What % of petrolium use of the USA goes towards US military uses?

Question

Why the hell would a patriotic American NOT want to know, dipshits? Has it occurred to you that there are tons of arguments about how the Iraq war is ALL about oil, but nobody asks if maybe we don't end up burning more oil than we spend on that war? Has it occurred to you that we risk empowering states like Venezuela, Saudi Arabia, and other oil-producing countries with cultures exactly COUNTER to US values (Venezuela is communist, Saudi Arabia harbors radical Islamic terrorist groups, etc)? Has it occurred to you that war is ECONOMIC and that bleeding our oil supplies dry *might* be part of the larger scheme or that Iraq or Al-Queda might just be puppets of a more vested interest party that stands to profit from our dumb rush to revenge and control? You moronic armchair patriots make me sick. Shove your dumb paranoid BS where the sun doesn't shine! Real patriots care if we win. If you aren't a part of winning; you're part of the problem.

Did it also occur to you that since Bin Laden was working for the CIA at one point that he might know a LOT more about this stuff than the public? Look at our answers so far! We're just GUESSING. I feel pretty confident that our enemies know more about us than we know about ourselves, and in the Book of War that's suicidal. Read some Sun Tzu and get a clue.

Answer 1

Ignore the xenophobes and freaked out Bushites. Imagine . . . automatically calling someone a "terrorist" because he/she has good questions about fuel consumption, the military, etc. What is to become of the free and interested thinkers of this world!

I was just reading a blog about the topic of your question by a writer named Sohbet Karbuz. That name should get the xenophobes pretty hot, eh? According to the entry the U.S. Dept. of Defense is the largest buyer and user in the world of oil. Figures given for 2004 suggest 144 million barrels of oil were needed by the military. That cost the Dept of Defense about 8.2 billion dollars. Ouch! A country could rebuild a whole city for that amount, like New Orleans, maybe! Or hire enough inspectors to look at every bridge and overpass in America!

In this blog a really interesting question is raised. The amount bought by the military is only close to what is used by the military. There is a serious discrepancy. Apparently somewhere around 300 000 barrels a day are unaccounted for. It is suggested that it finds its way onto the world market. Do you think the Defense Department would actually do such a thing? Like sell oil on the world market and use the money to fund the war.

One last intriuging stat is that today's American military has the highest per soldier comsumption rate of any army at any time in history. One soldier on a per capita basis "uses" about 9 gallons each day. To put the whole Iraq invasion into perspective; in the first three weeks of combat in Iraq the fuel consumed equaled the amount that all Allied forces used during the Great War of 1914 - 18. And if that's not enough, During the 1940s, General Patton commanded a force of nearly 1/2 million soldiers. On a day to day, month to month, basis, the Pentagon's forces of today are a third of those of Patton's yet use four times the amount of fuel.

Amazing results to a great question. Now I will be honest, here. I didn't really answer your question because you asked for a percentage. So, I had to do some more investigation.

The United States uses about 20 000 000 million barrels of oil per day, or 7 300 000 000 barrels a year. Wow! The Dept. of Defense uses about 400 000 barrels per day and approximately 144 million barrels a year (using 2005 numbers). According to my math then, the military uses about 2 percent of the total. A previous answerer gave you the same answer and commented that it is probably higher because of the war. I have a feeling he is right and that the amount is much greater. Come to think of it, that's right! There are 300 000 barrels unaccounted for. Maybe they aren't being sold on the black market but actually are used by the tanks, Hummers, planes and soldiers' campstoves! And if that's the case, consumption figures given by the Pentagon are really half of the amount they say. Does that mean that Bush and his war pigs in the Pentagon are only telling us the truth half the time?

Answer 2

About 2% in 2000. Probably more now because of the war.

Answer 3

only a terrorist would want to know that.

Answer 4

why the hell do you want to know!!!!