Moving out of the superpower orbit by Tom Engelhardt

In all of this, the Cold War's "winner" has been highly successful in at least one aspect of its global imperial mission: penetrating previously off-limits regions of the former imperial foe, setting up its own military outposts there, and supporting whatever new Bush-friendly (or NATO-friendly) regimes emerged. Unsurprisingly, this has been especially true in regions capable of contributing to nailing down control over the Middle Eastern (and Caspian) oil heartlands of the planet.