ShmoopTube

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[ musical flourish ]

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And here's your Shmoop du jour, brought to you by the oil crisis,

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the bane of teenage skincare. [ screaming ]

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All right, well, give this excerpt a read.

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[ mumbles ]

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And the question: The cutoff of oil might have been avoided

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if the United States had... what?

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And here are your potential answers.

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[ screaming ]

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Well, this cutoff of oil -

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it was definitely trendy, but not in a good way.

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In 1973, OPEC, the Organization of the Petroleum

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Exporting Countries,

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imposed an oil embargo against the United States,

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raising oil prices almost fourfold.

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Talk about a gas problem. Let's look to the answers

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and find out what might have caused this upset.

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Well, could the cutoff of oil have been avoided if the U.S. had

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A - not bombed Laos and Cambodia and had

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pulled out of Vietnam?

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Well, people might have been frustrated that we were

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in Southeast Asia at all, but Vietnam didn't export

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oil, was not a member of OPEC, and didn't have any sway

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on the group's decisions. So this probably had nothing to do with it.

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Would the cutoff have been avoided if the U.S. B -

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supported the Iranian revolution instead of Mohammed Pahlavi?

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Well, look at the excerpt again. See the year? It's 1973.

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The Iranian revolution was in 1979.

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Now there was another oil crisis after the Iranians overthrew the shah,

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but that rebellion is a little behind our cur. So it's not B either.

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Could the U.S. have avoided the oil embargo if it had

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D - established closer ties

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with Egyptian president Nasser after the Suez Canal crisis?

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Whoa, hold up. Nasser was president of Egypt from 1956

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to 1970. In 1973, Anwar Sadat

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was leading the country. And he actually initiated a break

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away from Soviet influence in Egypt.

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Which means that the cutoff of oil might have been avoided

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if the United States had C - remained neutral during the Yom Kippur War

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between Israel, Syria, and Egypt.

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And there we go. In October of 1973, Syria and Egypt

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launched a surprise attack on Israel, one of America's

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staunchest allies in the region. So you better believe we were

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caught in the middle of, uh, the Middle East.

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When the U.S. supported Israel in the conflict, OPEC

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retaliated by limiting the oil supply, driving prices

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through the roof. That makes C the right answer.

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There's a whole other story we can tell about putting the cartel

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before the horse, but we just won't go there.

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[ horse neighs ]

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