IOR/L/PS/12/3960

The file concerns the United States (US) Government-sanctioned Oil Mission to the Middle East, 1943, and subsequent talks between delegations sponsored by the British and US Governments, which led to the publication of the Anglo-US Oil Agreement in 1944, the purpose of which was to manage international oil supply and demand. A revised text of the agreement was signed in September 1945, but the agreement was not subsequently ratified by the US Government.

The papers include: background papers on British Government oil policy, 1943-44, including one document dated 1934 (folios 283-352); India Office telegram dated 31 October 1943, concerning the political aspects of the preponderant US oil contribution to the Allied war effort (folio 281); papers concerning the US Oil Mission to the Middle East, 1943; papers concerning the proposed US Government oil pipeline from Dhahran in Saudi Arabia to a point in the Mediterranean; the influence of domestic US politics on the Anglo-US talks; India Office 'Memorandum on the Concessions in the Arab Sheikhdoms of the Persian Gulf', dated 1 March 1944 (folios 191-199); reports from the British Embassy, Washington on the progress of the talks; United States No. 1 (1944) Agreement on Petroleum between the Government of the United States of America and the Government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, 1944 (folios 62-64); reports of opposition to the agreement by the US oil industry, 1944; discussion by the US Government of a revised text of the proposed agreement, February 1945; and further Anglo-US talks on renegotiating the oil agreement, 1946-47.

The file also includes correspondence from the Foreign Office, the Ministry of Fuel and Power, the Political Resident in the Persian Gulf, and the Government of India.

The file includes a divider, which gives a list of correspondence references contained in the file by year. This is placed at the back of the correspondence.