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Why the Gulf Wealth Matters to Britain [and the US] 
A summary 
Anglo-American interest in the enormous hydrocarbon reserves of the Persian Gulf does not derive from a need to fuel Western consumption. 
The US has never imported more than a token amount from the Gulf and for much of  the postwar period has been a net oil exporter. Anglo-American  involvement in  the Middle East has always been principally about the strategic advantage gained from controlling Persian Gulf hydrocarbons, not Western oil needs. 
What remains a US strategy: the US and Britain would provide Saudi Arabia and  other key Gulf monarchies with  ‘sufficient military supplies to preserve internal security’. 
In a piece for the Atlantic a few months  after  9/11, Benjamin Schwarz and Christopher Layne explained that  Washington 'assumes responsibility for stabilising the region’ because  China, Japan and  Europe  will  be dependent on its resource...
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An analysis with good insights, but like a typical revolutionary socialist approach it tends to be too optimistic. The Algerian movement against the regime tends to tilt towards reforms, reforms to be granted by the regime under pressure from the street. It reminds me of the Tunisians' demands after the flight of Ben Ali. Given the decades long of entrenched "civil society", NGOs, and the hegemony of international "liberal" order, with focus on entreprenurship, "human rights", etc. and the interests of the major imperialist states in preserving stability with focus on "development" within domination, the project of revolution against an authoritarian unjust system has been depicted as an out-of-date prospect. This has been exasperated by the wars in Libya, Syria and Yemen and the defeat in Egypt. Thus the fear of radicalism to carry out a meaningful real change. There is no intention to challenge the existing institutions and bui...
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