Saudi oil fields on fire, but who did it?

[Mr Quatro]

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world...ies/ar-AAHk2cp

Iran on Sunday rejected U.S. accusations it was responsible for devastating attacks on two oil installations in Saudi Arabia that struck at the heart of the kingdom’s oil industry and forced Aramco, the state oil company, to suspend its production output by half.

A rebel group in Yemen, known as the Houthis, had claimed responsibility for Saturday’s attacks, saying that it had sent a fleet of attack drones toward the two oil facilities in eastern Saudi Arabia. Hours later, though, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, in a Twitter message, directly blamed Iran for what he said was “an unprecedented attack on the world’s energy supply” and said there was “no evidence the attacks came from Yemen” — leading to speculation they had been launched directly from Iran, or on Tehran’s behalf, by allies in Iraq.

The U.S. government believes 15 structures at Abqaiq were damaged on the west-northwest-facing sides — not the southern facades, as would be expected if the attack came from Yemen.

Khurais is one of Saudi Arabia’s largest oil fields and is believed to produce about 1.5 million barrels per day. Abqaiq is the site of the kingdom’s largest oil processing facility, operated by Aramco. It may be the world’s most important piece of oil infrastructure, built to process about 7 million barrels a day of oil so that it can be shipped out of the Persian Gulf to foreign markets.

[moose1am]

What should the Saudi's to stop these type of attacks in the future? And should Saudi Arabia attack Iran to retaliate for this attack on the Saudi Oil Fields and production facilities?

What should Trump do?

[August]

My best guess is the militant wing of the Salvation Army.

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by August

My best guess is the militant wing of the Salvation Army.

3-pointer.

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by moose1am

What should the Saudi's to stop these type of attacks in the future? And should Saudi Arabia attack Iran to retaliate for this attack on the Saudi Oil Fields and production facilities?

What should Trump do?

Iran and the Houthi are the same side. Which makes it unnecessary to discriminate between the two in target selection.



Of course, since this is an ongoing war, retaliation is mandatory - plus "x". The alternative is to accept defeat. I am not in knowlerdge of what the Saudi military is capable of, however, but honestly I do not expect too muchg, even if thy buy modern US weaponry like crazy - I still have on mind Gen. Frank's description of how they played "training" like little boys in '90/'91 when they got those new M1s.



Maybe they want to side up with Israel if they consider to strike Iran. Better for them it would be, no doubt. The allied UAE's fighting competence does not seem to have cut it.



Whats the legal situation in miltiary treaties between the US and SA? Is there a legal obligation of the US from some treaty of SA gets attacked directly by a foreiogn power? Formally the Houthi could not count for that since formally SA started the war, but Iran would be a different thing, I think.

[mapuc]

My thoughts on this:

Was it Iran who directly attacked those targets in SA ?

Or did Iran do this in-directly by giving Huthi drones, weapons and train them in using these drones ?

Will USA/SA try to find an excuse to attack Iran ?

I don't like the idea in which USA and SA attack targets in Iran and then in 10-15 years from now we are being told it was based on a big lie.

Markus

[Mr Quatro]

Both sides (Iran and Yemen) are both against Saudi, especially Iran with their oil production being curtailed.

Saudi can't afford to attack Iran without first protecting their oil fields or they will loose the other half.

Nothing will happen till Saudi is ready to fight back. Meanwhile 5% of the world's oil production has been destroyed.

Price of gas going up for sure not to mention war drums are beating and no doubt in my mind President Trump will be right in the middle of it all.

[mapuc]

I can't remember his title or what he was expert on/in

Said on Danish tv, couple of month back or so

"Saudi-Arabia is no match for Iran.

Iran is the super power among the Islamic states in the region with the exception of Israel."(from my memory)

So far Iran is taking part in this civil war in Yemen by supporting the Houthi. The question is:
Will they go from supporting Houthi to full scale war against SA.
Or take directly part in the civil war in Yemen.

I fear it will turn from bad to worse.

Markus

[Skybird]

Brief, compact, uncomfortable comment.

https://translate.google.de/translat...les-Chaos.html

The European illusions about Iran must come to an end. It is not the innocent vitim of Americna aggression, and it never was. In fact it showed to be a bully right since Khomenei's times when it scored the first victory against the US during the hostage crisis. It then stubbornly refused to get defeated by Saddam durign the first Gulf war against Iraq. It established a plethora of retaliation options thropughtout the reigon by planting the networks of terror logistics. It finally rejects to economically collapse due to the sanctions today. Not mentioning that the claimed superior Saudi coaltion so far wa sunable to defeat the Huthi in Yemen, nor can Israel drive Iran-supported structures out of Lebanaon.

"Weak"? "Innocent"? "Victim"? By points it won every round against the West so far. And the stupid Europeans even want to give it a golden cup for that.

[Catfish]

^ or, according to this opinion piece link, Bolton was right.

quote from above link: "[...] showed to be a bully right since Khomenei's times when it scored the first victory against the US during the hostage crisis. It then stubbornly refused to get defeated by Saddam durign the first Gulf war against Iraq. [...]"

Lol. "Stubbornly refused to be defeated" after Saddam's attack. How could they.
Poor Saddam sure did not know what happened when he did like he always had done, to suddenly become the pariah of the US. Only showed the middle east, that siding with the US is a two-sided sword.

[Jimbuna]

IMHO it was Iran.

[Jimbuna]

The United States has issued satellite images and cited intelligence to back its allegation Iran was behind attacks on major Saudi oil facilities.

One official said there were 19 points of impact on the targets and the attacks had come from a west-north-west direction - not Houthi-controlled territory in Yemen, which lies to the south-west of the Saudi oil facilities.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-49712417

The case is in the process of being built.

[ikalugin]

It is a lengthy proxy war that just got to Saudi oil industry. May be related to the return of oil related sanctions on Iran.

[Skybird]

I am not saying it was not Iran, but the impact direciton and suggested flight paths concluded form them, means nothing. Both drones and cruise missiles can be programmed to follow preset flighttracks that - if wanted - let them running circles around a location, zig-zag, or approach from right the opposite direction at where the attacker originally launched the weapons.

The impact positions are no hard evidence.

I assume it was Iran indeed.

Russia: possible, it has a motive (pushing oil prices upwards, unsettling the West, supporting its ally Iran), but its very unlikely and wopuld be a daring game even for Russia's standards: thats why I say No.

China: not really any motive of theirs, they depend on oil imports.

Turkey: has a motive (local rivalry and seeking regional dominance, unsettling Europe), but then has also motives not to escalate this tremendously and piss the US, EU: No to Turkey.

Israel: possible, but has no real motive I am aware of, and its against their sober sense of pragmatism - so why pissing the Saudis?

Egypt: no motive I am aware of, and probably also lacking the options (I do not know the Egypt military).

Iraq? They have other things on their mind, are busy with keeping floating, and probably have not the needed hardware.

Yemen? Definitely a motive - its war - , but not without foreign help: see above list of candidates.

So I assume it was Iran. They have several motives, and the skill and technological options.

The mine attacks also were not proven to have been conducted by Iran, and still I assume it was them.

Pompejo needs to learn the difference between "evidence" - and "motive" and "hint", however. Talking about evidence to the public but not revealing said evidence due to protecting secret sources, does not count.