Patrick Link > Recent Status Updates

I didn't know Gertrude Himmelfarb's dissertation was on Lord Acton.

The Western view of the Soviet Union as dominating its Eastern Allies doesn't get much support when looking into the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance.

It seems like Brezhnev saw Siberian gas as a cure-all and wasn't totally wrong.

The CIA killed Mattei, didn’t they?

The slow move to prioritize the Urals over the Caucuses.

DIdn't know that coal and hydropower were much higher priorities over oil in the Soviet Union in the 1930s.

A truncated beginning with Standard Oil.

The controlled "White Revolution" seems to have botched land reform, always a sign of future trouble. There was an interesting part about how the US has no theory of political change and policy is ad hoc and would like to read more about that. Overall, it's an excellent read that opens up the vagaries of Pahlavi era in Iran and of the Seven Sisters oil consortium.

A lot of problems are placed at the foot of the shah who is never secure enough to.

I wish I knew more about the Seven Sisters oil consortium before I started reading this book. I think my interest is taking in more about them than the Iranian factionalism in the book. Might need a re-read after I do more.

First time reading about TVA’s David Lilienthal.

Controlling markets and takers allowed the oil powers to outlast Iran in 1953.

The AIOC not wanting to change an old favorable deal was a major impediment to an already fractured seven year development plan in the late forties.

The main argument of the book stresses that informal relationships between the ruling party and local notables that shape authoritarian power in the event of democratic transition have lasting implications for party system institutionalization.

It seems like the great oil deals of 1946 should be better known watersheds.

Going to try and focus on finishing one or two books at a time in 2024 instead of reading parts and putting them down.