“We must become the owners, or at any rate the controllers at the source, of at least a proportion of the oil which we require.” — British Royal Commission, agreeing with Winston Churchill’s policy towards Iraq, 1913
“What we want to have in existence, what we ought to have been creating in this time is some administration with Arab institutions which we can safely leave while pulling the strings ourselves; something that won’t cost very much, which the Labour government can swallow consistent with its’ principles, but under which our economic and political interests will be secure. […..] If the French remain in Syria we shall have to avoid giving them the excuse of setting up a protectorate. If they go, or if we appear to be reactionary in Mesopotamia, there is always the risk that [King] Faisal will encourage the Americans to take over both, and it should be borne in mind that the Standard Oil company is very anxious to take over Iraq.” — Sir Arthur Hirtzel, Head of the British government’s ‘India Office Political Department.’ 1919
” [Middle East oil is] a stupendous source of strategic power, and one of the greatest material prizes in world history.” — U.S. State Department, 1945
“If they turn on the radars we’re going to blow up their goddamn SAMs (surface-to-air missiles). They know we own their country. We own their airspace… We dictate the way they live and talk. And that’s what’s great about America right now. It’s a good thing, especially when there’s a lot of oil out there we need.” –U.S. Brig. General William Looney (Interview Washington Post, August 30, 1999) [Referring, in reality, to the brutal mass-murder of hundreds of civilian Iraqi men, women and children during 10,000 sorties by American/British war criminals in the first eight months of 1999]
“Oil is much too important a commodity to be left in the hands of the Arabs.” —Henry Kissinger
