Trump has repeatedly suggested that the US should have taken Iraq's oil as compensation for the war and tied a small, lingering US troop presence in eastern Syria to "securing" oilfields there, even musing about letting Exxon Mobil develop them. Trump has pushed for greater US control over rare earths and other critical minerals, eyeing Greenland's vast deposits of cobalt, nickel, copper, and lithium, and even declining to rule out using force to obtain them. "Previous administrations pursued the same strategic control of energy, minerals and chokepoints, but cloaked it in multilateralism and 'market stability,' whereas Trump voices the extractive logic directly," says Hanieh, author of Crude Capitalism: Oil, Corporate Power, and the Making of the World Market.
Author: Rob Quinn with Newser.AI
Published at: 2025-12-24 19:39:51
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