the Bahrein and Basrah concessions, described the attitude of the "various authorities and rulers" toward the IPC in these words:
From the earnestness of their address in my conversation with various authorities and rulers on the subject of production, they will brook no sitting on concessions, regardless of what loopholes the terms may give us, particularly us, whom, one and all, they suspect as capable of cheating on production, the future leaves them cold; they want money now.
The pressure of governments and of public opinion appears to have induced IPC to dispense with some of its restrictions. In 1938, one oil company official wrote:
As regards the BOD and Basrah concessions it is the consensus of opinion of the Groups that it will be necessary to explore these concessions and if satisfactory oil is found, that same should be exploited, even though the production and the reserves from the IPC concession would amply cover the crude oil requirements of the Groups. We are led to this conclusion since we do not believe that public opinion or the Government would permit that these large areas were either left unexplored or unexploited if production were found.
World War II interrupted the operations of IPC in most of its concessions, and political disturbances handicapped its activities since that time. Yet even after allowing for these difficulties, in 1948 production in Iran was seven times larger than in Iraq, while in 1936 production in Iran was a little more than double that in Iraq. In Saudi Arabia commercial production did not begin until 1938, but by 1948 it was almost six times the production of Iraq.
The restrictive policies of the Iraq Petroleum Company during its early years have been summarized as follows:
Following the discovery of oil in Iraq in October, 1927, these three groups (BP, Shell, and Exxon-Mobil) employed a variety of methods to retard developments in Iraq and prolong the period before the entry of Iraq oil into world markets. Among the tactics used to retard the developments of Iraq oil were the requests for an extension of time in which to make the selection plots for IPC's exclusive exploitation, the delays in constructing a pipeline, the practice of preempting concessions for the sole purpose of preventing them form falling into other hands, the deliberate reductions in drilling and development work, and the drilling of shallow holes without any intention of finding oil.
Restrictive policies were continued even after a pipeline was completed, for in 1935, IPC's production was a shut back several hundred thousand tons. Moreover, for a time, a sales coordinating committee was established to work out a "common policy regarding the sale of Iraq oil." Again in 1938 and 1939, the Big Three opposed any "enlargement of the pipeline and the corresponding increase in production" on the ground that additional production would upset the world oil market. Although the Big Three eventually conceded to the demands of the French (CFP) for some expansion, no action was taken until after World War II.
While the restriction of Iraqi production during the 1930's had its roots in the generally depressed economic conditions of the time, the continued curtailment of Iraq's output after World War II stemmed from different causes. With the development of Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, the US firms- which owned 100 percent of the former and 50 percent of the latter- gained large-scale sources of supply that were far more attractive to them than Iraq, where their ownership interest was only 23.75 percent. A later complication was the emergence of Libya as an important and largely uncontrollable source of Middle East countries. To the question of whether Libyan output could be accommodated within the limits of the overall growth rate Page answered, "Of course, with Iraq down." Indeed, keeping Iraq "down" was the only means by which the high growth rates of iran and Saudi Arabia could be sustained in the face of Libya's expansion without creating a price-reducing surplus.
That the IPC continued its restrictive practices into 