1973 oil crisis

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Price of oil adjusted for inflation

Price of oil (nominal)

West Texas Intermediate oil price history 1946–2022^[1]

In October 1973, the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries (OAPEC) announced that it was implementing a total oil embargo against the countries who had supported Israel at any point during the Fourth Arab–Israeli War, which began after Egypt and Syria launched a large-scale surprise attack in an ultimately unsuccessful attempt to recover the territories that they had lost to Israel during the Third Arab–Israeli War. In an effort that was led by Faisal of Saudi Arabia,^[2] the initial countries that OAPEC targeted were Canada, Japan, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, and the United States. This list was later expanded to include Portugal, Rhodesia, and South Africa. In March 1974, OAPEC lifted the embargo,^[3] but the price of oil had risen by nearly 300%: from US$3 per barrel ($19/m³) to nearly US$12 per barrel ($75/m³) globally. Prices in the United States were significantly higher than the global average. After it was implemented, the embargo caused an oil crisis, or "shock", with many short- and long-term effects on the global economy as well as on global politics.^[4] The 1973 embargo later came to be referred to as the "first oil shock" vis-à-vis the "second oil shock" that was the 1979 oil crisis, brought upon by the Iranian Revolution.