Chamblee54

People are saying more and more about the oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. TomDispatch has a fascinating paragraph about one of the key players, British Petroleum (BP): “Originally known as the Anglo-Persian Oil Company (later the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, still later British Petroleum), BP got its start in southwestern Iran, where it once enjoyed a monopoly on the production of crude petroleum. In 1951, its Iranian holdings were nationalized by the democratic government of Mohammed Mossadeq. The company returned to Iran in 1953, following a U.S.-backed coup that put the Shah in power, and was finally expelled again in 1979 following the Islamic Revolution.”
If you look at the problems of the world in the last forty years, so many are affected by Iran. The 1953 revolution left great resentment, which became manifest in the 1979 revolution. Soon Iraq…whose border with Iran was clumsily drawn by the British…decides to attack Iran. A gruesome eight year war is the result, with the USA supporting both sides ( as well as possibly encouraging Iraq to attack Iran). The idea was, if they are fighting each other, they will leave Israel alone.
After this war is over, Iraq has a problem with Kuwait over it’s war debt. Another war is the result, with the USA involved. Iraq is vanquished, but some in the USA are not satisfied, and after a few years the USA invades Iraq again. That war is still raging.
The biggest winner of the US-Iraq war (aka World War W) is Iran. This new influence in Persia is very troubling to Israel, which is loudly rattling it’s nuclear saber. While Israel is making noise about Iran, it takes attention away from the Palestinian tragedy.
It is interesting to consider that during the Iran-Iraq war, Israel was the middleman in the “Iran Contra Affair”. This involved selling weapons to Iran, to use against the weapons (including wmd) that we were selling Iraq. Apparently, Iran was not an existential threat in those days.
Pictures are from The Library of Congress. This is a repost. This was originally published at this time two years ago, when people feared the worst about the Gulf of Mexico. There are many indications that the recovery is far from complete.