Oral History Interview with William Tucker, September 25, 1985 Page: 89
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89
feel the pressure. I guess Libya was the first break. I
remember it was in about 1970 when this poker game started
to be played--the major oil companies and the independents
of Libya against the Libyan government. At the same time,
the Iranians came into the picture. There was a negotiation
going on there, and there was a negotiation going on in
Saudi Arabia. The Saudis lagged a little bit behind the
Iranians and the Libyans, but the Iranians and Libyans
started playing a game where each one would leapfrog. A
settlement would be made in Libya, and that settlement
originally was forced by Occidental--Armand Hammer--and
the other independents. That was followed by a settlement
in Iran. So then the Iranians would demand that they get
better terms than had been agreed to. So the thing began
to leapfrog, and the Saudis came into it. There were a
number of different agreements, all technical ways to give
the government a larger take and to force the price up.
So the price of oil in the marketplace bottomed out as the
cost to the majors, who were really offtakers and contractors
in the producing countries. By now all the concessions
had really been nationalized. The governments exertedthe right to their national wealth and their natural
resources, so the oil companies became, in one way or
another, contractors to the governments, and their ability
to attract cash at the wellhead began to get pushed down
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Marcello, Ronald E. & Tucker, William. Oral History Interview with William Tucker, September 25, 1985, book, September 25, 1985; Denton, TX. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc2137858/m1/91/?rotate=180: accessed July 16, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting UNT Oral History Program.