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The Masquerade 341

ominous when, at the beginning of December 1970, the government of Ven­
ezuela raised its tax rate to 60 per cent and arrogated to itself the right to set

posted prices unilaterally.
A week later, on 9 December, the twenty-first meeting of OPEC opened at
Caracus. Half a dozen resolutions were passed, of which the key one was
Resolution XXI-120. It provided for a minimum 55 per cent tax rate for all

member countries, the elimination of disparities in posted prices by taking the
higher price as the norm (with allowances for gravity factors and geographic
location), a uniform increase to reflect the improvement in the world
petroleum market, the adoption of a new gravity escalation system and -

somewhat inconsistently - the abolition of all differential allowances among
OPEC members. There were other resolutions. One provided for the estab­
lishment of a committee to discuss production levels; another for the compul­
sory reinvestment of oil company earnings in the producing countries; and yet

another for two factors of recent origin to be taken into account in determining
the level of posted prices, viz. the decline in the international value of the US
dollar and the rise in the cost to OPEC’s members of imported manufactures.
The attainment of these various aims was entrusted to a negotiating group of

Gulf oil-producing countries which was to begin discussions with rhe oil
companies at Tehran within thirty-one days. The Gulf group was to report to
the full body of OPEC no later than seven days after the end of the negotia­

tions, and OPEC was to meet to evaluate the results within a further fifteen
days. Should the negotiations ‘fail to achieve their purpose’, the relevant
resolution concluded, the member countries of OPEC would take ‘concerted
and simultaneous action’ to secure the desired results.

The Caracas resolutions signalled the end, for all practical purposes, of
separate agreements between oil companies and individual governments over
oil prices and tax rates. Henceforth, any concession granted to one country
would rapidly and inevitably be demanded by another, starting a chain reac­

tion which would eventually bring in every member of OPEC. The Caracas
Conference also made plain - to anyone, that is, whose eyes were not clouded
by trust or hope - that the distinction which supposedly existed between
moderate and radical members of OPEC was an illusion. The representatives
of the so-called ‘moderate’ Arab governments at the conference were fully as

vocal as those of the ‘radical’ regimes in their acclamation of the Libyan junta’s
triumph a few months earlier, and in their approval of the new demands
ormulated by the conference. Whether they were driven to assume this

fe°Slt*on’as has been alleged on their behalf by their apologists in the West, by
ar 0 the consequences of appearing less aggressive and anti-imperialist than
easiireVb^Ut^°nary Arah governments is really beside the point. (It might as
asi y e argued that the whole ‘moderate/radical’ business was merely a

to^l?1111111,6 to guh an impressionable Western audience.) What is more
e P°lnt is that the Caracas demands revealed with brutal clarity the