Thread: Oil in T2k
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Old 07-17-2020, 01:39 AM
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StainlessSteelCynic StainlessSteelCynic is offline
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The relationship between Malaysia and Indonesia would be quite interesting I think. Both nations have Islam as their primary religion but Malaysia still has a relationship with the British Commonwealth and various nations that were part of it. Despite their shared religion, I would think that the Malaysians would lean more towards those nations than they would towards Indonesia particularly as the Malaysia-Indonesia conflict is still within living memory of the older population.
For those who don't know of this particular war, a very rough description: - Indonesia actively sought to prevent the creation of the nation of Malaysia in the 1960s and various British Commonwealth nations fought in the war to allow Malaysia to come into existence.

Regardless of what infrastructure Malaysia might possess for refining oil, it should be remembered that the Malaysian region on the island of Borneo, surrounds the nation of Brunei.
And Brunei has oil.
The other nations in the region have oil but Brunei is basically a country that revolves around oil & natural gas - 90% of it's GDP was derived from crude oil and natural gas through the 1990s into the 2000s. It's built upon the back of oil & gas exports. A tempting target for Indonesia, they only have to hack their way through no more than 50-100 km (31-62 miles) of Malaysian territory to get to Brunei.

A big question would be, would Australia aid Malaysia if Indonesia decided to either attack Malaysia directly or tried to force their way through Malaysian territory to get Brunei?
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