The Boy Who Cried Oil Drilling

October 1, 2010
According to Reuters in 2004:

Drilling of an exploratory well in Cuba's virgin Gulf of Mexico waters that could make the Communist nation an oil exporter and undermine the U.S. embargo has been completed, a senior official said.

Work on the well by Spain's Repsol YPF began in June and captured the attention of the industry and governments due to its potential economic and political consequences.

According to The New York Times in 2006:

In 1977, the United States and Cuba signed a treaty that evenly divided the Florida Strait to preserve each country's economic rights. They included access to vast underwater oil and gas fields on both sides of the line.

Now, with energy costs soaring, plans are under way to drill this year, but all on the Cuban side.

With only modest energy needs and no ability of its own to drill, Cuba has negotiated lease agreements with China and other energy-hungry countries to extract resources for themselves and for Cuba.

According to Time in 2008:

Despite the Bush Administration's hard line on Cuba, Republicans in Congress have proposed legislation to exempt Big Oil from the embargo. That clamor is sure to rise — especially if Barack Obama, who is more open to dialogue with Havana, becomes the next President — now that Cuba's state oil company, Cubapetroleo, or Cupet, has announced a stunning new estimate of more than 20 billion bbl. bubbling off its shores. "This is not a game," Cupet's exploration manager, Rafael Tenreyro, assured reporters in Havana last week.

And today, The New York Times recycled its 2006 story again:

Five months after the BP oil spill, a federal moratorium still prohibits new deepwater drilling in the American waters of the Gulf of Mexico. And under longstanding federal law, drilling is also banned near the coast of Florida.

Yet next year, a Spanish company will begin drilling new wells 50 miles from the Florida Keys — in Cuba's sovereign waters.

Meanwhile, despite years of hype, no one reports on the main (and obvious) obstacle to oil drilling in Cuba: U.S. sanctions.

Therefore, if you are concerned about oil drilling by the Castro regime or anyone else in Cuba, the solution is simple: stop whining and support U.S. sanctions.