Special to WorldTribune.com

Saudi Arabia and Iran, the two dominant forces in the Middle East, upped the stakes in the oil production game at the OPEC meeting of member states in Vienna on June 5.

After Saudi Arabia’s insistence on maintaining OPEC production levels, Iran countered by saying it would increase production to one million barrels per day within months of Western sanctions being lifted.

“If OPEC members want to keep prices at the same level, we expect them to make room for Iranian oil,” Teheran’s oil minister, Bijan Zanganeh, was quoted as saying by Shana news agency.

The moves all but guarantee a worldwide flood of oil that makes it highly unlikely prices will rebound to last year’s high of $115 per barrel.

Experts are now saying that Saudi’s move last year to force OPEC to allow oil prices to fall was not aimed at U.S. shale producers (U.S. oil output is at a 44-year high) but at crippling Mideast rival Iran.

In April, Saudi Arabia increased its crude output to 10.3 million barrels a day, its highest level in decades. The kingdom has increased investment in drilling amid speculation it will shoot for 12 million barrels per day.

The result of the June 5 OPEC decision will be more oil on global markets this summer, and a tidal wave of crude if sanctions on Iran are lifted after nuclear negotiations conclude on June 30.

  Iran seen on collision course over oil production, oil production, OPEC, Saudi, WorldTribune.com