UPDATE 8-Oil steady as Middle East conflict fears support, Trump probe weighs

* Pentagon to send radar, missiles to bolster Saudi defenses
* House releases whistleblower report on Trump-Ukraine
dealings
* Saudi move to restore production adds to supply
* Trump says trade deal with China could come soon

(Updates prices to settlement, market activity, comments)
By Laila Kearney
NEW YORK, Sept 26 (Reuters) - Oil was largely flat on
Thursday after a Pentagon statement intensified concerns of a
Middle East conflict disrupting supply, supporting prices, while
new details connected to the impeachment inquiry into U.S.
President Donald Trump weakened demand sentiment.
Brent crude LCOc1 futures settled at $62.74 a barrel, up
0.6%, or 35 cents. U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude
CLc1 settled at $56.41 a barrel, down 8 cents, after briefly
turning positive following the Pentagon statement.
Crude futures pared losses late in the session after the
U.S. Department of Defense said it would deploy radar systems,
Patriot missiles and about two hundred personnel to bolster
Saudi Arabia's defenses after an attack on the kingdom's oil
facilities this month. Details about the deployment clarify the Pentagon's Friday
announcement about U.S. plans to send more forces to Saudi
Arabia after the Sept. 14 strike, which Washington has blamed on
Iran.
"The complex saw a late session rally on reports that the
U.S. was sending military equipment to Saudi Arabia with the
headlines driving another dose of risk premium into the pricing
structure," said Jim Ritterbusch of Ritterbusch and Associates.
Oil took a hit earlier in the session after the U.S. House
Intelligence Committee released a declassified version of a
whistleblower report alleging Trump used his office to solicit
interference in the 2020 presidential election from a foreign
country. "When the odds of impeachment go down, the market goes up.
When the odds of impeachment go up, it goes down," said Phil
Flynn, an analyst with Price Futures Group in Chicago. "The
market doesn't like the prospect of impeachment - that's going
to be a negative for the U.S. economy, it's going to be a
negative on U.S.-China trade."
Prices were also under pressure by the faster-than-expected
recovery of Saudi output after the drone and missile strikes on
two of its oil-processing plants, as well as a surprise 2.4
million-barrel build in U.S. crude inventories last week.

Saudi Arabia, the world's top oil exporter, has restored its
production capacity to 11.3 million barrels per day, sources
briefed on state oil company Saudi Aramco's operations told
Reuters. Comments by Trump on Wednesday, which signalled that a
resolution to the U.S. trade dispute with China might be near,
helped limit losses.
A day after delivering a stinging rebuke to China over its
trade policies, Trump said Beijing wanted to make a deal and it
"could happen sooner than you think."
Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe also signed a
limited trade deal that would open Japanese markets to $7
billion of U.S. products annually.