ABSTRACT
The importance of petroleum to a nation is not to be gauged alone by the demand for gasoline, for fuel oils, or lubricants. Importance may also be gauged by critical needs, special functions, irreplaceable services more significantly than by quantity of consumption solely. Oil is a raw material that is vital to the welfare, the industrial and military strength of nations, indeed to the very survival of nations. This paper attempts to present a brief picture of the world oil-producing districts and consuming markets, the political impediments to the free movement of oil, and some of the international tensions that have arisen as a result of the fortuitous and uneven manner in which oil resources are distributed geographically and politically.