Download or read book Connecting Midstream: The Politics and Economics of Oil Transportation in the Middle East written by John Vincent Bowlus and published by . This book was released on 2013 with total page 648 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This dissertation examines the political and economic significance of oil transportation in the Middle East. It argues that the June 1967 War and the closure of the Suez Canal from 1967 to 1975 transformed the patterns of oil transportation in the Middle East and shaped the history of oil and Middle East politics in the process. Prior to 1967, Western oil companies and governments used the Suez Canal and transnational pipelines from Iraq and Saudi Arabia to transport oil to Europe across oil-transit countries in the eastern Mediterranean, including Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria. During the Suez Crisis from 1956 to 1957, oil supplies were briefly curtailed and alternative oil routes considered, but Western strategies for transporting Persian Gulf oil to Europe did not change.