Crude Ambition: This is the story of power

By Seven Media

Crude Ambition is an audio deep dive into the raw power of energy. They call it the industry of industries where most people see a gas station while we see the most high stakes and ruthless game of chess ever played. This is the story of the genius and the greed and the unapologetic reality of the hydrocarbon age as we deconstruct the monopolies that built empires along with the geopolitics that start wars and the industrial titans who realized early on that if you own the energy you own the future. We do not deal in sanitized narratives or green fairy tales but instead focus on energy realism

  1. 37 Saddam Hussein's war for Kuwaiti oil

    Apr 6

    37 Saddam Hussein's war for Kuwaiti oil

    The Cold War is over, oil is cheap, and everyone thinks energy crises are history. Then at 2 a.m. on August 2nd, 1990, a hundred thousand Iraqi troops roll into Kuwait and shatter the illusion. This is the episode where Saddam Hussein gambles on annexation, the world's dependence on the Persian Gulf snaps back into focus, and the first post-Cold War crisis turns out to be all about oil. Episode 37 of Crude Ambition covers the invasion that proved the prize was never safe.

    20 min
  2. 36 The 1986 Oil Price Bloodbath

    Apr 6

    36 The 1986 Oil Price Bloodbath

    Saudi Arabia has had enough. This is the episode where the kingdom's oil revenues collapse from $119 billion to $26 billion, quota cheating tears OPEC apart, and the Saudis finally stop propping up the price and threaten to flood the market. Episode 36 of Crude Ambition follows the brutal price war of the mid-1980s and the question haunting every oil capital on earth: how low can it go?

    25 min
  3. 35 How Wall Street broke the oil giants

    Apr 6

    35 How Wall Street broke the oil giants

    The greatest oil boom in history ends with a billion-dollar shale project killed overnight and Colorado ghost towns sprouting weeds. This is the episode where the fever of thirty-four-dollar oil gives way to glut, conservation proves more powerful than anyone imagined, and OPEC watches helplessly as the world learns to use less. Episode 35 of Crude Ambition charts how the bust that followed the boom nearly turned oil into just another commodity.

    19 min
  4. 34 The Hostage Crisis and Saddam's Oil War

    Apr 6

    34 The Hostage Crisis and Saddam's Oil War

    "We're going down" are the last words from inside the American embassy before the line goes dead. This is the episode where Iranian militants storm the compound, take fifty Americans hostage for 444 days, and the second oil shock spirals into full-blown geopolitical crisis. Episode 34 of Crude Ambition follows the hostage drama, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, and the moment the world realized the shift in oil power was part of something far bigger.

    18 min
  5. 33 The Iranian Revolution and Oil Panic

    Apr 6

    33 The Iranian Revolution and Oil Panic

    A single newspaper article mocking an exiled cleric sets Iran on fire. This is the episode where Ayatollah Khomeini's followers turn mourning into revolution, the Shah's regime crumbles in a relentless cycle of protest and bloodshed, and American intelligence insists the throne is safe right up until it isn't. Episode 33 of Crude Ambition tracks how the Iranian Revolution triggered the second oil shock and sent the world economy reeling all over again.

    21 min
  6. 32 How the 1970s killed cheap oil

    Apr 6

    32 How the 1970s killed cheap oil

    Cheap oil is dead, and the industrial world has to figure out how to survive without it. This is the episode where Japan reinvents its entire economy around conservation, France sends inspectors with thermometers into banks and offices to enforce temperature limits, and the West scrambles to break its addiction to Middle Eastern crude. Episode 32 of Crude Ambition follows Hydrocarbon Man's painful, ingenious fight to adapt to a world turned upside down.

    15 min
  7. 31 How OPEC Seized the Global Economy

    Apr 6

    31 How OPEC Seized the Global Economy

    A building in Vienna quietly changes its nickname from "the Texaco Building" to "the OPEC Building," and that says everything. This is the episode where the oil exporters go from bit players to masters of the global economy, petroleum earnings explode from $23 billion to $140 billion, and the industrial world plunges into its worst recession since the war. Episode 31 of Crude Ambition chronicles OPEC's golden age and the staggering price the rest of the world paid for it.

    21 min
  8. 30 When Oil Brought Superpowers to Their Knees

    Apr 6

    30 When Oil Brought Superpowers to Their Knees

    The embargo hits and the world loses its mind. This is the episode where oil prices explode 600 percent, panicked buyers bid against each other like their survival depends on it, and the age of cheap energy dies in a matter of weeks. Episode 30 of Crude Ambition plunges into the chaos of late 1973, when gas lines, fear, and the scramble for every last barrel reshaped the global economy overnight.

    20 min
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About

Crude Ambition is an audio deep dive into the raw power of energy. They call it the industry of industries where most people see a gas station while we see the most high stakes and ruthless game of chess ever played. This is the story of the genius and the greed and the unapologetic reality of the hydrocarbon age as we deconstruct the monopolies that built empires along with the geopolitics that start wars and the industrial titans who realized early on that if you own the energy you own the future. We do not deal in sanitized narratives or green fairy tales but instead focus on energy realism

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