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N0KFQ > TODAY 17.10.15 15:45l 59 Lines 2773 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
BID : 70240_N0KFQ
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Subj: Today in History - Oct 17
Path: IZ3LSV<IR1UAW<IQ5KG<I0OJJ<N6RME<N0KFQ
Sent: 151017/1445Z 70240@N0KFQ.#SWMO.MO.USA.NA BPQ1.4.64
1973
OPEC enacts oil embargo
The Arab-dominated Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries
(OPEC) announces a decision to cut oil exports to the United
States and other nations that provided military aid to Israel in
the Yom Kippur War of October 1973. According to OPEC, exports
were to be reduced by 5 percent every month until Israel
evacuated the territories occupied in the Arab-Israeli war of
1967. In December, a full oil embargo was imposed against the
United States and several other countries, prompting a serious
energy crisis in the United States and other nations dependent on
foreign oil.
OPEC was founded in 1960 by Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, and
Venezuela with the principle objective of raising the price of
oil. Other Arab nations and Third World oil producers joined in
the 1960s and early 1970s. For the first decade of its existence,
OPEC had little impact on the price of oil, but by the early
1970s an increase in demand and the decline of U.S. oil
production gave it more clout.
In October 1973, OPEC ministers were meeting in Vienna when Egypt
and Syria (non-OPEC nations) launched a joint attack on Israel.
After initial losses in the so-called Yom Kippur War, Israel
began beating back the Arab gains with the help of a U.S. airlift
of arms and other military assistance from the Netherlands and
Denmark. By October 17, the tide had turned decisively against
Egypt and Syria, and OPEC decided to use oil price increases as a
political weapon against Israel and its allies. Israel, as
expected, refused to withdraw from the occupied territories, and
the price of oil increased by 70 percent. At OPEC's Tehran
conference in December, oil prices were raised another 130
percent, and a total oil embargo was imposed on the United
States, the Netherlands, and Denmark. Eventually, the price of
oil quadrupled, causing a major energy crisis in the United
States and Europe that included price gouging, gas shortages, and
rationing.
In March 1974, the embargo against the United States was lifted
after U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger succeeded in
negotiating a military disengagement agreement between Syria and
Israel. Oil prices, however, remained considerably higher than
their mid-1973 level. OPEC cut production several more times in
the 1970s, and by 1980 the price of crude oil was 10 times what
it had been in 1973. By the early 1980s, however, the influence
of OPEC on world oil prices began to decline; Western nations
were successfully exploiting alternate sources of energy such as
coal and nuclear power, and large, new oil fields had been tapped
in the United States and other non-OPEC oil-producing nations.
73, K.O. n0kfq
N0KFQ @ N0KFQ.#SWMO.MO.USA.NA
E-mail: kohiggs@gmail.com
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