Robert Newman gets to grips with the wars and politics of the last hundred years - but rather than adhering to the history we were fed at school, the places oil centre stage as the cause of all commotion. This innovative history programme is based around Robert Newman's stand-up act and supported by resourceful archive sequences and stills with satirical impersonations of historical figures from Mayan priests to Archduke Ferdinand. Quirky details such as a bicycle powered street lamp on the stage brings home the pertinent question of just how we are going to survive when the world's oil supplies are finally exhausted.

Robert Newman's History of Oil was recently shown on More4 in the UK. The 60 minute show, based around Robert's stand up act, explores the role of oil in war and politics.

A lot of people have been asking where they can find more information about the role of Iraq in WW1 - Robert says:

"It's mentioned in War Plan Iraq by Milan Rai (Verso) also by John Pilger in his writings on Iraq (I think Distant Voices), and probably it's in Robert Fisk's mighty tome The Great War For Civilization. Though I haven't read that yet. There's a couple of pages about it in Al Morton's A People's History of England. If you click on Babylon Railways on the net you can get interesting source stuff.

I found some first person accounts of British soldiers stationed in the Middle East between 14-20 on the interweb. I'd give you the co-ordinates but you've got Google - hope that doesn't mean that you just end up bumping into each other."

Source:
www.robnewman.com