In 1901, a British businessman acquired the rights to explore and extract oil in most of Iran for 60 years at a cost of only 20,000 pounds, using nearly deceptive means. A few years later (1908), vast amounts of oil were discovered, and the British government and companies reaped huge profits, while Iran received almost no benefits. In the 1950s, after Mossadegh became Prime Minister, he pushed for the nationalization of oil, which was Iran's closest attempt to establish a modern sovereign state.