The Global Wars for Oil and the Capitalist Hostility to Iran

The assassination of the Iranian military official General Qasem Soleimani has raised the question of why people who have power in this country have problems with the government and people of the nation of Iran. In my opinion, this hostility largely stems from the fact that Iran, and many of the nations of that region contain most of the oil resources of the world.

We all need transportation in order to get to our jobs. Most of this transportation uses gasoline that is a byproduct of oil. So, every single corporation in the world is totally dependent on oil for their profits.

Corporations are locked into a system where they must be obsessed with the drive to maximize profits. When the people of Iran receive more in resources for their day to day lives, corporations receive less in their drive for super-profits. When we understand these basic facts, the history of Iran and the rest of the Middle East becomes clear.

However, even before the current hostilities against Iran, we can go back to the Second World war to see how capitalist powers have always been obsessed with dominating the oil resources in the world. We might think about the fact that WWII was a highly mechanized war that depended on tanks, aircraft, naval destroyers, and aircraft carriers. All this military hardware depended on a constant supply of oil.

During WWII Germany’s sources of oil came from Romania and their synthetic conversion of coal to oil. Before the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor, the United States government cut off the oil exports to Japan. At that time, Japan depended on 80% of its oil from the United States. Japan made up some of this oil shortage with its colony in Indonesia. However, both Japan and Germany had insufficient amounts of oil to conduct the war.

This was one of the reasons why Germany invaded the Soviet Union, where there were plentiful oil supplies. Ironically the Soviet government of Joseph Stalin had been supplying the German Nazis with oil before the German invasion. The German fascists also worked to consolidate friendly relations with Reza Shah, who was the ruler of Iran at that time.

Reza Shah wanted to play a neutral role in WWII. He opposed the targeting of Jews by the Nazis, and Iranian diplomats protected hundreds of Jews from persecution.

However, both Britain and the Stalinist Soviet government were opposed to the neutral stance of the Shah. The British depended on Iranian oil. The Soviet Union had been invaded by the fascists and formed and alliance with Britain and the United States. The United States needed to supply the Soviets with armaments via a rail line going through Iran.

For these reasons Britain and the Soviet Union invaded Iran and defeated Iranian resistance in two months. Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, the son of the former Shah, was placed in power and Iranian oil became a vital part of the allied war effort.

However, most of the oil used in the Second World War came from the region around the state of Texas. Initially the Germans sent submarines to the Caribbean Sea to destroy tankers filled with oil coming from Texas.

The United States government advanced a huge infrastructure project aimed at getting oil from this country into the Second World War. Scientific advancements, and a huge labor force, combined to produce the Big Inch and Big Little Inch Pipelines. These two pipelines connected Texas’ oil to New Jersey and Pennsylvania. These pipelines also made it easier for Texas oil to be delivered to Europe.

After Germany was defeated at the battle of Stalingrad, the Allied forces invaded at Normandy. From that point on, the United States moved to become the superpower of the world.

In the war against Japan, the United States manufactured over 100 aircraft carriers, while the Japanese only managed to produce eight. This large disparity in war production gave the United States a tremendous advantage in the naval war in the Pacific. The Japanese also had to contend with the national liberation movements in China, Korea, and Vietnam.

Looking at this history we see how oil production was one of the reasons why the United States became the super-power of the world.

A brief background to the history of the United States

The capitalists in the United States were the real victors of the Second World War. Their victory allowed the United States to replace Britain as the world’s super-power.

The British ruled the world by using their colonial system. That system included colonies in South Africa and Palestine.

The United States had a different approach to ruling the world. For most of Britain’s former colonies, the United States relied on indigenous governments that ruthlessly carried out the dictates of Washington and Wall Street. However, in South Africa and Israel the United States relied on colonial settler states that advanced a course similar to the history of the United States.

The thirteen colonies were a settler regime that confiscated huge areas of land from the native inhabitants. Capitalists in the U.S. were also tied to the system of chattel slavery that advanced a perspective that Black people were not entitled to citizenship rights. While the revolution that created the United States did away with British rule, the theft of native land, as well as chattel slavery continued.

However, chattel slavery also was a roadblock to the advancement of capitalism. This reality convinced northern capitalists to support the Union forces in the Civil War. That war ended chattel slavery.

However, after the Civil War the federal government abandoned the idea of giving Black people equal rights and supported the segregationists who made Jim Crow segregation the law. This meant that Black people lost citizenship rights in this country.

Then, in the 1960s the civil rights movement forced the government to outlaw Jim Crow. Discrimination in the United States became a covert rather than overt policy.

The creation of the apartheid states of Israel and South Africa

In 1948 both Israel and South Africa formed new governments that expropriated lands from the original inhabitants. Then, those governments adopted laws that legally discriminated against the indigenous inhabitants.

The history textbooks of the United States routinely argue that the land where the European colonists settled was a wilderness. A wilderness is a place where there is no life. However, millions of people representing about 500 nations lived on that land.

The Zionist movement that organized to create the state of Israel argued in 1895 that the Palestinian people would need to be removed from their homeland in order for the state of Israel to be established. This was in a written statement by one of the founders of Zionism, Theodore Herzl. Every Israeli prime minister has echoed that sentiment. This attitude meant that the Israeli government never took seriously the idea of equal rights for Palestinians.

The United States became an indispensable supporter of Israel. Every year the U.S. gives Israel billions of dollars in aid. In fact, the U.S. gives Israel more money than any other nation in the world. Yet Israel only has a population of only about seven million. So, we can ask the question: Why does the U.S. give all this money to Israel?

When we look at the map, we see that Israel is located in the region where most of the oil in the world is located. Today Israel is the dominant military power in that region. Included in the Israeli arsenal are atomic bombs capable of destroying vast areas of land along with its inhabitants.

So, when we look at the absolute need of oil to support the capitalist system, the reason for the enormous aid the United States gives to Israel becomes clear.

The United States capitalists continue to consolidate their dominance after WWII

The pro-capitalist media routinely portrays the allied victory in the Second World War as an immense victory for the human race. Clearly, the regime of Adolf Hitler and the Nazis was one of the most destructive in human history. However, after WWII the United States government inflicted numerous horror stories on the people of the world.

In order to consolidate its dominance of the Pacific region, the United States went to war against Korea and Vietnam. These wars cost the lives of millions of people who lived in those regions. In 1965 the United States supported a coup in Indonesia that cost the lives of hundreds of thousands of people in that country.

In the Middle East the United States government also worked consistently to advance its position as the super-power of the world. In 1953 the U.S Central Intelligence Agency worked to overthrow the Iranian government of Mohammad Mosaddegh. The government headed by Mosaddegh nationalized Iranian oil and worked to limit the powers of the Shah. 

In Iraq the United States government favored the 14 Ramadan Coup of 1963 to depose the government of Abd al Karim Qasim. The Qasim government nationalized Iraqi oil and was a popular government. The Ba’ath Party organized the coup and the regime of Saddam Hussein eventually took power.

These coups resulted in decades of ruthless repression of the people of Iran and Iraq. However, the oil and auto corporations in the United States gouged out super-profits during those same years.

Then, in the year of 1959 a revolution erupted in the nation of Cuba. The Cuban revolutionary government of Fidel Castro was different from the governments that had been overthrown in Iran and Iraq. The new Cuban revolutionary government worked to solidify its relations with the masses of Cuban people.

So, when the United States organized a military force to invade Cuba at the Bay of Pigs (Playa Girón), the Cuban people organized to defend their government. The results of this history are clear for everyone to see.

Iran and Iraq are minerally rich nations that have vast deposits of oil. Cuba is a relatively poor country in mineral deposits, and relies on income from tourism, sugar, and nickel.

As a result of the coups in Iran and Iraq those countries went through decades of ruthless repression. In spite of the fact that the land in Cuba is relatively poor, today Cuba has three times more doctors per capita as the United States. Today thousands of children die every year in the United States because this country doesn’t have the professionalism of Cuban health care. While pregnant Cuban women and children receive regular medical check-ups, this is not the case in the United States for the majority of the population.   

Conclusion

When we look at this history, I believe a clear picture emerges. The 1979 revolution in Iran was a clear denunciation of a U.S. supported regime in that country. Clearly the current Iranian government doesn’t have the revolutionary character of the Cuban government. However, the imperialist character of the United States government demands that Iran have a government that is totally compliant with its goals. I believe that the history I’ve pointed to underscores this point.

The current reality of Iraq is clear to anyone who looks clearly at that nation today. As horrendous as the regime of Saddam Hussein was, the current reality is even worse. The U.S. imposed economic embargo and war created these conditions.

In the United States while corporations have been gouging out super-profits, the overall standard of living has been in decline for about 50 years. For me, this reality means that workers and farmers in this country have the same interests as workers and farmers in Iraq, Iran, and Cuba. These interests stem from the fact that human needs are more important than profits.

When we look at this history of the world since the Second World War, I believe a clear picture emerges. One of the priorities of U.S. imperialist foreign policy has been to control the world’s supply of oil. We see this in the U.S. policy with respect to Iraq, Iran, Israel-Palestine, and now Venezuela.

The workers and farmers in these countries have the same interests as workers and farmers in this country. For these reasons, as a worker, I oppose the hostilities the U.S. government has advanced towards Iraq, Iran, Palestine, and Venezuela.    

Cuba has shown the world how to defend the interests of workers against international capitalist drive for profits. I believe that today more and more people in the world are learning that lesson.