The notion that oil motivates America’s military engagements in the Middle East is often disregarded as nonsense or mere conspiracy theory. In , bestselling author and Nation magazine defense correspondent Michael T. Klare challenges this conventional wisdom and corrects the historical record. The film unearths declassified documents and highlights forgotten passages in prominent presidential doctrines to show how concerns about oil have been at the core of American foreign policy for more than 60 years — rendering our contemporary energy and military policies virtually indistinguishable. In the end, calls for a radical re-thinking of US energy policy, warning that unless we change direction, we stand to be drawn into one oil war after another as the global hunt for diminishing world petroleum supplies accelerates.