OPEC-Iran-Shah

Guardian (UK) Sunday April 8, 2007

“The gathering of Russia, Iran and other major international gas producers tomorrow in Qatar is an ominous one for the UK and other European countries. Western leaders…for years had to deal with OPEC, which [controlled] a large chunk of world oil trade. They [again] face a potential new natural gas cartel. Indeed, some members of the Gas Exporting Countries Forum openly talk about this….Of course, they will use friendly words - 'co-ordination', 'security of supply' and 'predictability'. But what they have in mind is an organisation that will behave in ways entirely hostile to the market-oriented goals for which UK governments have pushed for [three] decades. It may not happen straight away - but it will happen, and more influence over gas markets will bring more geopolitical muscle….This week's meeting is picking up unfinished business dating back to the 1970s energy crisis. It was the Shah of Iran, Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, who first raised the idea.”

Needless to say, OPEC does control a large chunk of world oil trade, but others have been controlling OPEC (therefore the change in wording). And the “others”, despite what is being claimed here, and in so far as the Near East is concerned, are not “the natives”. For that is a requirement, perhaps the requirement, for achieving what he calls “market-oriented goals”. However, of interest to me here is the fact that the author makes no secret of the Shah of Iran’s idea of such an organization (which he did put into action) having been perceived as a hostile and ominous threat by the European governments and, presumably, certain US administrations. And so, while Chomsky and Islamists on one hand, and apparatchiks self-styled as “peace activists” and “socialists” on the other, are still busy portraying pre-Islamic Republic Iran as a “client state”, to others the actual causes of the “Glorious Revolution” of Khomeini and the murderous Shiite Taliban are becoming more clear.