We’ve been told the children’s version of the story of the ANZACs.
We’re told a story of bravery and national identity, but beneath the shifting sands of the Western Desert and Gallipoli lies a more pragmatic narrative: the birth of the global petroleum age.
If we view the ANZAC legacy as the first chapter in a century-long struggle against energy descent, we can begin to understand the deeper reality behind today’s standoff between the US, Israel, and Iran.
In 1911, Winston Churchill was staring at the decline of British coal production.
He made a decision that would define the 20th century: he converted the British Royal Navy from domestic Welsh coal power to Persian oil.
It was a move born of sheer desperation.
To maintain naval supremacy against a rising Germany, Britain needed ships that were faster and easier to refuel.
However, this transition turned a self-sufficient empire into a vulnerable one.
Britain had no domestic oil.
By choosing oil, Churchill tethered the Empire’s survival to a resource thousands of miles away.
When the ANZACs landed at Gallipoli in 1915, they were the infantry of this new energy dependency.
The Dardanelles were the potential choke point on the route to the Anglo-Persian oil fields.
If the Germans took control, the British Navy (the heart of the Empire) would literally run out of fuel.
While the ANZACs were digging in at Anzac Cove, Germany was pushing a different kind of threat: the Berlin-to-Baghdad Railway.
This “iron ribbon” was designed to link German factories directly to the oil wells of Mesopotamia (Iraq), bypassing the Royal Navy’s maritime blockades entirely.
This was the first modern attempt to build a land-based energy corridor to circumvent sea power.
The WW1 Middle Eastern campaigns were a desperate British effort to ensure this railway never reached its terminus.
The ill-fated ANZACs were sent to disrupt Ottoman control and ensure that the world’s highest-quality energy remained under Western maritime control, delaying the inevitable “energy descent” of the British Empire until the 1970s.
[During WWII] Rommel didn’t lose at El Alamein because he lacked bravery; he lost because his “Net Energy” hit zero.
His petrol-powered tanks were abandoned in the sand simply because there was no more fuel to move them, a stark preview of a world in energy descent.
Today, the faces have changed, but the “geometry of the energy supply” remains the same, albeit with a terrifying new twist: Declining Net Energy (EROEI).
In the ANZAC era, poking a hole in the ground at an oil field yielded 100 units of energy for every 1 unit spent.
Today, that ratio is trending close to 1:1.
Oil no longer flows from wells; it must be pumped out by pumping water or CO2 in.
The current conflict between the US, Israel, and Iran is the “end-game” of this decline.
Middle East oil producers’ storage tanks are full, so wells are being “shut in”.
For complex geological reasons, many of these wells will never return to their previous production levels, some will never be viable.
This is Energy Descent.
Just like the Berlin-Baghdad Railway, Iran and other BRICS [Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa – informal alliance] nations are helping China build the “Belt and Road” to move energy and influence to the Mediterranean, bypassing the US-controlled sea lanes.
In March, with the Strait of Hormuz closed, we’re seeing the physical reality of energy descent.
It isn’t just about high prices; it’s about the fact that the energy required to secure the oil is starting to exceed the value of the oil itself.
For decades, Australia’s strategic complacency was fuelled by a massive stroke of geological luck: Bass Strait oil.
Discovered in the 1960s, these fields (Kingfish, Halibut, and Mackarel) once provided all of Australia’s domestic needs.
Today, Bass Strait fields’ production has plummeted by over 90 per cent from its peak.
We have moved from being a self-sufficient energy “island” back to being an “energy satellite” of the global market.
The “price of petrol” has always been a measure of military might.
The ANZACs paid the initial “deposit” on Western energy security.
Today, Australia’s vulnerability (holding less than 36 days of fuel) is the final, ironic twist.
While the ANZACs fought to secure an oil supply for the West, we now live in a world where the “surplus energy” that built our modern civilization is evaporating.
The lesson of the “Rats” is more relevant than ever for a post-growth future: without secure, local oil supply lines, even the most advanced renewable energy system eventually fails.
With abundant productive land and our strong social cohesion, the Gympie region is well placed to endure an energy and financial reversion to the mean.
We need a group of wise citizens to create and implement a plan for a post-growth community where everyone’s needs are met.
Please contact me if you’re willing to step up to this challenge in any way (at philbethechange@gmail.com).
– Phil Baulch
Gympie
