Chapter 1155 Happy People
Christmas brought a rare peaceful day to the battlefields of Afghanistan and Iraq.
The Afghan and Iraqi people no longer have to prepare to enter air-raid shelters and basements every day!
Taking advantage of this rare window period, transport trucks carrying supplies entered Iraq from the borders of Iraq, Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia.
Saddam also walked out of the underground command post and basked in the sun. The soft sunshine made Saddam warm all over.
When listening to the radio, which was introducing the violent incidents encountered by Europe and the United States on Christmas, Saddam showed a gloating look.
The more damn Americans and American running dogs die, the better!
As long as the United States and its running dogs are unlucky, Saddam is happy.
But when he saw that the beautiful Baghdad before was now full of scars, Saddam's good mood just now disappeared.
"When the war is over, everything will be fine!" Saddam clenched his fists, as if he was talking to the Iraqi people, and also as if he was talking to himself.
Saddam believed that as long as the war was over, Iraq would soon be able to rebuild after the war.
His biggest confidence was that Iraq had abundant oil and natural gas, which could be exported continuously and bring continuous income to Iraq.
Moreover, Iraq now maintained friendly relations with Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates and other countries. It would be easier to borrow money from them for reconstruction after the war.
At this point in the war, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and other countries have supported Iraq with more than 20 billion US dollars in weapons and supplies. In addition, they have lent Iraq more than 20 billion US dollars, allowing Iraq to continue to purchase weapons, equipment and supplies.
This is a war of attrition. Whoever can't afford it first will lose the war.
But in any case, even if the United States withdraws its troops and ends the Iraq War, Iraq will be a loser, but at that time, both Iraq and the United States will be losers!
For Iraq, since the war began, it has been a loser anyway, because the war took place in Iraq, no matter how it was lost or how much it was lost.
For Americans, there are only two results: big win or big loss, either big win or big loss. As long as Iraq is conquered and Iraqi oil is controlled, the United States will win by relying on Iraqi oil and natural gas, even if it invests hundreds of billions or even trillions of dollars.
And if Iraq is not conquered, it will be a big loss for the United States. A large amount of military expenditure will be invested, huge casualty pensions, and loss of weapons and equipment, plus it will shake the US military hegemony, which is very fatal, and it is definitely a big loss.
At that time, there may be some moths that will make some countries challenge the United States.
Saddam wore a bulletproof vest and went to the hospital to visit injured civilians accompanied by staff and security personnel. This scene was photographed by the media and will become news material.
While visiting the injured ordinary people, Saddam comforted them, and at the same time denounced the United States and its lackeys for air strikes on unarmed civilians, and said that he would be with everyone and live and die with Iraq, and would never succumb to the hegemony of the United States. Iraq refused to be colonized, and the fate of the Iraqi people must be firmly in the hands of the Iraqi people.
Saddam did not stay in the hospital for long. After all, who knows whether the Americans will launch missile attacks after getting the news.
Saddam went around Baghdad and saw the tragic situation in Baghdad, which made him hate the United States even more.
Tripoli, the capital of Libya.
Gaddafi watched the news and saw the vicious explosions in Europe and the United States on Christmas Eve. He was so happy that he danced with joy.
As the most well-known anti-American fighter in the world today, Gaddafi hates the United States very much.
The US air strikes on Libya that year caused Libya to be almost reduced to ruins, and most of Gaddafi's relatives died in the American air strikes.
After ten years of reconstruction, Libya's oil production and exports have returned to the level before the air strikes, but in those years, the prices of oil and natural gas were not high, and Libya's oil revenue was far less than before.
But the past two or three years are different. Since September 11, 2001, oil and natural gas have risen, and Libya's oil and natural gas revenues have also increased significantly, which allows Libya to better invest in infrastructure, national welfare and arming itself.
By now, the international crude oil price has exceeded $60 per barrel, and the price of natural gas has risen to $0.28 per cubic meter, and even in winter, it can be $0.34 per cubic meter.
Libya now exports 1.56 million barrels of oil per day, which means that the daily oil export revenue can reach $93.6 million; and Libya's daily natural gas exports have reached 10 million cubic meters, and the natural gas export revenue has reached $2.8 million to $3.4 million!
With the improvement of relations between Europe and Russia, Libya's oil and natural gas can be exported to Europe unimpeded.
The huge energy income allows Libya to start a large number of projects, build schools, hospitals, nursing homes, and roads, etc.
Of course, Gaddafi also has more money to buy weapons, but Gaddafi buys more weapons from Russia. After learning from the lessons of the past, Gaddafi buys more S300 air defense missiles, as well as advanced fighters produced by Russia such as Su-27 fighters and MiG-29 fighters.
To this day, Russia's Black Sea Fleet still has a squadron stationed in the Libyan military port.
Gaddafi was in a good mood and asked people to transfer money to more than a dozen accounts.
Gaddafi has been working on funding.
Gaddafi has always been one of the financiers of Bin Laden's organization.
Gaddafi read the news and then started to deal with the work.
Libya is very large, with a land area of 1.76 million square kilometers, but in fact Libya is also very small, because more than 95% of Libya is desert and semi-desert, only the coastal and northeastern inland areas are plains below 200 meters above sea level, and other areas are basically covered with gravel, and there are few places suitable for human habitation. This is also the fundamental reason why Libya's population has not yet reached 6 million.
It seems that the land area is large, but in fact the area suitable for living is very small.
Of course, Libya also has good things given by God, that is, abundant oil and natural gas. Libya's proven oil and natural gas reserves rank first in Africa, at 43 billion barrels and 1.54 trillion cubic meters respectively.
As long as there is no war and no sanctions from Europe and the United States, Libya's economy will easily take off.
With a small population, it is easy to become a wealthy country because of its abundant resources.
Moreover, the large amount of desert also prevented refugees from the wars in Africa from coming to Libya, and did not protect Libya from the harm of refugees.
The pen in Gaddafi's hand was turning, but he was considering how many sets of S300 air defense missile systems to introduce to protect Libya's security. (End of this chapter)