the middle east
the part of asia that europeans see
as the middle of what they see as the
east
sort of arbitrary whatever we call it
the middle east this part of the world
is literally where civilization started
right here in modern-day iraq and over
the years the borders here have been
redrawn
many times as empires have ebbed and
flowed through this region
by the way i didn't make this time lapse
a very talented youtuber did
and he deserves a medal for it
or perhaps just a new patron thanks man
anyway the most recent
carving up of this region happened by
european powers
the french the british the russians i
mean are we surprised
no like of course of course it was the
british of course it was the french of
course it was europeans of course
the lines they drew didn't really take
into account language or ethnicity or
regional identity they just sort of
sliced it all up amongst themselves
and said these are our new regions of
power
in the middle east eventually those
european powers left but
the lines they drew stuck around and
became
the skeleton for what the borders look
like today
and this is where our story starts in
the 1930s
here in the modern middle east at this
point
across the ocean there was this growing
superpower that had spent the last
century moving west
taking over this whole continent and
beyond deep into the pacific ocean
we've talked about that a bit but things
were changing the world had just fought
a brutal world war that was fought with
new weapons
that were powered by this new important
substance
oil germany lost that war in part
because they didn't have
access to enough oil to keep up with
this new style of warfare
that relied a lot more on machines
the young superpower realized that
access to this stuff would determine
who would be powerful and who would not
so they stopped looking west for a
moment
and turned east with hopes of finding
the fuel they needed to build their
power
the us presence in the middle east
started with one little dot
right here but soon that dot would
expand into a sprawling network of
alliances
covert attacks flows of weapons money
and the building of innumerable bases
and eventually turning into full-on
ground wars
this is how the u.s stole the middle
east
ready and willing to employ all means
necessary
okay so it's the 1930s and the us
doesn't have a
significant presence in the middle east
at this point but that's about to change
because there's a company based in
california that wants to explore this
vast desert for oil
11 000 miles from san francisco
there lies a primeval desert a mass of
drifting
sand and sun-baked earth one-third the
size of the united states
this was sort of a risky decision for
the california company because first off
they had no idea if there was actually
any oil here
they knew it would mean sinking into the
desert the money of thousands of
stockholders
in a project that might well end in
complete loss
and second off this desert was a part of
a
very hardcore religious kingdom the fact
that mecca is the source and the shrine
of islam
gives saudi arabia a central place in
the islamic
and therefore the arab world that was
home to the holiest sites in islam
run by a dogmatic royal family that did
not like outsiders
especially non-believing westerners but
even still
the king of the desert kingdom
eventually gives the california company
permission to explore
almost a million square kilometers of
this desert looking for oil
and after a few years the bet paid off
and on march 3rd
1938 in this little patch of coastal
desert
they struck gold well actually they
struck oil but
it might as well have been gold
[Music]
so throughout the 30s and 40s american
oil executives workers and their
families started
flocking to the middle east establishing
the first significant
american presence in the region they set
up little cities around the oil
operation that were little slices of
america
full of the deepest sinful behavior
like allowing women to drive and the
consumption of alcohol
here is another american colony complete
with air-conditioned houses
two hospitals and an outdoor movie
theater
this is the sort of stuff that is very
off limits in saudi arabia it's
literally
illegal at this point so you have a lot
of saudis who are not happy about their
government letting the americans
in to behave however they want but the
oil kept
flowing and soon the u.s government goes
to the royal family and says
listen the oil is flowing better than
ever this is awesome
how about we build a little military
base attached to our little oil city
so that we can you know protect you and
protect us and protect the oil and stuff
and the saudis are like okay um having
the great satan come to our country for
oil is one thing
but letting them set up a full-on
military base on our soil
and especially when like everyone in our
country is not happy with their presence
in the first place
but said the royal family
all of this oil is really valuable and
it's really nice and we're getting super
rich
so they're like yeah sure set up the
base but there was one stipulation that
the saudis had for the americans
you are not allowed to literally plant a
flag
no flagpoles of the united states you
cannot put your flag anywhere on this
base
instead you can put a little plaque on
the side of the building so that your
flag is not literally on our soil and
that was the deal
and that's exactly what happened the u.s
sets up its first
military operation in the middle east in
the form of a landing strip that is
right next to this oil field
okay so all of this infrastructure that
the americans were building
required someone to build it they needed
a construction company
and there was one construction company
that the americans really liked that
helped them build their oil city and
their base
this company was founded and run by a
guy named muhammad now listen do you
think i'm really giving you the
backstory on the construction company
that built the air base in the oil city
just because that's interesting and i'd
like to talk about construction
no this is actually very relevant to the
story and you'll see why
very soon so the americans and the
saudis are having this forbidden
oil bromance and it's going really well
and they are just the oil is flowing
everyone's getting rich
and meanwhile the rest of the middle
east is looking at saudi arabia and
they're like
dude wtf why are you like in bed with
america and like why are you letting
them set
up a landing strip in your country and
the saudi royals are like
do you realize how rich we're getting
right now like if you were in our
position
you would do the same thing egypt okay
so it's the 1950s and
let's get back to muhammad the
construction guy his company
by this point is thriving the american
presence
in oil land is just exploding and he is
building
all of the stuff for it and so this guy
is just has a giant business
and he starts to have children well in
fact he had a lot of children
like 54 children because he had 22 wives
because
that is a thing in saudi arabia to this
day
anyway the point is one of muhammad's
sons is named
osama
i told you this was gonna be relevant
okay a reminder that saudi arabia is not
the entire middle east
so i'm gonna leave the osama bin laden
cliffhanger for a moment
to tell you what else was going on in
the middle east at this time remember
that it was the hunt for oil that
brought the us to saudi arabia
originally
but now in the 50s and 60s there was a
new reason
for the us to think about the middle
east and that reason is because there's
another big superpower
that has nuclear weapons called the
soviet union
who is coming into the region and saying
to everyone
come join team communism and the u.s is
like
hold my beer
[Music]
so in addition to oil the us is now
involved in trying to
not let the soviet union have any power
in this region
over in iran there was a democratically
elected leader that the u.s didn't like
they thought he was maybe a little too
friendly with the soviet union so they
worked together with the british
to literally overthrow the government of
iran
so that they could install a dictatorial
leader that was more friendly to the
united states
little side note here the airport that i
fly out of
here in dc is named after the guy who
like
gave the go-ahead for this coup in iran
john foster dulles
so i'm reminded of the whole iran thing
every time i fly so the u.s has its oil
thing it's now involved in
trying to prop up a dictator in iran
there's another big thing happening that
brings the us into the region
which is that the newly declared state
of israel
is starting to piss off its neighbors
and starting to look to the u.s
for support and the us gladly offers it
seeing israel as a friendly nation
in the region that could be a big
proponent of u.s interests so the u.s
starts to fund
israel with tons of money and fighter
jets and
all of these things to help them fight
their wars against their arab neighbors
there was a debate happening in the
united states on whether or not they
should actually do all of this to
support israel
so intensely because they knew if they
did they were going to piss off
all of the neighbors in the middle east
and all of the neighbors are the ones
who had the oil
in the end the us did decide to support
israel and
with that came a major backlash from all
of these oil producing countries in the
neighborhood
there's a crisis of such proportion that
we probably haven't even begun to grasp
it yet as far as the country is
concerned
scenes like this are becoming all too
common on both sides of the atlantic
but for america they are more ominous
they tell the arabs that their oil
weapon is wounding america the country
that supports and supplies their enemy
israel
eventually this backlash against
supporting israel kind of calmed down
there was some peace talks and anyway
let's get back to muhammad the
construction guy and his son osama
because this is where it really starts
to heat up
and it is this world of religious
authority and deeply rooted traditions
that has now been challenged by the
wealth of oil and the western invasion
it has brought
so it's now the 70s and mohammed bin
laden the construction guy
is now insanely rich his construction
company is giant
his 54 children are also rich and his
son
osama is growing up and he's in his 20s
and is looking around at all of this
stuff happening in
iran and in israel and is starting to
feel
really uncomfortable with the notion of
his family being so supportive of
american presence in the middle east
and his government this religious
kingdom home of mecca and medina
being so okay with the us so
embedded in the middle east at this
point these are ancient
holy lands why is my government
and my family supporting this great
satan superpower coming in
and becoming so involved in the middle
east so bin laden
sets out on a lifelong quest to fight
back
against these superpowers not just the
us but also the soviet union
invading the middle east he heads to
afghanistan
where the soviet union is invading
afghanistan trying to take it over
bin laden wants to fight back by the way
the same year
in iran that dictator that the u.s put
in
gets overthrown in a giant religious
revolution
that gets rid of the old dictator that
the u.s liked and puts in a religious
government headed by this guy ayatollah
khomeini
this new government takes a bunch of
americans hostage and
starts off hating the united states and
i mean can you blame them
if someone overthrew the person i
elected i would be pretty pissed too
so anyway back to bin laden he arrives
to afghanistan with a few things
number one a bunch of money remember his
family is like super rich
he also comes with construction
infrastructure because
he's like a construction guy like his
family knows construction and
infrastructure building
but most importantly he comes with an
obsessive
dedication to fighting back against any
superpower
that is invading the middle east so
osama joins in
with all of these rebel fighters who are
fighting back against the soviet union
and they fight a long brutal war by the
way the u.s was
secretly loving this loving that the
soviet union was getting like
beat back by these like rebel fighters
so they end up sending
loads of weapons and money and support
to these fighters
something that will come back to bite
them a few decades later
eventually osama and the afghan fighters
beat back the soviet union it was 10
brutal years of war
and by the end these fighters were
battle hardened
osama was now completely dedicated to
his cause
of fighting back against superpowers who
are coming into the middle east
so he returns back to saudi arabia where
he starts raising money
and awareness for his new group that he
started while he was in afghanistan
it's called al-qaeda and the mission of
the group is to protect
islam through violently striking back
against
big superpowers coming into the middle
east and saudi arabia is like
osama like do you have to do this dude
do you realize how rich we're getting
like saudi princes are living on yachts
in the south of france and like flying
in their private jets and they're like
dude chill like it's fine we get it we
don't like the united states but like
can you like maybe chill
our partnership with the united states
is actually turning out to be really
great and i know yeah they're really
into israel and they're really bad and
everything but like
they buy our oil and they give us
weapons and we're like
doing just fine over here osama doesn't
chill
and the saudi government eventually
takes away his passport not letting him
leave and told him to hush up with all
the anti-american holy war talk
so osama finds another plan to maybe win
back the heart of the royals
saudi arabia has a next door neighbor
named iraq who was run by
saddam hussein who osama sees as a
really bad muslim
totally secular and brutal and he's just
like not a good guy
saddam is also cashing in on the oil
boom he's building big palaces and
statues of himself all over the country
oh yeah and he also used the oil money
to build a giant army like
the fourth biggest in the world with
this massive army
saddam decided that he could maybe
multiply his oil reserves if he popped
down to invade this little tiny country
of kuwait
where there's also loads of oil this
sort of freaked the saudis out if saddam
with his giant army could grab kuwait
what would stop him from marching right
across this desert
into saudi arabia so there's this moment
that like
oh it's like the moment of infamy of
this whole thing where osama goes to the
saudis and he says
i volunteer as tribute he doesn't
actually say
i volunteer and tribute that was a
hunger game i believe we have a
volunteer
but he effectively says i have me and my
battle-hardened men
who like can go in and fight against
saddam and and
defend the kingdom and the saudis are
like um
no we're not gonna like let this ragtag
group
of like rebel fighters fight off the
fourth largest army in the world
and osama's like well we beat the
soviets like they're a big army with
nuclear weapons and everything
and the saudis are like yeah because you
hid in the hills in caves in afghanistan
prince sultan literally told bin laden
verbatim
quote there are no caves in kuwait
and then he asks them what will you do
when he lobs the missiles at you
with chemical and biological weapons
osama's response
we will fight them with our faith and
the saudis are like
um awkward
sorry dude like instead the king met
with somebody else that he thought would
make a much
better fit than bin laden and his faith
fighters
dick cheney had flown to saudi arabia
the day after
saddam had invaded kuwait at this point
the bromance between the u.s and saudi
arabia had cooled a little bit
as saudi had gotten more and more flack
for being in bed with the u.s
but even despite this he told cheney to
come with
as much force and as quickly as he could
[Music]
and that is exactly what dick cheney did
ready and willing to employ all means
necessary
the us went insane here
they recruited 37 other countries and
then they sent more firepower
in terms of ships and bombers and troops
and
all this stuff than you and i could ever
imagine it was
insanity and they totally crushed saddam
within a few weeks they had pushed it on
back
and completely won over the hearts of
the royals
the bromance is back in business so now
you have these
saudis that are beaming at the americans
for helping them fight off saddam
and you have a bunch of bases that the
u.s set up to
mount this attack way more than before
the us
came with all of this firepower and
manpower and bases and artillery
and then they just sort of never left
something that really pissed off
a lot of saudis who were very
uncomfortable with us presence to begin
with
but the guy who was most pissed off than
anyone in the middle east at this point
osama bin laden who had not only been
rejected by his own country
but then who got chosen instead but the
great satan the united states
a power that osama had built his entire
life
fighting against so osama bin laden
starts to double down
on his original mission he leaves saudi
arabia
and begins coordinating very precise
attacks that could really only be
coordinated by a guy who was good at
technical details of a construction
company
and who had lots of money to fund it he
carries out attacks against the united
states
all around the world and by the late 90s
he starts planning the attack that would
change our world forever
so this is just the first half of the
story
what happens next is something that
we're all kind of familiar with
in fact i think we're all still kind of
processing the us presence in the middle
east today
and how that all went down but it
deserves taking a look at
and i'm not going to do that right now i
want to make a separate video
for iraq and afghanistan and israel and
iran
and dive into each of these cases to
show how the u.s presence in the middle
east is not just about
oil in fact oil is becoming less and
less of a vital aspect of the u.s
presence as we
have alternative sources of this sort of
energy instead
our presence in the middle east has
become a fixture of how we think about
foreign policy and how we think about
the map
it's become so embedded in our military
doctrine and in our foreign policy
doctrine
that it's proving to be really hard to
think about how we could ever get out
[Music]
thank you everyone for watching this
video um man middle east
the middle east it's a complicated place
and this is just
a very broad overview and like i said i
want to go deeper into each of these
case studies because
there's so much more to cover with each
of these stories
anyway that is to come stay tuned for
that
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see ya