Saudi Oil Facilities: Al Qaeda’s Next Target?

Osama bin Laden’s January promise of more attacks on the US was soon followed by a failed suicide attack on a refinery in Saudi Arabia. Any attack on Saudi oil facilities would bring immediate harm to the US and the rest of the world. Iraq already provides a powerful example of the deleterious effects of strikes against oil facilities. Since June 2003, Iraq facilities have been hit 298 times, and Iraqi oil production is down by nearly half, with the oil industry losing $6.25 billion in 2005 alone. Saudi facilities and tankers are readily accessible for Al Qaeda recruits from the country who are disgruntled about high taxes and unemployment, and bin Laden has referred to US oil interests as a chief motive behind the “plunder” of the Middle East. According to a former agent with the US Central Intelligence Agency, an Al Qaeda attack on the Saudi oil infrastructure would result in economic losses “more damaging than a dirty nuclear bomb set off in midtown Manhattan or across from the White House.” – YaleGlobal