Thread by @AliaGvR

Didn't forget @HC_Richardson, so some info on oil in Syria.

Syria basically has none. What Trump said has absolutely no truth. But there are a bunch of conspiracy theories, which shows how gullible he is when he hears them.

Oil and gas is absolutely irrelevant in Syria:

Oil production has been on the decline in Syria for decades. In the decade prior to 2011 Syria only produced 400k barrels per day. In 2008, Syria’s oil expert vs import had a negative balance. 2/

What oil they had was on the border with Iraq (2.5 bill barrels of reserves early 2011).

It exported most to OECD Europe from terminals out of the Med (Latakia, Tartous, Baniyas). 3/

There used to be TAPLINE, the oil pipeline for Saudi oil transported *over* Syria. That was closed in the 70s. Another oil pipeline from Kirkuk to Baniyas, Syria closed in 2003.

4/

Then there are conspiracy theories over liquified gas. They were amplified by Jill Stein and Robert Kennedy Jr (of anti-vaxx notoriety).

They think the US is blocking pipelines for LNG from Iran via Iraq & Syria; another from Qatar via Saudi & Jordan to Syria. 5/

Nonsense: none of those pipeline were ever viable. Plans to implement were on the drawing board for yrs.

Another was for gas from Egypt to Syria then to Turkey. That was planned for over 20 yrs! What was started was never finished as Egypt doesn’t have enough gas to export. 6/

Neither does Iran have enough gas to export. Iran is under sanctions, as is Syria and Turkey — so nothing concrete was/is possible. The Qatari to Syria line was never real; it was conspiracy. And…doesn’t have enough gas for Europe; domestic demand is rising. 7/

Even if there was enough gas, it’s a conflict zone. And who would pay for the pipeline between non-friendly states?

Unless these are economically viable there are no options. 8/

What I found when looking for maps though, is wildly exaggerated oil field depictions from either far right or far left outlets. They have no concept of:

* Oil viability
* Size
* Demand
* Previous plans

9/

This is easy to see. Check the map of the Turkey-Syria buffer zone (tweet 1) and you can see it's far from the small fields Syria did have.

So Syria for oil?

Complete nonsense not borne of any actual fact whatsoever. Hope this helps!

Fin.