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Part One of a two-part series
Players on a rigged grand chessboard: Bridas, Unocal and the Afghanistan pipeline
By Larry Chin
Online Journal Contributing Editor
March 6, 2002�After the fall of the Soviet Union, Argentine oil company Bridas, led
by its ambitious chairman, Carlos Bulgheroni, became the first company to exploit
the oil fields of Turkmenistan and propose a pipeline through neighboring
Afghanistan. A powerful US-backed consortium intent on building its own pipeline
through the same Afghan corridor would oppose Bridas' project.
The Coveted Trans-Afghan Route
Upon successfully negotiating leases to explore in Turkmenistan, Bridas was
awarded exploration contracts for the Keimar block near the Caspian Sea, and the
Yashlar block near the Afghanistan border. By March 1995, Bulgheroni had accords
with Turkmenistan and Pakistan granting Bridas construction rights for a pipeline into
Afghanistan, pending negotiations with the civil war-torn country.
The following year, after extensive meetings with warlords throughout Afghanistan,
Bridas had a 30-year agreement with the Rabbani regime to build and operate an
875-mile gas pipeline across Afghanistan.
Bulgheroni believed that his pipeline would promote peace as well as material wealth
in the region. He approached other companies, including Unocal and its then-CEO,
Roger Beach, to join an international consortium.
But Unocal was not interested in a partnership. The United States government, its
affiliated transnational oil and construction companies, and the ruling elite of the
West had coveted the same oil and gas transit route for years.
A trans-Afghanistan pipeline was not simply a business matter, but a key component
of a broader geo-strategic agenda: total military and economic control of Eurasia (the
Middle East and former Soviet Central Asian republics). Zbigniew Brezezinski
describes this region in his book "The Grand Chessboard-American Primacy and Its
Geostrategic Imperatives" as "the center of world power." Capturing the region's oil
wealth, and carving out territory in order to build a network of transit routes, was a
primary objective of US military interventions throughout the 1990s in the Balkans,
the Caucasus and Caspian Sea.
As of 1992, 11 western oil companies controlled more than 50 percent of all oil
investments in the Caspian Basin, including Unocal, Amoco, Atlantic Richfield,
Chevron, Exxon- Mobil, Pennzoil, Texaco, Phillips and British Petroleum.
In "Taliban: Militant Islam, Oil and Fundamentalism in Central Asia" (a definitive work
that is a primary source for this report), Ahmed Rashid wrote, "US oil companies who
had spearheaded the first US forays into the region wanted a greater say in US
policy making."
Business and policy planning groups active in Central Asia, such as the Foreign Oil
Companies Group operated with the full support of the US State Department, the
National Security Council, the CIA and the Department of Energy and Commerce.
Among the most active operatives for US efforts: Brezezinski (a consultant to
Amoco, and architect of the Afghan-Soviet war of the 1970s), Henry Kissinger
(advisor to Unocal), and Alexander Haig (a lobbyist for Turkmenistan), and Dick
Cheney (Halliburton, US-Azerbaijan Chamber of Commerce).
Unocal's Central Asia envoys consisted of former US defense and intelligence
officials. Robert Oakley, the former US ambassador to Pakistan, was a "counter-
terrorism" specialist for the Reagan administration who armed and trained the
mujahadeen during the war against the Soviets in the 1980s. He was an Iran-Contra
conspirator charged by Independent Counsel Lawrence Walsh as a key figure
involved in arms shipments to Iran.
Richard Armitage, the current Deputy Defense Secretary, was another Iran-Contra
player in Unocal's employ. A former Navy SEAL, covert operative in Laos, director
with the Carlyle Group, Armitage is allegedly deeply linked to terrorist and criminal
networks in the Middle East, and the new independent states of the former Soviet
Union (Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, and Kyrghistan).
Armitage was no stranger to pipelines. As a member of the Burma/Myanmar Forum,
a group that received major funding from Unocal, Armitage was implicated in a
lawsuit filed by Burmese villagers who suffered human rights abuses during the
construction of a Unocal pipeline. (Halliburton, under Dick Cheney, performed
contract work on the same Burmese project.)
Bridas Versus the New World Order
Much to Bridas' dismay, Unocal went directly to regional leaders with its own
proposal. Unocal formed its own competing US-led, Washington-sponsored
consortium that included Saudi Arabia's Delta Oil, aligned with Saudi Prince Abdullah
and King Fahd. Other partners included Russia's Gazprom and Turkmenistan's
state-owned Turkmenrozgas.
John Imle, president of Unocal (and member of the US- Azerbaijan Chamber of
Commerce with Armitage, Cheney, Brezezinski and other ubiquitous figures), lobbied
Turkmenistan's president Niyazov and prime minister Bhutto of Pakistan, offering a
Unocal pipeline following the same route as Bridas.'
Dazzled by the prospect of an alliance with the US, Niyazov asked Bridas to
renegotiate its past contract and blocked Bridas' exports from Keimar field. Bridas
responded by filing three cases with the International Chamber of Commerce against
Turkmenistan for breach of contract. (Bridas won.) Bridas also filed a lawsuit in
Texas charging Unocal with civil conspiracy and "tortuous interference with business
relations." While its officers were negotiating with Pakistani and Turkmen oil and gas
officials, Bridas claimed that Unocal had stolen its idea, and coerced the Turkmen
government into blocking Bridas from Keimir field. (The suit was dismissed in 1998
by Judge Brady G. Elliott, a Republican, who claimed that any dispute between
Unocal and Bridas was governed by the laws of Turkmenistan and Afghanistan,
rather than Texas law.)
In October 1995, with neither company in a winning position, Bulgheroni and Imle
accompanied Niyazov to the opening of the UN General Assembly. There, Niyazov
awarded Unocal with a contract for a 918-mile natural gas pipeline. Bulgheroni was
shocked. At the announcement ceremony, Unocal consultant Henry Kissinger said
that the deal looked like "the triumph of hope over experience."
Later, Unocal's consortium, CentGas, would secure another contract for a
companion 1,050-mile oil pipeline from Dauletabad through Afghanistan that would
connect to a tanker loading port in Pakistan on the coast of the Arabian Sea.
Although Unocal had agreements with the governments on either end of the
proposed route, Bridas still had the contract with Afghanistan.
The problem was resolved via the CIA and Pakistani ISI- backed Taliban. Following a
visit to Kandahar by US Assistant Secretary of State for South Asia Robin Raphael in
the fall of 1996, the Taliban entered Kabul and sent the Rabbani government
packing.
Bridas' agreement with Rabbani would have to be renegotiated.
Wooing the Taliban
According to Ahmed Rashid, "Unocal's real influence with the Taliban was that their
project carried the possibility of US recognition, which the Taliban were desperately
anxious to secure."
Unocal wasted no time greasing the palms of the Taliban. It offered humanitarian aid
to Afghan warlords who would form a council to supervise the pipeline project. It
provided a new mobile phone network between Kabul and Kandahar. Unocal also
promised to help rebuild Kandahar, and donated $9,000 to the University of
Nebraska's Center for Afghan Studies. The US State Department, through its aid
organization USAID, contributed significant education funding for Taliban. In the
spring of 1996, Unocal executives flew Uzbek leader General Abdul Rashid Dostum
to Dallas to discuss pipeline passage through his northern (Northern Alliance-
controlled) territories.
Bridas countered by forming an alliance with Ningarcho, a Saudi company closely
aligned with Prince Turki el-Faisal, the Saudi intelligence chief. Turki was a mentor
to
Osama bin Laden, the ally of the Taliban who was publicly feuding with the Saudi
royal family. As a gesture for Bridas, Prince Turki provided the Taliban with
communications equipment and a fleet of pickup trucks. Now Bridas proposed two
consortiums, one to build the Afghanistan portion, and another to take care of both
ends of the line. By November 1996, Bridas claimed that it had an agreement signed
by the Taliban and Dostum�trumping Unocal.
The competition between Unocal and Bridas, as described by Rashid, "began to
reflect the competition within the Saudi Royal family."
In 1997, Taliban officials traveled twice to Washington, D.C. and Buenos Aires to be
wined and dined by Unocal and Bridas. No agreements were signed.
It appeared to Unocal that the Taliban was balking. In addition to royalties, the
Taliban demanded funding for infrastructure projects, including roads and power
plants. The Taliban also announced plans to revive the Afghan National Oil
Company, which had been abolished by the Soviet regime in the late 1970s.
Osama bin Laden (who issued his fatwa against the West in 1998) advised the
Taliban to sign with Bridas. In addition to offering the Taliban a higher bid, Bridas
proposed an open pipeline accessible to warlords and local users. Unocal's pipeline
was closed�for export purposes only. Bridas' plan also did not require outside
financing, while Unocal's required a loan from the western financial institutions (the
World Bank), which in turn would leave Afghanistan vulnerable to demands from
western governments.
Bridas' approach to business was more to the Taliban's liking. Where Bulgheroni and
Bridas' engineers would take the time to "sip tea with Afghan tribesmen," Unocal's
American executives issued top-down edicts from corporate headquarters and the
US Embassy (including a demand to open talks with the CIA-backed Northern
Alliance).
While seemingly well received within Afghanistan, Bridas' problems with
Turkmenistan (which they blamed on Unocal and US interference) had left them
cash-strapped and without a supply.
In 1997, they went searching for a major partner with the clout to break the deadlock
with Turkmenistan. They found one in Amoco. Bridas sold 60 percent of its Latin
American assets to Amoco. Carlos Bulgheroni and his contingent retained the
remaining minority 40 percent. Facilitating the merger were other icons of
transnational finance, Chase Manhattan (representing Bridas), Morgan Stanley
(handling Amoco) and Arthur Andersen (facilitator of post-merger integration).
Zbigniew Brezezinski was a consultant for Amoco.
(Amoco would merge with British Petroleum a year later. BP is represented by the
law firm of Baker & Botts, whose principal attorney is James Baker, lifelong Bush
friend, former secretary of state, and a member of the Carlyle Group.)
Recognizing the significance of the merger, a Pakistani oil company executive
hinted, "If these (Central Asian) countries want a big US company involved, Amoco is
far bigger than Unocal."
Clearing the Chessboard Again
By 1998, while the Argentine contingent made slow progress, Unocal faced a
number of new problems.
Gazprom pulled out of CentGas when Russia complained about the anti-Russian
agenda of the US. This forced Unocal to expand CentGas to include Japanese and
South Korean gas companies, while maintaining the dominant share with Delta.
Human rights groups began protesting Unocal's dealings with the brutal Taliban. Still
riding years of Clinton bashing and scandal mongering, conservative Republicans in
the US attacked the Clinton administration's Central Asia policy for its lack of
clarity
and "leadership."
Once again, violence would change the dynamic.
In response to the bombing of US embassies in Nairobi and Tanzania (attributed to
bin Laden), President Bill Clinton sent cruise missiles into Afghanistan and Sudan.
The administration broke off diplomatic contact with the Taliban, and UN sanctions
were imposed.
Unocal withdrew from CentGas, and informed the State Department "the gas pipeline
would not proceed until an internationally recognized government was in place in
Afghanistan." Although Unocal continued on and off negotiations on the oil pipeline
(a separate project), the lack of support from Washington hampered efforts.
Meanwhile, Bridas declared that it would not need to wait for resolution of political
issues, and repeated its intention of moving forward with the Afghan gas pipeline
project on its own. Pakistan, Turkmenistan and Afghanistan tried to push Saudi
Arabia to proceed with CentGas (Delta of Saudi Arabia was now the leader). But war
and US-Taliban tension made business impossible.
For the remainder of the Clinton presidency, there would be no official US or UN
recognition of Afghanistan. And no progress on the pipeline.
Then George Walker Bush took the White House.
Next: The Bush administration's Afghan carpet
Larry Chin is a freelance journalist and an Online Journal Contributing Editor.
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