The Oil Drum | DrumBeat: September 28, 2006

302 comments on DrumBeat: September 28, 2006

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Dryki on September 28, 2006 - 2:29pm

Is my memory right that Reagan is credited with using oil prices to destabilize and ultimately crash the Soviet Union? Beyond that, isn't it part of what governments are supposed to do - to maintain market structures. Keeping the price of energy down, whether with the 7th Fleet or subsidies, is government action. It strikes me as meaningless to say that a government does not influence prices. Of course it does. But it's not going to happen at RR's level - the Saudi princes, do they take GWB's phone calls - of course they do. I'd not even be surprised if God doesn't tell him where to tell them to drill and find new reserves.

cfm in Gray, ME

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GROK on September 29, 2006 - 1:03pm

Ronnie RayGun's <politically manipulated< the world oil market by having a secret deal with the swing producer, SA, to pump oil like mad to drive down world oil prices. Prices plumetted. The USSR was deprived of huge cash inflows that had been coming in from it's oil. Within 5 years they, the USSR and it's empire, started to collapse. The SA"s got the high tech fighter planes, communication, promises of defense if the kingdom was challenged. They called that chip in after the invasion of kuwait by So-Damn-Insane of Iraq.<p> Of course SA seems to be producing all out so this particular scenario is unlikely. Are there other scenarios? Likely.

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davidsmi on September 29, 2006 - 1:39pm

Don't forget that we were also in an arms race and we kept upping the ante so that they reached a point where they were spending an unsustainable portion of their national budget on the military. I've seen some estimates that it may have reached as much as half of the entire economy of the Soviet Union.

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302 comments on DrumBeat: September 28, 2006

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