IRAQ: Oil and blood

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Marines are convinced that the insurgency in Anbar province is largely funded by profits from oil smuggling. And, to make things more complicated, they say some of the smuggling is done by tribes friendly to the U.S. and hostile to the insurgency.

The tribes sell purloined oil to others in a chain of business deals, and the insurgency ends up making a profit, too.

One of the problems, Marines say, is that the tribes see this kind of oil trade as natural, and not at all illegal.

— Tony Perry in Anbar province