The War Begins
The war for the Greater Middle East can be said to have been prompted by a near-hysterical over reaction to a geologist’s report stating that oil production in North America had peaked and would soon begin to fall off sharply. This led to president Jimmy Carter’s infamous “Crisis of Confidence” national address urging energy conservation. The response from conservative pundits and the public was so savagely negative that Carter’s ensuing State of the Union Message in January 1980 would announce what came to be known as the Carter Doctrine: the United Staes would regard the Persian Gulf area to be of vital national security interest. Carter immediately order the Department of Defense to seek out locations for military installations in the area.
