Surely the US occupation authority knows full well that no oil major will take advantage of this "opportunity"

Worst case hypothesis: a fly-by-night "western" oil company will be used to plunder Iraqui oil to exhaustion while the whole country will be kept "struggling for democracy".

> plunder Iraqui (sic) oil to exhaustion

Are you aware of the timescale involved? As a multiple of, say, the US electoral cycle? Clearly not...