JOURNAL: The Saudi Systempunkt

The bulk of Saudi Arabia's security system is allocated to the defense of oil system assets. Despite this effort, the system remains extremely vulnerable. The reason for this vulnerability is due to the effectiveness of new methods of warfare being developed in Iraq. A dictum from the newly emerging global guerrilla doctrine is: Avoid direct attacks on highly defended assets. Attack the target indirectly through adjacent systems.

Today's disruption (one of several of this type over the last year) of Iraq's oil terminal in Basra demonstrates how this is done. Sabotage of a main transmission line north of Baghdad shut down Iraq's electrical system in parts of central and southern Iraq on Monday. This outage shut down the oil export terminal for most of the day. This attack likely cost the Iraqi government in excess of $100 m in export earnings alone for a total attack cost of less than $1,000 (see Global Guerrilla math for more).

Last summer, I detailed a Saudi scenario that focused on this vulnerability (as opposed to the ridiculous attacks most "experts" predict on Ras Tanura):

The electricity cell was the first to take action with an attack on one of the two high voltage power lines from the Ghazlan power complex. Since Ghazlan provides over 40% of the power in the eastern province and the electrical network is sparse (and except for a single connection to the central region, isolated), this attack caused over voltages that resulted in a system wide blackout that lasted two days. Oil production from the province was cut in half as systems (refineries, pumping stations, port facilities, etc.) that supported the huge Ghawar oil field were unable to acquire the power necessary for full production.

Saudi Arabia has an isolated and extremely vulnerable electrical system. For a global guerrilla, Ghazlan's substations represent the prime systempunkt. Additional systempunkts are available in the field water injection system. Attacks on these systems are 1) relatively easy, 2) will have major impact on the primary target through cross infrastructure cascades of failure, and 3) are difficult to defend without exposing primary systems to attack.

Comments

[gmoke]

My understanding is that, currently, supply just about equals demand these days in the oil market. Any system disruption is going to be magnified by that supply/demand equivalence from now on.

I say it's going to be an expensive Fall and Winter and the anti-war movement in the USA would be wise to start organizing through energy conservation and learning lessons from the homefront efforts in WWII. "Support the troops, conserve energy."

We are in a fight for survival and need a citizens based civil defense because we all know damn well that George W ain't gonna do it.

[The Oil Drum (profgoose)]

Great stuff John. I will be linking to this post later on tonight from The Oil Drum. Keep it up.

[Cardenio]

I was talking about a civil defense type plan for San Francisco a while back. The problem is in SF, like any other major urban area ( which is where you'll get your terrorist attack ) is you've got a dozen or more languages to deal with. It's hard enough to police an urban environment. " We're all in this together " just doesn't apply to major urban areas today. Instead of " civil defense " you're going to get " martial law " instead I think.

[gmoke]

" The problem is in SF, like any other major urban area ( which is where you'll get your terrorist attack ) is you've got a dozen or more languages to deal with. It's hard enough to police an urban environment. " We're all in this together " just doesn't apply to major urban areas today. Instead of " civil defense " you're going to get " martial law " instead I think."

Well, you gotta start somewhere. If it works in English, you can translate.

Here are some poster slogans from WWII
](http://www.state.nh.us/ww2/)
which I think have relevance today:

Do with less so they'll have enough!

Millions of troops are on the move... is YOUR trip necessary?

Have you really tried to save gas by getting into a car club?

All fuel is scarce. Plan for winter now!
1. Winterize your home!
2. Check your heating plant!
3. Order fuel at once!

Food is a weapon. Don't waste it!

Can all you can. It's a real war job!

Plant a victory garden. Our food is fighting.

Use it up - wear it out- make it do! Our labor and goods are fighting.

I wonder if reproductions of these posters would be useful not only at Camp Casey or in Washington DC on September 24 but also in daily life.

PS: One slogan I'd add for the 21st century is
Solar Is Civil Defense

[Adam]

Well they'd make a change from "Obey, Consume, Conform"

Truth is that Civil Defence is harder to do and less politically controllable than Martial Law. Civil Defence professionals have a history of analysing potential problems and then speaking out, causing all sorts of politicians embarrassment, whilst the military don't.

That said any attack on the Saudi oilfields is going to cause some impact to world supply. At present world oil supplies are on a knife edge, so the loss of even a weeks production would be crippling. This is not to say that the Saudis are against high oil prices. Every $1 a barrel increase is $3bn in extra revenues. Oil prices have risen by $30 recently (who remembers Rupert Murdochs position that oil at $25 a barrel was the best result of the war).

In some ways its a quantum problem, but instead of a butterfly, a few dozen mortar rounds could well cause an economic hurricane.

[Chinatronic]

http://www.chinatronic.com/mobile-phones-cellphones-c-15.html
http://www.chinatronic.com/mobile-phones-cellphones-c-15.html
http://www.chinatronic.com/mobile-phones-cellphones-c-15.html