Speaker 1: Pushkin. Lots of people have been drawing comparisons between the
Speaker 1: US invasion of Iraq in two thousand and three and
Speaker 1: the attacks on Iran in twenty twenty six. Alas point
Speaker 1: to similarities, like claims about nuclear weapons.
Speaker 2: It's also Cowbart testified at Barts the intelligence community said
Speaker 2: Iran wasn't building a nuclear weapon.
Speaker 3: What you said, I think they were very close to having.
Speaker 4: I take the threat very seriously. I take the fact
Speaker 4: that he develops weapons of mass destruction very seriously.
Speaker 1: And the preemptive nature of these attacks.
Speaker 5: There was abundantly clear that if Iran came under attack
Speaker 5: by anyone, the United States or Israel or anyone, they
Speaker 5: were going to respond and respond against the UN the
Speaker 5: United States.
Speaker 1: But then the conversation turns quickly to the many differences,
Speaker 1: the fact that, unpopular as it was, the Iraq War
Speaker 1: did actually have congressional approval, for example, or that there
Speaker 1: were ground troops in Iraq that we haven't really seen
Speaker 1: any wrong For me, the way these two moments in
Speaker 1: US history connect has less to do with intelligence reports
Speaker 1: and battle plans and Republican presidents than it does with
Speaker 1: fossil fuels and propaganda. It pulls together a lot of
Speaker 1: the stories we've been covering over the past several years
Speaker 1: into a single timeline, a unified arc towards fossil fascism.
Speaker 1: To understand what's happening now and where it might head,
Speaker 1: we need to take a step back and look at
Speaker 1: where it came from and how the whole thing hangs together.
Speaker 1: So that's what we'll be doing over the course of
Speaker 1: this three part mini series. Iimimi Westervelt and this is drilled.
Speaker 1: The fossil fuel industry and American identity have always been
Speaker 1: deeply entwined, and in case anyone ever forgets it, the
Speaker 1: American Petroleum Institute is there to beat us over the
Speaker 1: head with it, over and over and over again.
Speaker 6: This year we mark America's two hundred and fiftieth birthday.
Speaker 6: Since the beginning of our great nation, we have never
Speaker 6: accepted limits on what can be achieved. That spirit has
Speaker 6: defined the energy story. In eighteen fifty nine, the Drake Well,
Speaker 6: America's first commercial oil well struck oil in northwest Pennsylvania.
Speaker 6: This breakthrough helped launch a new era of prosperity.
Speaker 1: Here's Mike Summer's American Petroleum Institute President at the twenty
Speaker 1: twenty six State of American Energy event, talking about America's
Speaker 1: first oil well, discovered in Pennsylvania in eighteen fifty nine,
Speaker 1: and how it sparked the modern global oil industry, which
Speaker 1: of course he connects directly back to American energy dominance today.
Speaker 6: It was a reminder then, as it is now, that
Speaker 6: the American energy leadership has never been accidental.
Speaker 1: In this ten minute or so speech, Summers gives us
Speaker 1: a neat and tidy illustration of fossil fascism. Not only
Speaker 1: do you have the nationalism and the idea of a
Speaker 1: return to previous greatness that is the hallmark of fascism
Speaker 1: of every kind.
Speaker 6: Well, we embrace innovation, growth and prosperity, or slide backward,
Speaker 6: deny facts, delaying progress and ignoring the realities of rising demand.
Speaker 6: That's the choice, and the American people have made up
Speaker 6: their mind. We choose energy success, not surrender.
Speaker 1: But you also have that national identity and former glory
Speaker 1: linked inextricably to fossil fuels.
Speaker 6: Americans spent years being told that they should do less,
Speaker 6: build less, produce less, and pay more. We're done with
Speaker 6: all of that. American energy is the future, and America
Speaker 6: is ready to lead.
Speaker 1: And importantly threatened by a small minority.
Speaker 6: A small fringe is stuck in the past. They oppose growth, expansion,
Speaker 6: and new infrastructure. They're against new jobs, higher living standards.
Speaker 6: They resist the energy required, the power modern life. They
Speaker 6: offer no vision for the future.
Speaker 1: Listening to this talk earlier this year, I was reminded
Speaker 1: of a conversation I had with Brown University environmental sociologist
Speaker 1: doctor Robert Brule a few years ago about how long
Speaker 1: the American Petroleum Institute has been connecting fossil fuels to
Speaker 1: American identity.
Speaker 3: The why and share of the effort that these guys
Speaker 3: are spending money on. And it's not on science denial. Yes,
Speaker 3: they spend this much on science denial, and you know,
Speaker 3: I'm not saying that that isn't important and doesn't count,
Speaker 3: but you know, they're spending probably five or ten times
Speaker 3: more trying to influence the perceptions of these corporations and
Speaker 3: the perceptions of their product and tying their product to
Speaker 3: the American way of life and everything good about America.
Speaker 3: You know, apple pie mom, you know the flag fossil fuels,
Speaker 3: and so by implication, what they do is they basically
Speaker 3: say any attack on fossil fuels is an attack on
Speaker 3: our way of life. That's an extremely powerful argument that
Speaker 3: the fossil fuel companies have been making for decades, that
Speaker 3: they've been connecting fossil fuels with the American way of
Speaker 3: life and the good life.
Speaker 1: The APA was formed as World War One, the first
Speaker 1: fossil fueld War came to a close. Oil companies had
Speaker 1: been coordinating during the war to ensure a study supply
Speaker 1: of fuel to the front and Standard Oil of New
Speaker 1: Jersey publicist Ivy Lee thought it would be a shame
Speaker 1: if that coordination ended when the war did.
Speaker 3: After the war ended, there was an interest in sort
Speaker 3: of coordinating an industry position for the petroleum industry to
Speaker 3: represent their interests to the public. And out of that
Speaker 3: comes the American Petroleum Institute and Ivy lead Ross, on
Speaker 3: his experience in the War Propaganda Board, effort to start
Speaker 3: developing larger institutional public relations efforts, and he works with
Speaker 3: the head of Standard Oil of New Jersey, which we
Speaker 3: now know as Exxon Mobil to form the American Petroleum
Speaker 3: Institute in nineteen nineteen and so the American Petroleum Instudents
Speaker 3: is now one hundred years old and it's considered to
Speaker 3: be the really the first modern, sophisticated, public relations oriented
Speaker 3: trade association in the world.
Speaker 1: But it's not just the American Petroleum Institute that emerges
Speaker 1: out of World War One. There's also a newly delineated
Speaker 1: region with a whole bunch of new states and borders
Speaker 1: carved up by the fossil fuel industry and its government
Speaker 1: backers in France, Britain, the Netherlands, and the US after
Speaker 1: the break. How the thirst for Middle East oil both
Speaker 1: contributed to World War One and reconfigured global politics when
Speaker 1: the war ended. From the very early days of the
Speaker 1: oil industry, it's been tied to national identity. It is
Speaker 1: inextricably linked to both nationalism and imperialism. That one hundred
Speaker 1: year history is covered in great detail and a whole
Speaker 1: bunch of really good books I'm going to link to
Speaker 1: in the show notes, but will now attempt to summarize.
Speaker 1: In about five minutes. Here we go history time. Okay, So,
Speaker 1: just as the Americans are getting going in Pennsylvania, Russia's
Speaker 1: czar opens up the Baku region of Azerbaijan to private
Speaker 1: oil prospectors. By eighteen ninety, Russian oil is giving American
Speaker 1: oil a run for its money. At the same time,
Speaker 1: the Dutch have moved to modernize the oil industry in
Speaker 1: Indonesia and start the Royal Dutch Oil Company. Then they
Speaker 1: merge with Shell Transport to create Royal Dutch Shell and
Speaker 1: ship oil all over the world. So within really just
Speaker 1: a few decades, the oil industry is taking root everywhere.
Speaker 1: But that's not happening in the Middle East, although lots
Speaker 1: of people are speculating that there are large oil reserves there.
Speaker 1: Why well, because it's mostly controlled by the Ottoman Empire,
Speaker 1: the so called sick man of Europe, which is in
Speaker 1: economic freefall and limping toward collapse. Various countries start jocking
Speaker 1: to grab the Arabian Peninsula and the oil that lays
Speaker 1: below it. Germany, Britain and France are all there. Germany
Speaker 1: starts building the Baghdad Railway from Baghdad to Berlin, which
Speaker 1: would give them access both to the oil fields of
Speaker 1: Bastra and the ports of the Persian golf An Australian
Speaker 1: gold miner William Darcy begins exploring for oil nearby in
Speaker 1: Persia today Iran and putting bids in on oil fields
Speaker 1: in modern day Iraq. In nineteen oh eight, just as
Speaker 1: he's getting ready to shut down the Persian exploration, he
Speaker 1: hits black gold. He creates a new company, the Anglo
Speaker 1: Persian Oil Company. That's the company known today as BP,
Speaker 1: and guarantees Britain a study supply of Arabian oil. They
Speaker 1: want more, particularly those Mesopotamian oil fields in what is
Speaker 1: today Iraq. For years, Anglo Persian tries to convince the
Speaker 1: Ottoman Empire to give them a concession there. Twice they
Speaker 1: have contracts drawn up and ready to sign, and something happens.
Speaker 1: The first time, rioting breaks out in Istanbul and the
Speaker 1: sultan is deposed before he can sign. The second Archduke Ferdinand,
Speaker 1: heir apparent to the Austro Hungarian Empire, is assassinated, kicking
Speaker 1: off World War One. During the war, Britain takes possession
Speaker 1: of Baghdad and Bosra. As the war comes to an end,
Speaker 1: several secret treaties come to light, among them a collection
Speaker 1: of letters between diplomats Mark Sykes of Britain, George Picot
Speaker 1: of France, and Russian foreign minister Sergey Sazanov, known collectively
Speaker 1: as the Pike's Picot Agreement, negotiated in early nineteen sixteen.
Speaker 1: It splits up the Arabian Peninsula between the three countries,
Speaker 1: without of course, consulting any of the people who actually
Speaker 1: live there. Britain gets Bagdad and Basra, France gets Mosul,
Speaker 1: and Syria Persia's split between Russia and Britain. Anglo Persian
Speaker 1: is not happy about this. They do not like the
Speaker 1: idea of giving Mosul to the French and immediately begin
Speaker 1: working behind the scenes to undermine this arrangement. Yeah, another
Speaker 1: secret deals signed in late nineteen eighteen, the French agree
Speaker 1: to give up Mosil so long as they can retain
Speaker 1: a share of the oil there and control of Syria.
Speaker 1: Digging up shares of the Arabian Peninsula's oil even enters
Speaker 1: into the Versailles Peace Treaty talks in nineteen nineteen, where
Speaker 1: Royal Dutch Shell also enters the chat. There's a whole
Speaker 1: bunch of geopolitical jockeying and a lot of drawing of
Speaker 1: lines and creation of new countries that absolutely sets up
Speaker 1: the next one hundred years of conflict in the region.
Speaker 1: For our purposes, I'm going to jump to the formation
Speaker 1: of Iraq in nineteen twenty two via a treaty that
Speaker 1: Britain drafts with its personally selected monarch King Feisal. It's
Speaker 1: important not just because it creates modern day Iraq, but
Speaker 1: also because it's where an oil giant that had been
Speaker 1: missing from the conversation suddenly appears. It's right, it's the US,
Speaker 1: and particularly Standard Oil of New Jersey, the company known
Speaker 1: today as Exxon mobil. The US had provided most of
Speaker 1: Britain's oil during World War One, and oil for a
Speaker 1: lot of the other allies too, and now they want
Speaker 1: in on divvying up the Ottoman oil spoils. But in
Speaker 1: typical American fashion, the US had also refused to join
Speaker 1: the League of Nations and had never declared war against
Speaker 1: the Ottoman Empire, only Germany, which had targeted US vessels.
Speaker 1: At one of the very first meetings of the American
Speaker 1: Petroleum Institute, US oil executives began agitating for a way
Speaker 1: into Iraq's oil fields. They start releasing all these white
Speaker 1: papers and pamphlets and memos and talking to the press
Speaker 1: about how the British and French oil monopolies are anti
Speaker 1: democratic and anti American. British inspire back that America has
Speaker 1: established monopolies for itself in the Philippines and Haiti, only
Speaker 1: to turn around and criticize Britain for supposedly doing the
Speaker 1: same in Iraq. A massive amount of imperialist sword fighting ensues,
Speaker 1: all while pretending to be very very concerned for the
Speaker 1: rights of the Ottoman Empire's former citizens. Of course, when
Speaker 1: the alliance between Britain and King Faisal is finalized at
Speaker 1: the end of nineteen twenty two, it includes an open
Speaker 1: door for American oil companies in the region. Success except
Speaker 1: that the Turkish Petroleum Company still legally holds the oil
Speaker 1: concession in Iraq, and its negotiator, holosed Sarcus Gulbenkian, a
Speaker 1: Turkish born Armenian educated in Britain, is outsparting all of them.
Speaker 1: Discussions drag on for years, mostly because of Glbenkian, and
Speaker 1: finally in nineteen twenty eight Glbenkian is ready to sign
Speaker 1: a deal. Turkish petroleum will be divided four ways equally
Speaker 1: between Anglo Persia BP today, Royal Dutch Shell Combani Foncees
Speaker 1: de Petron Total Energies Today, and a consortium of US
Speaker 1: companies called the Near East Development Corporation led by Standard
Speaker 1: Oil of New Jersey, later Exxon and Socony Vacuum later Mobile.
Speaker 1: Each group has also given one point twenty five percent
Speaker 1: of their share to the only private stakeholder in the agreement,
Speaker 1: Gulbenkian himself. Accompanying the agreement is a map of the
Speaker 1: Arabian Peninsula with a red line drawn around it, which
Speaker 1: gives the document its name, the Red Line Agreement. Standard
Speaker 1: Oil's publicist Earl Newsome, was educating executives and Washington politicians
Speaker 1: about it back in the nineteen twenties and nineteen thirties.
Speaker 1: When I came across those documents in his archive, suddenly
Speaker 1: the strong sense of entitlement that US oil companies had
Speaker 1: seemed to feel around a rock and its oil made sense.
Speaker 1: It wasn't justified, not at all, but at least I
Speaker 1: knew where this entitlement had come from. It also helped
Speaker 1: make the American Petroleum Institute's power make more sense. It
Speaker 1: wasn't just operating as a trade group lobbying for this
Speaker 1: or that policy. It was actually negotiating foreign policy on
Speaker 1: behalf of the US. No wonder it and the industry
Speaker 1: it represented saw itself as just an extension of America
Speaker 1: and American identity and no wonder, it was so important
Speaker 1: to protect that connection.
Speaker 4: Not only smooth and efficient, but powerful as well. I
Speaker 4: watched them for hours. Great Jinny meed they were superb.
Speaker 4: I just couldn't help comparing them with ours. If you
Speaker 4: call that a comparison, surely these vehicles must be the
Speaker 4: property of the highest officials.
Speaker 6: I was wrong.
Speaker 4: It seems that almost everybody in this country has one
Speaker 4: of those. They call them automobiles.
Speaker 1: This is a clip from an American Petroleum Institute propaganda
Speaker 1: film that came out in the fifties. Doctor Brule told
Speaker 1: me about it a few years ago, and I think
Speaker 1: about it all the time. It's done in the style
Speaker 1: of the Jetsons and depicts Martians landing on Earth. The
Speaker 1: Martians are communists for some reason, and they visit Earth
Speaker 1: and they see cars and oil and decided capitalism is
Speaker 1: the way to go.
Speaker 4: And only one in almost a thousand makes a major discovery,
Speaker 4: pretty big odds. Yet America has proved reserves, the oil
Speaker 4: supplies still underground have kept increasings heavily. I couldn't imagine
Speaker 4: how this ever increasing supply of oil was achieved until
Speaker 4: I found out that there's not just one but thousands
Speaker 4: of oil companies, all competing with each other to discover
Speaker 4: and develop new sources of oil for believe it or not,
Speaker 4: in the USA, anyone who was willing to risk it
Speaker 4: can drill for oil.
Speaker 1: The American Petrolling Institute has only increased its power since then.
Speaker 1: It commissioned one of the industry's first reports on global
Speaker 1: warming in the late nineteen sixties and was integral and
Speaker 1: shaping the economic argument against acting on climate change.
Speaker 2: I was interested in the American Petrollum Institute, and I
Speaker 2: downloaded all the news articles that talked about the American
Speaker 2: Petroleum Institute and climate change, and there, as you can imagine,
Speaker 2: there are thousands of them, and they go all the
Speaker 2: way back to the nineteen eighties. So I downloaded them
Speaker 2: and I sorted them chronologically, and I just started reading
Speaker 2: all of them just to get an idea of what
Speaker 2: the American Petrollum Institute was saying about climate change. And
Speaker 2: I noticed that in the early nineties, the American Petroleum
Speaker 2: Institute is quoting these economists saying, you know, climate change
Speaker 2: is not a problem. It's not going to hurt society
Speaker 2: that much, and it's going to be too expensive to
Speaker 2: get off the fossil fuels, so we shouldn't do anything
Speaker 2: about this problem.
Speaker 1: That's Ben Fronte, who heads up the Climate Litigation Lab
Speaker 1: at Oxford University and uncovered a lot of early API
Speaker 1: documents on climate change.
Speaker 2: And then I saw them the American Petroleum Institute quoting
Speaker 2: and referring to these same economists again and again and
Speaker 2: again for decades in the late nineties and then the
Speaker 2: early two thousands, like wow, these are the go to
Speaker 2: guys for the American Patrollum Institute. And then I discovered
Speaker 2: that a lot of those studies that the American Petroleum
Speaker 2: Institute was citing by those economists were actually funded and
Speaker 2: commissioned by the American Petroleum Institute. So that was incredible.
Speaker 2: But what really got my attention was back in twenty seventeen,
Speaker 2: I think, and Donald Trump had announced that he was
Speaker 2: going to pull the US out of the Paris Climate Agreement,
Speaker 2: and in a speech he gave to justify doing that,
Speaker 2: he cited some economists and said that the Paris Agreement
Speaker 2: was going to be economically devastating for the US if
Speaker 2: the US stayed in it. And I thought that was
Speaker 2: really surprising, and so I went to go find that study,
Speaker 2: and it was authored by some of the same people
Speaker 2: that had been quoted by the American Patrolium Institute for decades,
Speaker 2: and it was the exact same situation. It was a
Speaker 2: study funded by industry, published by a think tank or
Speaker 2: consulting firm, and then it's quoted as being reliable and
Speaker 2: being rigorous research.
Speaker 1: In late twenty twenty one, before Putin invaded Ukraine, the
Speaker 1: American Patrolling Institute took to cable news shows and the
Speaker 1: Internet to warn the American public that the Democrats and
Speaker 1: their climate policies had made us vulnerable in this situation,
Speaker 1: that if they'd just been allowed to drill as much
Speaker 1: as they wanted, America would be able to rub Russia's
Speaker 1: nose in it and sweep in to save Europe with
Speaker 1: plentiful gas.
Speaker 6: There is a lot of concern about what has been
Speaker 6: put forth by this administration, and there's a lot of uncertainty,
Speaker 6: and that uncertainty is leading to a lack of investment
Speaker 6: in the United States.
Speaker 1: And when the.
Speaker 6: Administration is continually putting forward new proposals the limit production
Speaker 6: in the United States, American oil and gas companies are
Speaker 6: cutting back on production.
Speaker 1: That was our friend api President Mike Summers again, and
Speaker 1: it wasn't just Summers. Lots of other industry spokespeople were
Speaker 1: out saying similar things very early on. In fact, it
Speaker 1: was so early and the messages were so similar that
Speaker 1: I figured there must be some kind of coordination. So
Speaker 1: I called that PR expert, Christine Arena, to ask. She thought, for.
Speaker 7: A media campaign where you're engaging different stakeholders and you're
Speaker 7: writing the talking points, if you want your proxies, you know,
Speaker 7: other political officials, other organizations to repeat the same talking points,
Speaker 7: that takes at least three or four weeks. If you're
Speaker 7: producing a creative ad that is on television, that could
Speaker 7: take two months plus in a tight timeline.
Speaker 8: This was just too coordinated.
Speaker 7: Given the timeframe from the triggering event when Putin invaded
Speaker 7: to the release of this creative the intervals were too tight,
Speaker 7: the messages were too word for word. This is an
Speaker 7: organized disinformation effort geared towards affecting policy in the short term.
Speaker 7: I do personally believe that the communications pieces were put
Speaker 7: into place and ready to go prior to February twenty fourth,
Speaker 7: and that the fossil fuel industry knew it stood to
Speaker 7: benefit from Russia's war, not just in terms of near
Speaker 7: term gas prices, but you know, a shorter term scrap.
Speaker 1: It didn't matter that the Democrats hadn't actually managed to
Speaker 1: pass any climate policy, or that permits for oil and
Speaker 1: gas drilling had actually increased under Biden. It didn't matter
Speaker 1: that oil and gas production in the US had just
Speaker 1: hit a record high, or that it was Obama and
Speaker 1: Biden who had led the charge to lift the export
Speaker 1: ban in twenty fifteen, opening the door to the US
Speaker 1: becoming the world's top gas supplier in just a decade.
Speaker 1: What mattered was the story and being able to tell
Speaker 1: it first and loudest.
Speaker 8: The notion that it's octivists and woke people they should
Speaker 8: be the ones to fight climate change. You know, it's
Speaker 8: not relevant for real Americans, this notion that President Biden
Speaker 8: cares more about climate activists than he does about real Americans.
Speaker 8: So there's a concerted push around these narratives.
Speaker 1: Again, it's the industry pulling on the thread of American identity,
Speaker 1: and oil being a fundamental part of it. Worked. Within
Speaker 1: a month, the Biden administration had lifted any delayser restrictions
Speaker 1: on liquefied natural gas terminals and ink to deal with
Speaker 1: Europe that locked them into purchasing large volumes of American
Speaker 1: gas for years to come.
Speaker 5: We're going to work to ensure an additional fifteen billion
Speaker 5: cubic meters of liquified natural gas LNG for Europe this year.
Speaker 5: We will also work to ensure additional EU market demand
Speaker 5: for fifty billion cubic meters of LNG from the United
Speaker 5: States annually by twenty thirty.
Speaker 1: What we heard from industry at the time was the
Speaker 1: same thing we'd heard from President Trump during his first
Speaker 1: term and are hearing from him and his administration today.
Speaker 1: The idea of a lost and former greatness, of an
Speaker 1: identity in a global dominance that's being threatened not by
Speaker 1: climate change or by war, but by a pesky internal
Speaker 1: minority leftists, environmentalists, climate activists. In his twenty twenty six speech,
Speaker 1: API President Mike Summers described them as people who oppose
Speaker 1: progress and American greatness and will therefore be left behind.
Speaker 6: The future belongs to those who are willing to meet
Speaker 6: demand and to lead with realism. Those who claim to
Speaker 6: scarcity and stagnation will be left behind.
Speaker 1: He hammered. On energy dominance too, a theme repeated often
Speaker 1: by Trump and his administration.
Speaker 5: We're looking to be very energy dominant, and we will
Speaker 5: be in a very short.
Speaker 1: Order unleash energy dominance.
Speaker 3: This is unleashed the National Energy Dominance Council.
Speaker 1: We are unleashing energy dominance that taps into another key
Speaker 1: marker of fascism, the strongman leader guy who's going to
Speaker 1: lead us back to that former glory. In the case
Speaker 1: of fossil fascism, we call it petro masculinity. And the
Speaker 1: current US President is a walking example.
Speaker 9: When I wrote about this, that was during the first
Speaker 9: Trump administration. What I wanted to do was understand this
Speaker 9: connection and far right movements between misogyny, anti feminist politics,
Speaker 9: anti queer politics, and the support for fossil fuel and
Speaker 9: climate denial. And they still tend to be talked about separately,
Speaker 9: as if they are sort of coincidentally inhabiting the same movement.
Speaker 1: That's our story next time. Our senior producer and sound
Speaker 1: designer is Martin Zaltz Austwick. He also composed original music
Speaker 1: for this episode. Matt Fleming created the series artwork. Our
Speaker 1: first Amendment attorney is James Wheaton. The show was reported
Speaker 1: and written by me Amy Westervelt