On February 28, 2026, air strikes killed Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Almost overnight, missiles flew back in retaliation, US forces locked down bases across West Asia, and global energy markets panicked over the Strait of Hormuz. To the average viewer, the war looked like an inevitable clash between two permanent enemies. But turn back the clock and Washington and Tehran weren’t always rivals. They were business partners for years.
It boiled down to one thing: crude oil.
By the early 1900s, British investors controlled Iranian fields through the Anglo-Persian Oil Company (now BP). In 1951, Iranian Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh had had enough of Western exploitation and nationalized the entire oil industry. Washington and London weren’t buying any of it. In 1953, a CIA-backed coup toppled Mossadegh, restored Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, and handed control of Iran’s oil to the global “Seven Sisters” cartel.
That move secured Western energy interests. But it also built decades of deep domestic anger. The monarchy was toppled in the 1979 Iranian Revolution. The US Embassy hostage crisis lasted 444 days and diplomatic ties were severed permanently. Washington supported Iraq when Saddam Hussein invaded Iran in 1980, plunging Iran into a brutal eight-year war of attrition.
Throw in decades of crippling sanctions, secret nuclear sites, and the 2018 collapse of the 2015 JCPOA nuclear deal, and you have the exact powder keg that blew up in 2026.
We don’t just cover breaking conflicts at Borders & Beyond — we tell you how we got here. See how 100 years of oil money, secret intelligence, and political gambits reshaped the Middle East in our 15-minute investigative documentary below.