British Diplomatic Oil Crisis: Contemporary Anglo-Saxon Geopolitical Rivalries in the Persian Gulf: Drawing a Lesson? Or Sir Anthony Eden‘s Delusion of Grandeur.

The
Agreement recognises Persian ownership of the oil industry,
whereas under A.I.O.C.’s 1933 concession title to the installations
passed to the Persians in 1993. But the consortium will in practice
have the use of the installations (without any rent) and the
Agreement delegates to it a satisfactory measure of managerial
powers. The consortium’s tenure is for 25 years in the first
instance, with options to renew for three 5-year periods (i.e. a
total of 40 years and until 1994). Operations will begin over the
whole of the former A.I.O.C. concession (with a few minor
adjustments of border); but after the first 25 years the area will
decrease at each renewal of option until, by the last 5- year
period, the area covered by the consortium’s operations will be
about half what it was at the beginning.54

All
those companies mentioned already had big interests in the
Middle East oil. They were the companies with a ready market for
Iranian oil. The Times of London wrote:

Clearly,
the British Government and the Consortium Companies’
negotiations have gone a long way to meet Persian aspirations
without prejudicing the essential interests of the Companies, old
and new, whose job it will be to work the complex arrangements for
bringing back Persian oil to the world’s markets.55