The Center for Naval Analysis has assembled a panel of 13 recently retired 3- and 4-star generals and admirals to look at the strategic realities behind our dependence on foreign oil. They’ve now issued a new report with dire warnings that we must dramatically reduce our dependence on foreign oil for national security reasons. Unfortunately, they don’t go far enough when it comes to pushing solutions.
Time to go off the bottle?
Dependence on foreign oil constitutes a “National vulnerability,” they write, and a disruption in even half of that supply would “impact every aspect of our lives, from food distribution and what (or if) we eat.” They argue that we need to “view this issue with a sense of genuine urgency and find the time to act.” The key, they point out, is the transportation system, which relies almost exclusively on gasoline, diesel, and jet aviation fuel. All three, of course, come from oil.
We don’t need to end our dependence on foreign oil entirely, of course. If we simply used 30 percent less foreign oil, “our economy would have enough resilience to sustain the effects of a complete shutdown of the Strait of Hormuz [the passage way to the Persian Gulf] or any other major shipping choke point, with little effect.”
How do we get there? The report mentions the need to focus on developing alternatives to oil without acknowledging that biofuels, etc. are not at all cost effective at this point. And unfortunately, the report has little to say about the development of new oil and natural gas reserves in the United States. Still, the report helps put the energy challenge into a national security context. You can read the full report here.
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