Much of Asia's water originates on the Tibetan plateau which is controlled by China.

See:

http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/06/26/opinion/edchellany.php

QUOTES

Tibet's vast glaciers and high altitude have endowed it with the world's greatest river systems. Its rivers are a lifeline to the world's two most-populous states - China and India - as well as to Bangladesh, Burma, Bhutan, Nepal, Cambodia, Pakistan, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam. These countries make up 47 percent of the global population.

Yet Asia is a water-deficient continent. Although home to more than half of the human population, Asia has less fresh water - 3,920 cubic meters per person - than any continent other than the Antarctica.

While intrastate water-sharing disputes have become rife in several Asian countries - from India and Pakistan to Southeast Asia and China - it is the potential interstate conflict over river-water resources that should be of greater concern.

This concern arises from Chinese attempts to dam or redirect the southward flow of river waters from the Tibetan plateau, starting point of the Indus, the Mekong, the Yangtze, the Yellow, the Salween, the Brahmaputra, the Karnali and the Sutlej Rivers. Among Asia's mighty rivers, only the Ganges starts from the Indian side of the Himalayas.

END QUOTES

Well it may all work out but would you want China controlling your water supply?

There are other regions where water wars could erupt. Egypt still relies heavily on the Nile. The headwaters of the Nile are located in water-short Sudan.

Much of Syria and Iraq's water originates in Turkey which has dam plans of its own. Turkey is also selling water to Israel.

Anyone have any thoughts?

I know it's hard to pin the blame for all this on Bush or Israel so passions are unlikely to be aroused. But have a go anyway

With population growth, projected climate change and the capability to create huge water diversions , hostility is inevitable.
In asia global warming may postpone tensions as a greater than average amount of glacial melting occurs.

www.sciencepub.org/nature/0404/0215-ashishanthwal-ns.doc

Result more water in the system, for now. Lower Asian countries may well be appreciative of upstream dam infrastructure and it's flood mitigation abilities if the expected climate extremes occur in the future, bringing floods. Peace will depend on whether or not the stored water is equitably shared in drought periods.
The only problem is the greatest weapon available is to control water supply, so hostility may be both futile and fatal.

yes, i have some thoughts:

capitalism forbids population control.

unchecked population growth guarantees water wars.

human society is too stupid to avoid these problems.

stockpile secret caches of water bottles in your back bedroom.

Water plays a significant role in Middle East conflicts - probably more than oil.

For example, not many other people are aware of the dependency of Israel on the West Bank for its water supplies or the importance of Iraq and Turkey for water in the entire region.

Who remembers a water pipeline into Israel quietly opening just after the end of the current Gulf war?
Anybody?
I thought not.

Some overall background -

http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fandd/2001/09/fisher.htm
http://www.scripps.ohiou.edu/news/beirut/tobias.html
http://www.mideastnews.com/water004.html

The supply and control of water around the world will be bigger than any of the oil problems we have seen so far.

When the WTO pressures small nations to privatise their water supplies without giving a reason and when Coca Cola controls 10% of the world's fresh water and uses US military satellites to locate further potential sources, something is happening.

The current desalination plant in NSW is more likely a covert way for private interests to get a foot in the door of publicly owned water supplies.

Look at what happened in Bolivia with Bechtel in 2000.

It is surprising that the Middle East has not blown up already over water.
Low water supplies affects so many things including food production.
I note that Israel has built a significant amount of desalination plant.

I can't understand why there is so much opposition to a desal plant in Sydney.
The power requirement is a furphy, as it can easily be run on wind power
etc if thats what worries you. I ponted this out to Barry O'Farrell and
I know from our conversation that he understood what I was saying, yet
he has come out opposed to the desal plant.

Those opposing it are stark raving mad; it is an insurance policy
against having to move Sydney. Which do you think would be cheaper ?

there's plenty of water, the problem is too many people.

DEMOS wrote:

"capitalism forbids population control."

What on Earth are you talking about?

This sounds like poppycock.

The evidence, BTW, points in the opposite direction. When communist East Germany was reunited with capitalist West Germany fertility in East Germany plunged to the same low levels as those in W. Germany.

When Egypt, as part of its free market reforms, stopped subsidising babies fertility began falling.

Many religions, esp Catholicism and Islam, do for bid population control. But that's a different matter.

Fertility all over the world is falling. In India the total fertility rate (average life time babies per woman) dropped from 5 in 1970 to 2.8 today. Still much too high but the trend is in the right direction. Fertility in China is below replacement and even if the one child policy was dropped I doubt it would rise above replacement.

Even in then Islamic Republic of Iran total fertility has dropped to 1.7, well below replacement.

The worst case country was Saudi Arabia where total fertility was running at 6 in 1990. It is now below 4.

Simply saying there are too many people is not an answer. What do you think we should do about it? Shoot the surplus? Compulsory sterilisation after the second child?

Get real DEMOS.

Capitalism, the wealth it brings, the choices it offers, seems to be a good contraceptive

"Much of Syria and Iraq's water originates in Turkey which has dam plans of its own. Turkey is also selling water to Israel."

Without doing any searching, was there a "Gap Treaty"(?) about the water from Turkey?

I believe that that is suppose to be the trigger for armageddon (according to some vague memory of prophecy stuff).