Does the US addiction to oil signal its demise as a superpower? 

According to an article by Michael Klare at Asia Times the answer is yes.

Klare writes: "Nineteen years ago, the fall of the Berlin Wall effectively eliminated the Soviet Union as the world's other superpower. Yes, the USSR as a political entity stumbled on for another two years, but it was clearly an ex-superpower from the moment it lost control over its satellites in Eastern Europe.

"Less than a month ago, the United States similarly lost its claim to superpower status when a barrel of crude oil roared past US$110 on the international market, gasoline prices crossed the $3.50 threshold at American pumps, and diesel fuel topped $4. As was true of the USSR following the dismantling of the Berlin Wall, the US will no doubt continue to stumble on like the superpower it once was; but as the nation's economy continuesto be eviscerated to pay for its daily oil fix, it, too, will be seen by increasing numbers of savvy observers as an ex-superpower-in-the-making.

"The fact is, America's wealth and power has long rested on the abundance of cheap petroleum. The United States was, for a long time, the world's leading producer of oil, supplying its own needs while generating a healthy surplus for export.

"No less important was the role of abundant petroleum in fueling the global reach of US military power. For all the talk of America's growing reliance on computers, advanced sensors, and stealth technology to prevail in warfare, it has been oil above all that gave the US military its capacity to "project power" onto distant battlefields like Iraq and Afghanistan. Every Humvee, tank, helicopter, and jet fighter requires its daily ration of petroleum, without which America's technology-driven military would be forced to abandon the battlefield. No surprise, then, that the US Department of Defense is the world's single-biggest consumer of petroleum, using more of it every day than the entire nation of Sweden.

"From the end of World War II through the height of the Cold War, the US claim to superpower status rested on a vast sea of oil.....Domestic oil production reached a peak in 1970 and has been in decline ever since - with a growing dependency on imported oil as the result. When it came to reliance on imports, the United States crossed the 50% threshold in 1998 and now has passed 65%.

"According to the latest data from the US Department of Energy, the United States is importing 12-14 million barrels of oil per day. At a current price of about $115 per barrel, that's $1.5 billion per day, or $548 billion per year. This represents the single largest contribution to America's balance-of-payments deficit, and is a leading cause for the dollar's ongoing drop in value. If oil prices rise any higher - in response, perhaps, to a new crisis in the Middle East (as might be occasioned by US air strikes on Iran) - our annual import bill could quickly approach three-quarters of a trillion dollars or more per year.

"While our economy is being depleted of these funds, at a moment when credit is scarce and economic growth has screeched to a halt, the oil regimes on which we depend for our daily fix are depositing their mountains of accumulating petrodollars in "sovereign wealth funds" (SWFs) - state-controlled investment accounts that buy up prized foreign assets in order to secure non-oil-dependent sources of wealth. At present, these funds are already believed to hold in excess of several trillion dollars; the richest, the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA), alone holds $875 billion.

"Every day, the average GI in Iraq uses approximately 27 gallons of petroleum-based fuels. With some 160,000 American troops in Iraq, that amounts to 4.37 million gallons in daily oil usage, including gasoline for vans and light vehicles, diesel for trucks and armored vehicles, and aviation fuel for helicopters, drones, and fixed-wing aircraft. With US forces paying, as of late April, an average of $3.23 per gallon for these fuels, the Pentagon is already spending approximately $14 million per day on oil ($98 million per week, $5.1 billion per year) to stay in Iraq. Meanwhile, our Iraqi allies, who are expected to receive a windfall of $70 billion this year from the rising price of their oil exports, charge their citizens $1.36 per gallon for gasoline.

"Certainly, however, our allies in the region, especially the Sunni kingdoms of Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) that presumably look to Washington to stabilize Iraq and curb the growing power of Shi'ite Iran, are willing to help the Pentagon out by supplying US troops with free or deeply-discounted petroleum. No such luck. Except for some partially subsidized oil supplied by Kuwait, all oil-producing US allies in the region charge us the market rate for petroleum. Take that as a striking reflection of how little credence even countries whose ruling elites have traditionally looked to the US for protection now attach to our supposed superpower status.

"Think of this as a strikingly clear-eyed assessment of American power. As far as they're concerned, we're now just another of those hopeless oil addicts driving a monster gas-guzzler up to the pump - and they're perfectly happy to collect our cash which they can then use to cherry-pick our prime assets. So expect no summer tax holidays for the Pentagon, not in the Middle East, anyway.

"If anything demonstrates the critical role of oil in determining the fate of superpowers in the current milieu, it is the spectacular reemergence of Russia as a Great Power on the basis of its superior energy balance. Once derided as the humiliated, enfeebled loser in the US-Soviet rivalry, Russia is again a force to be reckoned with in world affairs. It possesses the fastest-growing economy among the G-8 group of major industrial powers, is the world's second leading producer of oil (after Saudi Arabia), and is its top producer of natural gas. Because it produces far more energy than it consumes, Russia exports a substantial portion of its oil and gas to neighboring countries, making it the only Great Power not dependent on other states for its energy needs.

"For Russian officials, however, the restoration of their country's great power status is not the product of deceit or bullying, but a natural consequence of being the world's leading energy provider.

"As a result of our addiction to increasingly costly imported oil, we have become a different country, weaker and less prosperous. Whether we know it or not, the energy Berlin Wall has already fallen and the United States is an ex-superpower-in-the-making."

However, the Bush administration refuses to invest in developing alternative sources of energy, especially solar power, instead protecting its corporate crony oil profiteers and hatching plans for more wars, against Iran for example, which will increase US trillions in deficit by billions more. 

The Bush administration has set the US on the path of becoming a super beggar and super debtor nation.

And impeachment is still off the table.