution ousted then President Askar Akayev under allegations of widespread corruption and cronyism. Bakiyev fell for the same ills, the resentment being exacerbated by an authoritarian drift that led to the shutting down of independent news media, the arrest of prominent opposition leaders and blatant nepotism with Bakiyev's family securing key positions.

Bakiyev's brother Marat was serving as ambassador in Germany but will be recalled, while his brother Adyl was an advisor to the Kyrgyz ambassador in China. In October 2009, Bakiyev appointed his son Maksim to head the newly created Central Agency for Development, Investment, and Innovation (CADII) while another son worked for the National Security Service.

The Scorecard of Central Asia

Some leaders are more enlightened than others in understanding that the distribution of wealth cannot just benefit a small minority: enabling their population to become more prosperous like in Kazakhstan allows everyone to see opportunities and not feel excluded. Central Asia is burdened by a ruling class and elite with vested interests, creating a natural brake to any efforts to change the way things are done.

Change can unleash unforeseen events and the fear of its consequences explains the efforts made to maintain the status quo. Allowing too much democracy and dissenting voices to be heard is equivalent to opening a Pandora box: too much transparency coupled with greater accountability leads to questions that challenges and weakens the legitimacy of the governments in place.

Looking at the levels of freedom and corruption and at the ease of doing business are good indicators of where Central Asian countries stand, even if some ratings are perception indexes. These reports can convey a bleak picture of Central Asian countries and are partially unfair as each country has some potential and there are many Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, Tajiks, Turkmens and Uzbeks that strive to abide by high standards and who can be trustworthy partners. Changing a system is not easy.

Freedom

Freedom House, an independent watchdog organization that supports the expansion of freedom around the world, will release at the end of Spring 2010 its Freedom in the World 2010 Report but preliminary findings should that "virtually all of the countries in the non-Baltic former Soviet Union continued to pursue a repressive course, including Russia, Kazakhstan, and Kyrgyzstan, which was downgraded from Partly Free to Not Free" further stating that "of the 47 countries ranked Not Free, nine countries and one territory received the survey's lowest possible rating for both political rights and civil liberties: Burma, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Libya, North Korea, Somalia, Sudan, Tibet, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan."

Corruption

On November 17, 2009 Transparency International, a civil society organization fighting corruption worldwide, released its 2009 annual Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) which measures the perceived level of public-sector corruption in 180 countries and territories around the world. There were no major changes from the 2008 CPI, with most of the Central Asian countries ranking towards the bottom of the totem pole. The best performing country, Kazakhstan, ranked # 120 compared to #145 in 2008; followed by Tajikistan at #158 compared to #151; Kyrgyzstan at #162 compared to #166; Turkmenistan at #168 compared to #166; and Uzbekistan #174 compared to #166.

Ease of Doing Business

In the 2010 World Bank's Doing Business Report which ranks 183 countries on their ease of doing business, the ranking is also mostly disappointing: Uzbekistan ranks #150 compared to # 145 the year before; Tajikistan makes a commendable leap forward from # 164 to # 152 but has still a long way to go; Kazakhstan remains stable at # 63 compared to # 64 in the 2009 Report; Kyrgyzstan is mentioned at one of the top 10 reformers, ranking # 41 compared to # 80 just a year before; and Turkmenistan is not even mentioned.

Each country has its own reality

So, in this context, could another regime fall like in Kyrgyzstan? One thing to understand is that uprisings can happen naturally or be planned. If a revolution was to be fomented or supported from within the system, anyone involved would have to be sure to be able to overthrow the existing government: failure would be met with dire consequences and even exile may not be enough to stay alive. The chance of seeing such uprisings, initiated from within the apparatus, or from criminal groups, is limited.

Uprisings that happen naturally (if we can say so) and unfold like in Kyrgyzstan are possible but each Central Asian country has a different local reality that needs to be looked at closely, and special attention should be given to the points of view of the citizen who don't necessarily want to turn their life upside down for change that may not bring a better life.

We have, in the past year, entered an entirely new dynamic in Eastern Mediterranean and South-East European strategic affairs. We are in a period and a region in which Russia, not the West, is taking the key initiatives and has much of the advantage. This is particularly significant given that Russian policymaking receives scant attention in US and other Western media, and remains as opaque to Western analysts as it was during the Cold War era when Russia was veiled by an Iron Curtain. At least during the Cold War, the West threw its best intellects into attempting to understand Russia and the Soviet Union.

Russia's recent major thrusts -- for a variety of historical, economic, and security reasons -- have been to dominate the Caucasus and Northern Tier, the Greater Black Sea Basin, and Central Asia. This has been evidenced particularly by Russia's successful initiatives to build strategic relations with Turkey and Iran. The profound depth of this transformation cannot be under-estimated, and, along with the stability of the European Union itself (which is inextricably bound to Russia for its energy), vitally affects the fate of South-Eastern Europe and the Eastern Mediterranean states.

At the same time that this tectonic shift is occurring, US policy toward the Eastern Mediterranean and adjacent lands has, for the past 60 years -- perhaps longer -- been heavily based on wishful romanticism, ignorance, and an overwhelming and narrow preoccupation with the containment of the now-defunct Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. US policy toward the region continues to be based around a premise of a Soviet threat which no longer exists, but which the US -- and for that matter, some in Britain -- cannot bring themselves to retire or revise. And by continuing to treat post-Cold War Russia as though it was still the Soviet Union, the US and UK have to a large degree caused Moscow to act in manners contrary to Western interests.

The US-led NATO caused alarm in post-Soviet Russia by moving to bring former Soviet bloc states into NATO, by treating Islamist terrorism in the Caucasus as something Moscow deserved while 9/11 was something the US did not deserve, and so on. The poorly-handled attempted deployments of missile defense systems by the US into Poland, the Czech Republic, and Azerbaijan further alienated Moscow, quite apart from the gratuitous refusal to allow Russia to become part of the West; US tacit or active support for Georgian attempts to seize control of Abkhazia and South Ossetia; the US blatant interference in the elections in Georgia, Ukraine, and the Kyrgyz Republic and in creating Kosovo as a supposedly independent state -- with attempts to do the same elsewhere -- were all further examples of perceived post-Cold War US hostility toward Moscow. There are many other examples of events which forced Moscow to return to a lonely course of action in pursuit of securing its own interests in a hostile world.

The high cost to the West of pursuing such a mumpsimus policy -- that is, policy which persists even though the underlying premises have clearly been proven to be erroneous -- is becoming evident as Western economies and Western strategic influence decline. The Western tide is retreating, showing the ground truths, once covered by the sea of wealth and power which had allowed the Cold War fixations to remain unchallenged.

We still see the persistence of Washington-based myths about the Eastern Mediterranean, South-Eastern Europe, and the Caucasus, and those myths have become more expensive to sustain, and more in the nature of comic opera. The result has been that, while the USSR and the threat of ideologically-based East-West confrontation has passed, Russia has been forced to respond by considering the reality that the West would not let the Cold War end. As a result, Russia has had to resume fending for itself in the regions of its immediate neighborhoods, including South-Eastern Europe, the Caucasus and Asia Minor, and the Levant and the associated Eastern Mediterranean. It was forced into accommodations with the People's Republic of China (PRC) over Central Asia, and while some of these were sensible for global trade as a whole, the resulting Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) has emerged in part as a mutual security regime which reinforces the growth of Chinese strategic power as well as the resurrection of some Russian regional hegemonic influence.

The declining strategic influence of the United States -- again, something not recognized in Washington, given that it remains lost in the mists of its own self-importance -- means that the new tensions of South-Eastern Europe, Asia Minor, the Caucasus, and the Eastern Mediterranean have emerged full-blown and there seems little that Washington is prepared to do to accommodate this. The reality is that Western policy toward Turkey and Russia still centers around approaches decided by the British Foreign Office during and after the Crimean campaign which ended in 1856.

At the same time, of course, the French historian, Alexis de Toqueville, also forecast in the first half of the 19th Century that Russia and the United States, as continental powers, must inevitably be rivals and must compete over Europe. So these ancient views of Russia as the perpetual enemy, and Turkey as the inevitable counterbalance to Russia, have shaped British and American strategic sentiments, just as romantic orientalism has shaped Western views of the Middle East and Asia. [Indeed, I would not say that the West should lose sight of the potential for Turkey to be used as a counter-balance to Russia, but this should not be an unthinking, perpetual, and universal policy, when, as in World War I and II, Turkey was not, in fact, always an ally of the West (or an asset to it), whereas Russia and the USSR were, at key times, allies of the West.]

A perspective of the context of actual Western geopolitical and economic interests, and the realities of history, have rarely played a dominant rôle in US or British strategic policymaking since the end of the Cold War. At the same time, Russian strategic policymaking has reverted to the age-old geopolitical and geoeconomic principles which have dominated Russian security for 500 years.

A year ago, however, it became conclusively apparent that Russia had, as a result of Moscow's initiatives and because of the changing global circumstance, become the power with dominance over Turkey. This was the result of trends which had been some time in the making, but my early reporting in March 2009 of that phenomenon -- and the implications it had for Western policy and for Greece and Turkey -- drew no response from the media or from policy officials. To its great credit, the American Hellenic Institute (AHI) took a gamble and published a report of mine in 2009 on the new Russo-Turkish strategic relationship. Only now, a year later, is the West reluctantly coming to grips with the fact that Russia is far more persuasive than the West with regard to Turkey, because Turkey is absolutely strategically in thrall to Moscow.

The same situation applies to Iran. And, indeed, we need to understand that it is impossible to formulate viable policy in Washington with regard to Turkey unless the broad context of Turkish, Russian, Iranian, Chinese, Caucasus, Black Sea, and other dynamics are taken into account. Western analysis is, in fact, guilty of stovepiping and geographic specialization, ignoring the historical and spatial context which drives reality.