Word: irak
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Died. The Emir Ali, 64, onetime King of Hejaz, brother of the late King Feisal of Iraq and the Emir Abdullah of Trans-jordania; after long illness; in the Bagdad palace of his nephew, King Ghazi of Irak...
...Arabs under Feisal had helped the Allies on the promise of an independent Arab kingdom. Instead, the Allies gave Feisal Syria under a French mandate. When Feisal took his kingship seriously, the French kicked him out. Chastened, he was given the British mandate of Irak. Complained he: "European statesmen are like impressionist paintings. The effect at a distance is excellent...
Meanwhile no one had forgotten the oil. France had taken Germany's place. The U. S. had cut itself in on the pure-hearted principle of the "open door." Perhaps the Turkish concession was good but the companies wanted a new one from Irak's King Feisal. At last Irak Petroleum Co. was formed and the shares were equally divided, 23% each, among the winners: The Netherlands' Royal Dutch-Shell; Anglo-Persian, in which the British Government has a 50% interest; France's Compagnie Française des Pétroles, in which the French Government...
...when a Briton discovered oil in Mosul (whence the word muslin), not far from the legendary site of the Garden of Eden, in the shadow of Mesopotamia's Kurdish Hills. Then the slippery Sultans of Turkey ruled, as Arab provinces, what is now Irak. The European oil companies were so greedy to get the Sultan's oil that they checkmated one another's efforts until June 1914. The line-up then was Britain, The Netherlands and Germany. Months later the War started, eventually eliminating Buyer Germany and Seller Turkey. After the War the double-crossing was resumed...
Everything was apparently set but in 1931 the world's oil markets were flooded by the eruption of the East Texas oil fields. The British, U. S. and Dutch oil men wanted to keep their Irak oil off the market as long as possible. The French, however, with no oil of their own, wanted their Irak oil at once. King Feisal, too, wanted his oil royalties, the chief prop of his State's income. Soon afterward Britain ended its mandate over Irak and gave Feisal his kingdom free and clear, with full membership in the League of Nations...