246. Memorandum From Henry Owen of the National Security Council Staff to President Carter1
SUBJECT
- Danger and Opportunity
US and allied reactions to the Iranian crisis may have created an opportunity for a more dramatic breakthrough on the energy problem than seemed possible even a month ago.
In the US the cut-off of Iranian oil has produced widespread media demands for more vigorous action to restrain oil imports.
Abroad, our representatives at the recent Paris meeting of the International Energy Agency received wide support when they proposed setting up a working group to devise a procedure for continually adjusting 1980 oil import targets to changing (and probably diminishing) oil availabilities, and to specify the concrete measures that countries will take to achieve resulting (and probably reduced) import targets.2 They also got allied agreement to move the IEA Energy Ministers’ meeting from January to December, so that these proposals can be acted on in time to influence the first quarter production levels set by several major OPEC countries. Such an agreement to allocate the [Page 775] prospective marginal oil shortage internationally would greatly reduce the competitive scramble for oil that runs up prices and gives political power to radical OPEC countries.
If the Energy Ministers agree to these tighter and more effective limits on 1980 oil imports, we can decide whether any new domestic restraints on US demand are needed to play our part in fulfilling this agreement. Against a background of evident allied cooperation, such measures might stand a better chance of public and Congressional acceptance than in the past.
It is not just the Iran crisis, but your firm stand in that crisis, which has produced the apparent change in US and allied attitudes. Any action that was seen as a US retreat could dissipate the change.
Even without such an upset, the opportunity described above may prove a mirage: Confronted with specific proposals, our allies and the Congress may back away. But we won’t find out without trying. The chances of success now seem sufficient to warrant the attempt—first in the IEA and, if this works, at home. We will report back to you on the IEA results.
- Source: Carter Library, National Security Affairs, Brzezinski Material, Subject File, Box 48, Oil, 8–12/79. No classification marking. Sent for information. The President initialed the memorandum.↩
- See Document 244.↩