Internal documents from ExxonMobile lay out plans for the world's largest corporation to undertake a bid for the British petroleum giant BP as early as the end of June. In the cover note to the 268-page action plan ExxonMobil chairman Rex Tillerson states that, "We have a reputation to protect. We have long been known as the largest polluter of American waters and stand firmly on our record from the fender-bender Exxon Valdez. As long as I am CEO, ExxonMobil will not stand idly by and see another company set new records for pollution -- and especially not a company run by a bunch of limeys."
Foremost among the objectives is to take over BP before the spill is contained, fearing that the million barrels of oil released into the Gulf of Mexico will be credited to any company other than the newly-created Exxon-Mobil-BP. The millions of gallons released exceeds twice the amount of the spill by the current U.S. record-holder, Exxon Valdez, which released less than 11 million gallons. The CEO continued, "It is our duty as Americans to recapture this important record for the Red, White and Blue. No one should foul our beaches and destroy the lives of the people of the Gulf Coast except an American company. We must not let this record disaster be claimed by some bunch of foreigners."
The price to be offered BP shareholders has been redacted in the document as have several pages apparently related to still-secret plans to insure that beaches, fishing areas and marshes continue to be destroyed for decades in order to secure this event as the unchallenged leader in U.S. environmental disasters. A footnote that was not blacked-out in the redacted section contains a statement by a Senior Vice President, "If we can acquire BP, all efforts should be directed to maintaining the flow as long as possible. For God's sake keep James Cameron out of this thing. He actually knows what he's doing down there."
The Exxon-Mobil CFO noted in an appendix that he urges a quick strike to acquire BP for two reasons. "First, buying more Congressmen to stop regulations will already dilute earnings. Second, clean-up costs can be minimized by carefully-selected campaign contributions and gifts to regulators. These costs, if they must be incurred, however, will be far more than offset by continuing income from BP's other fields."