Admiral Dennis Blair: "We Sent Troops to Middle East…Because of Oil-Based Importance of Region"

onMar 26, 2014 @ 11:54 PDT

At the just-completed U.S. House Committee on Foreign Affairs hearing titled, “The Geopolitical Potential of the U.S. Energy Boom,” Admiral Dennis Blair — former Director of National Intelligence, President and CEO of Institute for Defense Analyses and Commander in Chief of U.S. Pacific Command — admitted what’s still considered conspiratorial to some.

Put tersely: the U.S. and allied forces launched the ongoing occupation in Iraq and occupy large swaths of the Middle East to secure the flow of oil to the U.S. and its global allies, explained Blair.

Blair began his analysis lasting just over a minute after a line of questioning (beginning at 1:02:56 in the video below) coming from U.S. Rep. Jeff Duncan (R-SC) about TransCanada’s Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, “energy as an instrument of geopolitical power” and geopolitical tensions in Venezuela.

By Steve Horn

Steve Horn is the owner of the consultancy Horn Communications & Research Services, which provides public relations, content writing, and investigative research work products to a wide range of nonprofit and for-profit clients across the world. He is an investigative reporter on the climate beat for over a decade and former Research Fellow for DeSmog.

A Database of Canada’s Fossil Fuel Lobbyists

ByTaylor Noakes

onJul 14, 2026 @ 13:05 PDT

Some lobby organizations that work for environmental organizations also work for the fossil fuel industry.

Can Ireland Deliver as ‘Honest Broker’? Here’s What’s at Stake for Climate and Nature in EU Council Presidency

ByRachel Sherrington

onJul 14, 2026 @ 08:44 PDT

The Republic’s historic failure to curb agricultural pollution drives concern among campaigners.

Leonard Leo's Anti-Climate Network Makes a European Debut

ByGeoff Dembicki

onJul 14, 2026 @ 08:01 PDT

Leo-linked operatives were among a who's who of the international right that gathered for the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship (ARC) conference in June.