The coup did not fail - Mossadegh was replaced. Their stakes fell, yes, but to a meager 40%, I believe. This has gotten horribly off-topic, I'm afraid! An interesting discussion, nonetheless.
True dat. Regardless, the fact that the British went from a 100% stake in the Anglo-Persian Oil Company to a 40% stake - particularly when they were willing to overthrow the government rather than take a 50% stake - is hardly a win. Especially when that oil is extracted under the government of an American puppet state.his has gotten horribly off-topic, I'm afraid!
Aye but considering that the Americans themselves got about ~12%, it does put things into perspective as well - the British had to 'share the wealth', as it were, mostly with other European countries like France and Italy. I agree that the we completely restructured the dynamic of our alliance with the British after WWII, but I'm afraid we'll have to agree to disagree when it comes to the extent of that change in dynamic! (Interestingly enough, we were very much in favor of the Iranians and the British splitting profits from oil sales 50/50 but both Churchill and Mossadegh rejected that. We even went through the International Court of Justice! Geez, things have changed since then, heh.)
Mmmm.... Wikipedia's math is a little different than yours. - BP (UK) - 40% - Gulf (US) - 8% - Royal Dutch Shell (UK/ND) - 14% - Total SA (FR) - 6% - Chevron (USA) - 8% - Exxon (USA) - 8% - Mobil (USA) - 8% - Texaco (USA) - 8% That's 40%.
Ah so it is - I was just working off my (clearly outdated) memory. 40/40/20 between the UK, US, and Europe still doesn't quite point to a hegemonic dominance of the oil on our part, though. Interestingly enough, the proportions of stakes of Iranian oil were pretty similar to the stakes in the Iraq Petroleum Company - I'd probably wager the Americans wanted to keep up the status quo in the region by emulating what had been arranged in Iraq.