In his concise yet comprehensive history of petroleum, politics, and the modern world, Don Gillmor argues that oil’s geopolitical dominance is entering its twilight years:

The Oil Wars will always be with us. For more than a century, the wars were among the companies and nations trying to acquire and exploit territories that contained oil. But now oil is fighting its own war, facing both history and a green revolution, two battles it can’t win.

Gillmor’s conclusion to On Oil seems particularly prescient in the context of Donald Trump’s ill-advised and illegal war against Iran that is wreaking havoc on the global economy. Much of the Persian Gulf’s oil infrastructure — including the strategically vital Strait of Hormuz shipping route — lies within range of Iran’s stockpile of decidedly low-tech drones, rockets, and missiles. Whether the war was motivated by Trump’s desire to distract from the Epstein files, secure access to Iran’s oil assets, bring about the end-times, or was simply the consequence of truly exceptional stupidity is anyone’s guess. What’s less ambiguous is that the volatility unleashed in global oil markets by the attack is giving emerging economies worldwide incentive to speed up the transition to renewable energy.