Peak Oil

Overview
In 1956, M. King Hubert predicted that the US would peak in oil production between 1965-1970, then the rest of the world would follow suit and peak oil would be reached in the 1990's. The peak did happen in the US, but did not end up happening for the entire world, and Hubert's theory was disproven, although most predict that a Hubert's curve will occur in the 2020's.

But what if oil had peaked.....

POD
The POD in this TL is simply that there is less oil in the world, especially in the Middle East and Africa. Oil production in OPEC countries slowed in the 1970's, but most of that was attributed to the wars in Middle Eastern areas. In this TL, the real reason was that the production of oil was plateuing.

Peak Oil
main article:Peak Oil

In June 1990, the world production of oil officially peaked, and the OPEC nations were instructed not to tell the world, fearing a global catastraphy, but instead were called to attend an emergancy meeting in Cairo on June 28th, 1990. The delegates from the 12 member states decided to introduce a overall act to increase the number of oil wells and the search for new oil fields. The governments of the individual countries were instructed to use an extra 5% of gross income to pay for the new improvenments. Other major oil producers, including Russia, did not experiance declines like the Middle East and Africa, and so were unknowing of the developing crises. The Ac, formally called the Oil Increase Act, was condemed by NATO nations because it left even less money to use to improve the standards of living in the nations. Iraq cancelled its plan to invade Kuwait and instead decided to target Suadi Arabia, knowng that it had much more oil reserves. Iraq paid a terrorist group to plant bombs in various places in Iraq, giving Iraq an excuse to blame Suadi Arabia. What became known as the War of Iraqi Agression started in 1991 as Jordan, Iraq, Yemen, and Oman simultaniuosly delcared war on Suadi Arabia, with the claims that they had defiled the Quaran and had tried to create a revolution in Iraq. These events deepened the global catastrophy, and eventually led to a complete collapse in 2000.