Monday, October 13, 1924. Mecca captured.

Wahhabi forces took Mecca.

The Boston Bruins were added to the formerly solely Canadian National Hockey League.

Last edition:

Saturday, October 11, 1924.

Labels: 1920s, 1924, Art, The Press

Monday, October 6, 1924. Ali of Hejaz becomes king.

Ali of Hejaz was proclaimed the King of Hejaz.  His predecessor King Hussein bin Ali had fled from Mecca to Jeddah to avoid the conquest of Nejd by the Sultanate of Nejd, led by Ibn Saud.

Atypically for an Arab monarch/chieftain, he was married just once.  He had five children.  He died in Baghdad in the Hashemite Kingdom of Iraq in 1935.

Radio Marconi, the first public radio station in Italy, began broadcasting.

Last edition:

Friday, October 3, 1924. Insulting Kennesaw Mountain.

Labels: 1920s, 1924, baseball, British Empire, Egypt, Personalities, Scandal, United Kingdom

Wednesday. September 3, 1924. The massacre at Taif.

Troops of the Ikhwan sent by Sultan Ibn Saud of Nejd killed no less than 300 civilians in the city of Taif.

Last edition:

Tuesday, September 2, 1924. Glazman kills himself.

Labels: 1920s, 1924, Communism, Communists, Joseph Stalin, Personalities, Russian Civil War, Russian Revolution, Stalin's' Purges, USSR

Friday, August 29, 1924. The start of the Second Saudi-Hashemite War.

The Sultanate of Nejd, led by King Abdulaziz ibn Saud, attacked the Kingdom of Hejaz, ruled by King Hussein bin Ali, British ally during World War One.

Flag of the joint kingdom of The Kingdom of Hejaz and Nejd, which would become Saudi Arabia.

Hejaz contained Mecca and the city of Jeddah.  Citizens of Jejd had been barred from making the pilgrimage to Mecca, bringing on the war, and the thereby the birth of Saudi Arabia., at least as an immediate causa belli.  A more significant one may have been the end of British subsidies to both royal houses, removing restraint on both of them, and in the case of Hejaz, the ability to bribe other Arab principalities.

The Reichstag accepted the London protocol of the Dawes plan.

Last edition:

Thursday, August 28, 1924. The August Uprising.

Labels: 1920s, 1924, actors and actresses, August Uprising, California, California (Los Angeles), Ethnicities, Georgia, USSR

Monday, May 26, 1924. The beginning of the end for Hejaz.

The U.S. Immigration Act of 1924 was signed into law.

Ikhwan fighters.

The Battle of Turubah was fought between the Kingdom of Hejaz and the Sultanate of Nejd.  The defeat of Hajaz by the Saudi forces of Nejd paved the way for modern Saudi Arabia.

Wilhelm Marx resigned as Chancellor of Germany.

Last prior edition:

Sunday, May 25, 1924. Coolidge at Arlington.

Labels: 1920s, 1924, Calvin Coolidge, Greece, Memorial Day

A Palestinian Solution (that nobody is going to do).

In this thread, I suggested a solution to the "Palestinian" problem isn't all that hard:

An uncomfortable truth.*

In reality, I'd partially already proposed it:

The Palestinian Problem and its Wilsonian Solution.

Those threads are pretty complete, but let's just set out the basic facts of the problem.

Part One:

• The Palestinian Mandate's Levantines didn't want any sort of Jewish state or any sort of "two-state solution in 1948".  The neighboring Arab states didn't want one either.
• World War Two made it inevitable that Jews would seek refuge in the region they'd held historically and up until 70.
• The British tried and failed to create a two-state solution, and then washed their hands of the matter and left.
• The Israelis won the 1948 war.
• During the 1948 war, a lot of Levantines left out of fear, rational calculation of danger, or were expelled.
• Just would have invited them back in, but the Israeli's were not in the mood for that, and the Arabs largely weren't either.  That is, having fought for it, the Israeli's decided to keep what they had in every sense, and the Arabs were still dedicated to the proposition of pushing them out.
• That's now over 70 years ago and almost everyone involved in the original drama is dead.

Part Two:

• The Arabs have been happy to support a Palestinian diaspora, partially, but not to invite them into their own countries.
• The Palestinians have been unwilling to come up with a new, permanent plan, that doesn't feature, at a bare minimum, the territory that was at least partially in Mandatory Palestine.
• Gaza and to a lesser extent the West Bank were solutions that Israel was willing to put up with, but not the Levantines, even as they took advantage of it.
• The "Palestinians" have been , to a large extent, living on the Arab and Global dole since Gaza and the West Bank were created as entities subject to self rule. They don't have work, and they don't have much to do, other than to do, what people who have an income, but no work, do. . . . fill in the blanks here.

Okay now for the elements of the solution.

Part One

• The Palestinian Levantines need work and need to be taken off the dole.
• In order to do that, the pipe dream of an independent Palestinian state inside the borders of Mandatory Palestine needs to be given up on, unless Jordan, which is a Bedouin state, wishes to become that entity, and it doesn't.

So, what can be done.  There are two, and only two, possibilities.

Solution Number One.

The Palestinian Levantines can be taken in by the Arab states that have work, which would include the Emirates, Dubai, and Saudi Arabia.*

Yes, that's radical, but if they were taken in, taken off the dole, and got to work, within a generation or two, this problem would be over, and they would be better off.

Solution Number Two.

Create a Palestinian state in the Sinai.

That has obvious geoengineering problems, but the Israelis confronted those inside Mandatory Palestine and the states of the Arabian Peninsula have faced them as well.  It's been proven that you can geoengineer these areas productively.  It has been done.

And in that state, Gaza could remain part of it.

This, of course, would require Egypt to give up Sinai, but frankly, it's not making much use of it anyway.

Footnotes:

*And probably Jordan as well, as the West Bank was part of Transjordan and probably ought just go back to Jordan.

Related threads:

An uncomfortable truth.*

1940s, 1948, 70, 70s, Al Nakba, Arabs, British League of Nations Mandates, Hamas, Israel, Israeli Hamas War, Levant, Ottoman Empire, Palestine, Palestinian Revolution, Roman Empire, The Holocaust

The Palestinian Problem and its Wilsonian Solution.

Arabs, British League of Nations Mandates, Israel, Israeli Hamas War, It was because of World War One, It was because of World War Two, Kuwait, MIddle East, Ottoman Empire, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia

Wednesday, March 5, 1924. An attempted caliphate.

Following the Turkish Assemblies abolishment of the caliphate, Hussein bin Ali, King of the Hejaz and Sharif of Mecca, was proclaimed the Caliph of all Muslims by Muslim leaders in Mesopotamia and Transjordania.  Global Muslim reaction was mostly negative and it didn't take.    This date is somewhat disputed, and it could have taken place a couple of days earlier, or later.

Last prior:

Tuesday, March 4, 1924. Waltzing Matilda.

Wednesday, January 9, 1974. Oil.

OPEC voted to freeze oil prices for three months.  Saudi Arabia had been willing to reduce them, but Algeria, Iraq, and Iran, had not been.

Ronald and Nancy Reagan upon Reagan's 1966 Gubernatorial victory, and one decade away from his first run for the GOP Presidential ticket.

Actor turned politician Ronald Reagan delivered California's State of the State address, noting the oil crisis but asserting it was an opportunity to develop resources, freeing the US from foreign petroleum.

Thursday, November 22, 1973. Oily shifting sands and tides.

Japan, which had not yet come under the Arab oil embargo, dropped its support for Israel and joined the United Nations in calling for a separate Palestinian state.  In doing so, it was seeking to avoid the oil sanction.

Saudi Arabia warned the US that it would reduce oil production by 80% if the US did not stop supporting Israel, and that the country would destroy its oil wells if attacked.

Saturday, October 20, 1973. The Saturday Night Massacre, Sydney Opera House, and Arab Oil Embargo.

Watergate prosecutor Archibald Cox was dismissed by the Administration, and attorney General Elliot L. Richardson and deputy attorney General William B. Ruckelshaus resigned.  Cox was dismissed by Robert Bork, who later became an unsuccessful Supreme Court nominee, but who nonetheless was influential in the philosophy of the current Supreme Court.

The Sydney Opera House was inaugurated and opened by Queen Elizabeth II.

Saudi Arabia and Algeria halted petroleum exports to the U.S., the embargo now becoming a full-blown disaster.

Thursday, October 18, 1973. Creeping embargo and I go Pogo.

The IDF recrossing the Suez Canal.  The artillery pieces are M107's, a heavy US artillery piece much loved by the IDF. Amos1947, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Saudi Arabia cut its oil production by 10% and threatened to halt all of its oil shipments to the United States unless the US halt aid to Israel.  The United Arab Emirates completely stopped shipments to the U.S.

The Chilean Army's Caravan of Death, led by General Sergio Arellano, arrived in Antofagasta and summarily executed 56 left wing prisoners.  Military Governor of Antofagasta, General Joaquin Lagos, resigned in disgust, which actually brought to an end the Caravan.

Walt Kelly, cartoonist who started his career with Disney and the created Pogo, died of a cerebral thrombosis.

Pogo often dealt with serious themes and famously coined the phrase "we have met the enemy and he is us", a phrase truer now than ever.  "I go Pogo" was a bogus election phrases making fun of Eisenhower's "I like Ike" that also was associated with the cartoon.

The Palestinian Problem and its Wilsonian Solution.

Lex Anteinternet: Wars and Rumors of War, 2023, Part X, Declarations: 

October 15, 2023

Hamas v. Israel

Egypt has completed a concrete barrier to block Palestinian entrants from Gaza.  Their border is very small, so they will be able to enforce it.

Qatar has refused to take Palestinian refugees.

Why have I linked this in, well to demonstrate part of the problem.

Bernie "I knew Lenin when he was just a baby" Sanders has called Gaza an "open air prison".

It isn't, but if it is, the guards aren't just Israeli, they're also Egyptian, and quite frankly, the Arabs in general.  

Nobody wants the Palestinians, as by this point, to put it charitably, they're acclimated to living off the dole and are inclined to violence. They're like the residents of Northern Ireland at one time, on spades.

We went into the complicated history of what is now Israel the other day, but to unfairly summarize it, the problem was created by this.

Ottoman Palestine.

Jewish immigrants legally started migrating to the region when it was an Ottoman province, and then when it was a British League of Nations Mandate.  When the Jewish population became noticeable, in a region we might note that not only had an Arab population, but an Armenian population and a Greek population, the Palestinians began to worry and demanded that it stop.  They turned to violence in the 1930s/

Prior to this time, it isn't as if it was an independent country and indeed, as the map above shows, is borders weren't really what they are now.  Israel had been an independent kingdom in ancient times, but it had been conquered by numerous ancient empires and kingdoms during its history.  Rome put an end to Israel, as we discussed the other day, until 1948.  Like much of the pre World War One Arabic Middle East, it was ruled under Ottoman rule by various tribal families.  

The period after the Great War was transformational due to the high levels of Jewish immigration, and World War Two made a push towards a restoration of Jewish Israel inevitable.  After over a millennium of being murdered for no reason whatsoever, the Jewish people wanted a homeland of their own. And, by that time, they had the population base in Palestine to demand it.

The Palestinian Arabs simply couldn't accommodate themselves to the thought, and the non-Palestinian Arabs couldn't either. They made a bad bet.  Had the Palestinians imply gone along with it, quite frankly, by now the demographic impact of their higher birth rate would mean that Israel would have a majority Palestinian population. But they didn't, and in becoming refugees they became wards of the world.

Today, inside the Palestinian Authority, they suffer high unemployment, particularly in Gaza, which is an unnatural economic unit. The Arabs, and Iran, support them, but they've largely gotten over Israel by now and they don't want the Palestinians in their country. They'd rather back them economically than let them in.

But, if there's a solution to this, they probably need to.

Following World War One, largely due to Woodrow Wilson's view of how the world should work, everything pushed towards nation states.  Due to the Great War, Germany and Russia were pushed out of Poland. Finland, the Baltics States, and the various Slavic states that hadn't been independent, became independent.  Ireland became independent.  Colonialism started to become a dirty word.

The Ottoman Empire collapsed and Middle Eastern kingdoms, imperfectly drawn, sprang up. 

And populations were somewhat moved.  

After World War Two, this was very much the case again, although mostly due to the Soviet Union seeking to redraw is territory on ethnic grounds.

None of this is pleasant, but the solution to this may be here.

Israel isn't going to go away, and is not going to let itself become an Arab dominated state.

The Palestinians aren't going away either, but their territory, and they aren't getting Palestine back, isn't viable.  They've never, moreover, really had any sort of independent state in the first place.

They are also a Mediterranean people, which means that they are largely a Sunni Muslim (some are Christians, but they're disappearing as a demographic as Islam is hostile to them and for that matter the Israelis aren't keen on them either) Arab coastal people.

Qatar is a coastal, Sunni Bedouin Arab nation.  So is Saudi Arabia. So is Kuwait.  So is Dubai.

All of these countries have a labor shortage.

A solution, and perhaps the only one, is to resettle the Palestinians in those countries.  Not in one country, which will create all kinds of problems, but across them.  

They will not mix in immediately, but they would in fairly short order.  

Jews whose ancestors emigrated from Ukraine, Poland, etc., 75 years ago do not look back and wish romantically that they could reclaim lost occupations and lands. Frankly, in 75 years, if this was done, Palestinians wouldn't either.  For that matter, in a fairly short period, they'd be fairly mixed with the local Arab population in any event, their identify less of a thing, and their futures better.

Of course, nobody is proposing this, even though many are secretly thinking about it.  Simply pushing the Palestinians out of Gaza has come up as an Israeli solution before.  The Egyptians fear a lot of Palestinians heading their way, and they cannot accommodate them.  That Qatar would reject their entry at this point shows that a lot of Arab states have this on their minds.

And the Palestinians, clinging to a pipe dream, probably wouldn't want to do it either.

Related threads:

Hamas v. Israel. Some observations, and How did we get here?

People seem shocked to learn that Egypt isn't letting Gazans in.

Saturday, September 29, 1923. Mandates and Floods.

April 25, 1920. Settlements that didn't settle.

April 8, 1920 More Strife

The Secondary Waves of the Great War.

Churches of the West: Holy Days of Obligation.

Churches of the West: Holy Days of Obligation.: 

Holy Days of Obligation.

At one time, I assumed that the entire globe had the same Catholic Holy Days of Obligation, but this is not true.  No, not at all.

The United States has the following:

• Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God
• Ascension of the Lord
• Assumption of the Virgin Mary
• All Saints' Day
• Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary
• Christmas

In contrast, our immediate neighbor to the north, Canada, has the following:

• Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God
• Christmas

What the heck?  This seems rather light.

Mexico has the following:

• Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God
• The Body and Blood of Christ
• Christmas
• Our Lady of Guadalupe

Mexico is, of course, a Catholic country, but it has a history of anti-Catholic revolution, so that may explain it.  We share two of its four, one of which we also share with Canada.

I think frankly Canada should receive a couple of more.  Canada had its only sort of civil anti-Catholic revolution, quietly, which has made Quebec a mess, and perhaps an added Holy Day might be in order.

Having said that, Australia and New Zealand, which like Canada has a strong English history, also has only two.  The United Kingdom, however, has more than that.

Likewise, which devolved a strong Lutheran influence after at first having a very lukewarm one (Scandinavians have forgotten that the Reformation wasn't really that keenly received there at first, and then foisted upon them by a Swedish King who probably didn't believe at all), has only two.

But them, Sweden has the following:

• Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God
• Epiphany
• Feast of the Ascension
• Feast of Saints Peter and Paul
• Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary
• All Saints' Day
• Christmas

That's more than the U.S.  And Qatar has the following:

• Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God
• Thomas the Apostle
• Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary
• Birth of our Lady
• Christmas

And even Saudi Arabia has the following:

• Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God
• Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary
• Christmas

Serbia has only two, but it's mostly Orthodox.  So is Ukraine, but it has the following:

• Epiphany
• Presentation of the Lord
• Annunciation of the Holy Virgin Mary
• Feast of the Ascension
• Transfiguration of the Lord
• Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary
• Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary
• Exaltation of the Holy Cross
• Presentation of Mary
• Christmas

Ukraine, however, has a strong Eastern Rite Catholic tradition in its west, minority population though it is.  Its Catholic population persevered through Communism, even though its adherents were compelled to attend Orthodox services, which they did, before going to secret Catholic ones later.

Venezuela, in contrast, has a Catholic heritage, but like Canada, has only two Holy Days of Obligation.

The total possible Holy Days of Obligation are, currently:

Placed in the order of the liturgical calendar, the ten days (apart from Sundays) that this canon mentions are:

• 8 December: Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary
• 25 December: Solemnity of the Nativity of the Lord (Christmas)
• 1 January: Solemnity of Mary, the Holy Mother of God
• 6 January: Solemnity of the Epiphany of the Lord
• 19 March: Solemnity of Saint Joseph, Spouse of the Blessed Virgin Mary
• Thursday of the sixth week of Eastertide: Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord
• Thursday after Trinity Sunday: Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ (Feast of Corpus Christi)
• 29 June: Solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul, Apostles
• 15 August: Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary
• 1 November: Solemnity of All Saints

That's ten.

Prior to 1911, the total possible was thirty-six.   Then, as now, Bishops could reduce the number.  Today, only Vatican City and the Swiss Diocese of Lugano observe all ten, although some Dioceses have added Holy Days not on it, such as Ireland, which as St. Patrick's Day, and Germany and Hungary which have Saint Stephen's Day on 26 December, Easter Monday, and Pentecost Monday.

Now the country has fewer than two.

And two seems too few to me.

The Eastern Rite of the Catholic Church, I'd note, has the following:

• The Solemnity of the Nativity of the Lord (Christmas)
• The Epiphany
• The Ascension
• The Holy Apostles Peter and Paul
• The Dormition of Holy Mary, the Mother of God

Note, however, the situation in Ukraine.  The Orthodox have a duty of worship on the following days, although what that means is not clear to me:

• The Nativity of Our Lord, December 25
• The Circumcision of Christ, January 1
• Ascension Day, 40 Days after Pascha (Easter)
• The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, August 15
• All Saints Day, November 1
• The Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, December 8

In noting all of this, I feel a little bad and whiny about Holy Days, as I've often felt it a burden to get to Mass on them.  But, in my defense, I've often not grasped why no noon Mass was offered for them in my Tri Parish locality.  All in all, looking at it, I think we should add a couple to that six, and that the other country of which I am a citizen, ought to double the number of theirs.

Yes, it's a bit of a burden, and yes you stand out. But perhaps that's part of it.

Saturday, December 2, 1922. Kuwait gets axed.

The Uqair Protocol was signed on this day in 1922, setting the boundaries between Iraq, the Sultanate of Nejd, and the Sheikdom of Kuwait.

Basically, the British High Commissioner to Iraq imposed it as a response to Bedouin raiders from Nejd loyal to Ibn Saud being a problem.

Kuwait lost 2/3s of its territory in the deal, setting is modern boundaries.  It had no say in the arrangement, resulting in anti-British feelings in Kuwait.  It did establish a Saudi Kuwait neutral zone of 2,230 square miles which existed until 1970 and a Saudi Iraqi neutral zone that existed until 1982.

Country Gentleman had a winter theme, but the Saturday Evening Post and Judge were already in the Christmas spirit, even though this was still the Thanksgiving holiday weekend in 1922.

Wednesday November 2, 1921. Rise of the House of Saud

The Emirate of Jabal Shammar, whose territory would comprise at least 30% of modern Saudi Arabia at its height, surrendered to the British backed House of Saud and was incorporated into the Saudi kingdom, which was not yet referred to by that name.   The rise of the Rashidi state had resulted in the elimination of the Second Saudi State, which comprised over 40% of the current country.  It's defeat on this date in 1921 brought the Sauds very close to controlling the entire Arabian peninsula, although their borders did not yet include territories that are now within them.

Emir Abudull-azia muteb Al Rasheed who died in battle against the Saudis in 1906.

The story is complicated and long-running. The Rashidi Emirate was established in 1836 and had feuded with the Saud's from the onset, exiling them to Kuwait.  Constant strife between the ruling family and the Sauds was a permanent feature of its existence, and the emirate had begun to lose ground to the Sauds starting in 1902 as they fought to regain their territory.  The emirates position was both strengthened and imperiled by its decision to ally itself with the Turks, who were unpopular on the Arabian Peninsula, where as the British backed the Sauds for nearly inexplicable reasons. To make matters worse, the  House of Rashidi was incredibly unstable, with no established means of succession.

Following the sitting emir's death in battle in 1906, Mutail bin 'Abulazia succeeded is father but was assassinated by Sultan bin Hammud within a year. That figure then became emir but was unsuccessful in turning back the Saudis and was killed by his brothers in 1907.   Saʿūd bin Hammūd then became emir and lasted until 1910 when he was killed by relatives.  That lead to Saud bin Abdulaziz who ruled for ten years, from age ten until twenty, when he was assassinated by a cousin.  Only twenty at the time, he already had multiple wives.

Following his death,  ʿAbdullah bin Mutʿib ruled for a year as the 7th emir, surrendered to Ibn Saud on this date in 1921.  He, too, was only twenty years old at the time.

The story plays out violently, as we might suppose.  Upon the surrender the wife of one of the grandsons of the original emir, the grandson being Muhammad bin Talāl and his wife being Nura bin Sabhan married Prince Musa'id bin Abdulaziz Al Saud while  Talāl  was imprisoned.  The Prince was the twelth son of Ibn Saud.  The Prince and his wife became the parents of Prince Faisal bin Musa'id who murdered King Faisal of Saudi Arabia in 1975.  So in essence the murderer of King Faisal represented a union between the House of Saud and the Rasheeds.  The reasons for the Ameican educated Prince's actions have never been satisfactorily explained.

May 18, 1920. Future Popes, Equine Events, and Middle Eastern Wars.

Karol Józef Wojtyła, was born to Emilia and Karol Wojtyla in Wadlowice, Poland.

St. Pope John Paul II's parents at the time of their wedding.  They are both presently candidates for sainthood.

He'd become St. John Paul II the Great, the most influential Pope of the second half of the 20th Century.

His early life was hard, in a country where life itself was hard.  His mother, who was a school teacher, died when he was 8 years old.  His deeply religious father was first an NCO, prior to his birth, in the Austro Hungarian Army and then a Captain in the Polish Army.   Upon his wife's death he worked close to home so that he could care for his young child.

His father died of a heart attack Polish in 1941.  His eldest brother, with whom he was close, died of scarlet fever after attended to scarlet fever victims in the early 1930s.   Upon his father's death he was the only immediately surviving member of the family.  

He entered the seminary secretly during World War Two, the Germans had closed them in Poland, and was ordained in Soviet occupied Poland in 1946.

He ultimately rose to become Pope in 1978, and occupied that position until his death in 2005.  Since that time he has had two successors, with the first perhaps ironically being German, thereby creating the odd situation of a Pope who lived under German occupation during World War Two being succeeded by one who had briefly been in the German armed forces (anti aircraft gun crewman) as a very young man at the end of the war.

The National Horse Show was going on in Washington D.C.

General Pershing's personal mounts Entered in the National Capitol Horse Show which opened today. On the left is Col. John G. Quekemeyer with "Jeff" and on the Right Lt. W.J. Cunningham with "John Bunny".

Col. John G. Quekemeyer and Lt. James H. Cunningham taking the jumps on Princess and Dandy, at the National Capitol Horse Show. These two hunters were presented by the English Government to General Pershings Staff and are entered with the string of A.E.F. Horses.

And Man O War, who had not run in the Kentucky Derby, won the Preakness.

Another event involving a lot of horses was the Battle of Hamdh, which occurred on this day in 1920. The battle pitted the Ikhwan, the putative National Guard of Saudi Arabia, against Kuwaiti forces. The distribution of manpower was lopsided in favor of the Saudis.  It was part of the Kuwait-Najd War.

The event was part of the Saudi effort to annex Kuwait and impose a strict religious regime upon them.  The Kuwaitis lost the battle after six days, but ultimately the British would intervene and end the war.  Kuwait was a British protectorate at the time.  Prior to that the Saudis attempted to dictate a peace requiring the eviction of Shias, adoption of Wahhabism, declare the Turks to be heretics, ban smoking, ban prostitution, and destroy the American missionary hospital in Kuwait.  The peace was imposed by the British in 1922 and it did not include those provisions, but Kuwait, which was not allowed to participate in the discussions, lost more than 2/3s of its territory.

Blog Mirror: Russia paid a heavy price to end the oil price war

Russia paid a heavy price to end the oil price war

Saudi Arabia and Russia agreed to cut oil production by . . .

9.7M bbls per day.

Meanwhile, price at the pump, locally,  is under $1.70.

Global demand, meanwhile, is down due to the Coronavirus Pandemic.

And the hits keep on coming. . .

to the local economy, that is.

It seems selfish to lament the state of the economy in  your own state in the midst of a global pandemic, but this is simply extraordinary. 

1.  The Pandemic

First, that pandemic, we just published something on it here: Lex Anteinternet: Governor Gordon and State Health Officer issue sta...:

That more fully stated:

Governor Gordon and State Health Officer issue statewide closure order for public spaces

Governor Gordon and State Health Officer issue statewide closure order for public spaces

CHEYENNE, Wyo. –  Governor Mark Gordon has endorsed a decision by the Wyoming State Health Officer to close public places for a two-week period to help slow the community spread of coronavirus (COVID-19).
The closure order extends through April 3 and includes schools, theaters, bars, nightclubs, coffee shops, employee cafeterias, self-serve buffets, salad bars, unpackaged self-serve food services, gyms, conference rooms and museums. 
“This Governor has never been inclined to overstep local authority, but these are unprecedented times. It is critical that there is uniformity across the state in how social distancing measures are implemented,” Governor Mark Gordon said.
“Wyoming, like all Americans, must commit to reducing the strain on our healthcare system. These are hard measures and they will be difficult for employees and businesses alike, but they are warranted.”
Restaurants will be closed to dine-in food service, but may remain open for curbside take-out or drive-through food service. Under the order, childcare centers will be closed except for those serving essential personnel. 
Dr. Alexia Harrist, state health officer and state epidemiologist with the Wyoming Department of Health, said “We realize this action will be very difficult for many of our residents. But it is an important step to help them avoid becoming ill and to help them avoid spreading COVID-19 to those who are most vulnerable. We should all work together to help keep our friends and neighbors safe.”
Wyoming currently has 18 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and the Wyoming Public Health laboratory has completed nearly 300 tests, as of March 19, 2020. Additional testing is occurring at commercial laboratories.  A nationwide shortage of testing supplies is impacting Wyoming, like all states. Social distancing measures are the most effective means of slowing the spread of COVID-19, according to Dr. Harrist. 
 While most individuals will likely not experience serious illness related to COVID-19, older residents and people with certain health conditions put them at higher risk of developing a serious or life-threatening illness.

Before anyone thinks "oh, it's just a few days, remember that a lot of people who work in "bars, nightclubs, coffee ships. . . " and the like make their money on tips, not so much on their wages.

Indeed, it's a long debated but firmly entrenched aspect of the American economy that the food and beverage industry is exempt from the hourly wage laws, and so people really make up their money in their tips.  A person can argue for and against that. . . you won't be getting any rude disinterested French waiters for example, but it is hard on them in various ways.  When they aren't working, even if their employer keeps paying them (and most won't get paid as their employers won't be able to pay them while their not working, and they can't 'work from home') they're really in a bad way.

So are their employers, I'd note.  In lots of industries people can actually work from home.  Indeed, while I'll take it up in another post, my prediction is that this epidemic provides a push in a technological direction, the longer it goes on, that we'll never come back from. There are already entire industries where almost all of their employees work from home.  Insurance adjusters often do, for example. But right now, a lot of lawyers and their staffs are also.  Once people become acclimated to that, a lot of businesses are going to ponder if they need a central office any bigger than a closet big enough to house a server.

Anyhow, right now a lot of tavern owners and restaurateurs are going to be really hurting.  For that matter, a lot of other small businesses will as well.  While a person can argue that if we'd had a more distributist economy (and I'll do that in some other post) we might not be i this situation now, we're in it, and smaller businesses have less to fall back on in many instances.

2.  Oil is in the dumper

As if that isn't bad enough, yesterday oil was at $22.00/bbl.

Nobody on earth can make money on oil at that price.  It's absurd.  But it's really going to be hard on the U.S. Petroleum industry if it keeps up much longer.  Layoffs are already happening in Texas, I'm told.

3.  Coal layoffs

One of the mines laid off 60 people last Wednesday, the Tribune reports.

So the economy in Gillette, which is part of Wyoming's overall economy, must be reeling.  Low oil, coal layoffs, and Covid-19. 

And of course coal layoffs come due to low production, and that means that funding the schools, which of course are closed right now, becomes all the harder.  When those schools open back up, I have to wonder how many parents are pondering their next move, literally.

Oil closes under $30.00 bbl

Yesterday, that is.

The last time oil was that low was December, 2003.  And in real terms, it's lower now than it was then.

Indeed, the actual last time oil was as low as it currently is was in 1999.

Now, in the 1990s and the 2000s, when oil reached its current low mark, it didn't stay there.  In fact, it shortly thereafter rocketed skyward.  In the late 90s price crash the price went up to $40.00 bbl, which is more then than now, fairly quickly.  In the 2003 crash it soon recovered and over time went up to $151.00 bbl, a price that's unlikely to be the rebounding price here.

And there is likely to be a rebound.  Saudi Arabia, which is depressing the price, actually can't meet its expenditures if the price is lower than $80 bbl.  Nobody knows how low Russia can go, but the Saudis are betting that it can't stay this low long.  They may be right.

The Russians seem to be betting that they can, and there's additional speculation that they may be aiming to damage the American oil industry, which needs prices to be $50 bbl.  The US is the world's largest oil producer and is an energy exporter once again, but if we need $50, and the Russians can stay well below that, it'll result in a lot of American production being shut in and the Russians may gain the market.

Which leads to an additional theory, although one I'd discount, which is that the Russians hope to be low enough to hurt the Saudis and get part of their share while not so low as to hurt the American market, which would boost the OPEC share.

We'll see.

Anyway you look at it,a prolonged oil war between Russia and Saudi Arabia, an Oligarchy v a Monarchy, isn't good for American oil production and its really bad for the state.

Of course war, which this is only by analogy, is also bad for those who engage in them, and the outcomes are never predictable.  The US is never good at waging sustained war, as recent events once again have demonstrated, as people tire of them and in a democratic society they vote them out, basically.

Despotic countries are better at keeping wars running, but not necessarily winning them. Nazi Germany kept World War Two running well past the point of no return for the state.  Imperial Japan had lost the war prior to Iwo Jima.  Imperial Germany kept the war running right up to the point of internal revolution which in turn destroyed it.

The current head of Saudi Arabia is jailing family opposition to his rule and we know that Putin doesn't tolerate very much dissent.  But there are a lot of Sauds who depend on oil checks to evade working and there's plenty of Russians whose dachas depend on petrobucks.  At the current prices, they'll be hurting.  And nobody knows where that leads.