Saudi Oil Attacks

[PACOX]

Abu Dhabi/New York (CNN Business)Oil prices, which have remained low for months, could spike when markets open Monday as Saudi Arabia scrambles to repair damage to its energy infrastructure inflicted this weekend.

Coordinated strikes on key Saudi Arabian oil facilities disrupted about half of the kingdom's oil capacity, or 5% of the daily global oil supply. Yemen's Houthi rebels on Saturday took responsibility for the attacks on the Saudi Aramco oil facilities in Khurais and Abqaiq -- the world's largest oil processing facility and crude oil stabilization plant.

Saudi Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman said that 5.7 million barrels a day of crude oil and gas production have been affected. The latest OPEC figures put total Saudi production at 9.8 million barrels per day.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Saturday blamed the attack on Iran, which backs the Houthi rebels, calling it an "unprecedented attack on the world's energy supply." Iran, under US sanctions on its oil industry, has denied any involvement.

"The events in Saudi Arabia have ratcheted up tensions in the Middle East to a new level raising concerns about supply security," Chris Midgley, global head of analytics at S&P Global Platts said in a statement. "The sudden change in geopolitical risk" could cause crude prices to jump between $5 and $10 a barrel, Midgley said.

Oil prices have recently been low. Brent, the global benchmark, closed at $60.22 per barrel on Friday. The price closely followed in the United States, known as WTI, closed at $54.85.

Saudi Arabia, the world's largest oil exporter, had cut back on production of crude and other energy products as part of an OPEC effort to boost prices. The kingdom produces approximately 10% of the total global supply of 100 million barrels per day.

Other analysts expect a smaller oil market rally in the short term. "A small $2-$3 per barrel premium would emerge if the damage appears to be an issue that can be resolved quickly, and $10 if the damage to Aramco's facilities is significant," Ayham Kamal of the Eurasia Group said in a research note.
Two other analysts told CNN Business they believe prices could jump $15 per barrel because of the amount of Saudi oil affected by the attacks.
Saudi's energy minister said Saturday officials are "working to recover the lost quantities" of oil and will update the public within two days. Regional sources in the Middle East estimate Saudi Aramco has about 200 million barrels in storage in Amsterdam, Japan and China.

The strikes come as Saudi Aramco is taking steps to go public in what could be the world's biggest IPO. Aramco attracted huge interest with its debut international bond sale in April. It commissioned an independent audit of the kingdom's oil reserves and has started publishing earnings. Over the past two weeks, the kingdom has replaced its energy minister and the chairman of Aramco.
"The attacks could complicate Aramco's IPO plans given rising security risks and potential impact on its valuation," Kamal said.

https://www.cnn.com/2019/09/15/inves...ack/index.html

Breakdown:

• Someone attacked Saudi Arabia's oil facilities over the weekend. 5.7 million barrels of oil a day of oil production shut down, or 5% of the worlds daily consumption.
  
• Houthis out of Yemen took initial credit for the operation. The rebel group has targetted Saudi Arabia with drones and missiles in the past but never too much success. There have been reports of them getting their hands on better equipment though.
  
• The US immediately condemned Iran for the attack, saying the attacks originated from Iranian military outposts in Iraq. Both Iran and Iraq have denied such allegations.
  
• Gas prices are expected to rise as damage to the facilities is accessed and repaired. The WH said that it would be tapping into US reserves to mitigate the impact or decreased oil production in SA.

[Breccia]

As posted elsewhere, Trump has already ordered the strategic reserve open to keep prices stable. Of course, he already sold some of it off, so, at some point it's going to be a problem.

Also, he told his people to hurry up pipeline authorization...but, that's for another thread.

[Skroe]

Hello sweet future. Your victims await.

Just to paraphrase myself from the Bolton thread, this is a major historic event. The future kicked hard into the present today. This changes everything. It might be the biggest geopolitical event of 2019, and the largest since Russia's attack on the US in 2016.

I hope all Americans and Europeans get a good look at it and fall on their faces in the horror that awaits us all. The Houthis (or the Iranians themselves) are doing things that were long predicted to happen. And more they're innovating. Not in this attack, but they've done things like fly suicide drones into Saudi Patriot Missile Radars, and then launch ballistic missiles into Saudi Arabia. The Patriot missiles can't fire without that radar.

In the future when the US or Europe decide to bomb or drone strike Country X, the day is fast approaching where Country X will bite back, in a way far more substantial than Saddam Hussein's lame Scud missile attacks on Saudi Arabia and Israel in the Gulf War. Computing power, 3d printing, and miniaturization has all conspired to bring capable systems at low cost too people whose reach it use to be far out of reach of. Things that used to require expensive facilities and experienced machinists and complicated technological development, simply do not anymore.

Democrats used to scoff at Missile Defense. They called it wasteful. They called it provocative. They called it unneeded. They just didn't want to pay for it. Heaven forbid we don't devote every dollar to the God of Health Care. Meanwhile, here we are, 20 years later, and the number of drone and missile threats have diversified so rapidly and so quickly, that planners are scrambling for ways to counter them and Congress - on a bipartisan basis - is throwing billions of dollars at the issue. There is no political controversy on this. Year 2000 Democrats hated Missile defense. 2019 Democrats are all for it. And events like this illustrate why.

Our geographic isolation provided by the Atlantic and Pacific Ocean buy us more time, but not infinite time. We're all going to live in a world where full-spectrum Missile, Drone and Cruise Missile defense are built every 100-200 miles, from Maine to Florida, and from Washington State to San Diego. Europe too will be ringed by missile defense. In many respects it already is. It's vulnerability is far closer. Today it is vulnerable to Iranian missiles. Over the next decade and change, it'll go far beyond that.

I'm going to put this quite plainly. We are going to spend a trillion dollars over the next 40 years on exotic types of missile defense. Hell, I fully expect space-based missile defense - Star Wars - latent since the 1980s, to come into fruition in the next 15 years. Even Democrats are getting on board with that idea. Because technology has caught up to vision, and the emerging threat has made it self clear.

So get ready for it. Get ready to see battery after battery as you drive down I-95. Get ready for when the US strikes Country X in 2055, for Virginia-based missile defense to intercept cruise missiles fired at Norfolk by Country X. It's missile defense spending, or suburban America looking quite a bit like Aleppo. one day

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As posted elsewhere, Trump has already ordered the strategic reserve open to keep prices stable. Of course, he already sold some of it off, so, at some point it's going to be a problem.

Also, he told his people to hurry up pipeline authorization...but, that's for another thread.

I mean to be fair, opening the strategic reserve is exactly what it is for in a situation like this.

[Sunseeker]

Hello sweet future. Your victims await.

Just to paraphrase myself from the Bolton thread, this is a major historic event. The future kicked hard into the present today. This changes everything. It might be the biggest geopolitical event of 2019, and the largest since Russia's attack on the US in 2016.

I hope all Americans and Europeans get a good look at it and fall on their faces in the horror that awaits us all. The Houthis (or the Iranians themselves) are doing things that were long predicted to happen. And more they're innovating. Not in this attack, but they've done things like fly suicide drones into Saudi Patriot Missile Radars, and then launch ballistic missiles into Saudi Arabia. The Patriot missiles can't fire without that radar.

In the future when the US or Europe decide to bomb or drone strike Country X, the day is fast approaching where Country X will bite back, in a way far more substantial than Saddam Hussein's lame Scud missile attacks on Saudi Arabia and Israel in the Gulf War. Computing power, 3d printing, and miniaturization has all conspired to bring capable systems at low cost too people whose reach it use to be far out of reach of. Things that used to require expensive facilities and experienced machinists and complicated technological development, simply do not anymore.

Democrats used to scoff at Missile Defense. They called it wasteful. They called it provocative. They called it unneeded. They just didn't want to pay for it. Heaven forbid we don't devote every dollar to the God of Health Care. Meanwhile, here we are, 20 years later, and the number of drone and missile threats have diversified so rapidly and so quickly, that planners are scrambling for ways to counter them and Congress - on a bipartisan basis - is throwing billions of dollars at the issue. There is no political controversy on this. Year 2000 Democrats hated Missile defense. 2019 Democrats are all for it. And events like this illustrate why.

Our geographic isolation provided by the Atlantic and Pacific Ocean buy us more time, but not infinite time. We're all going to live in a world where full-spectrum Missile, Drone and Cruise Missile defense are built every 100-200 miles, from Maine to Florida, and from Washington State to San Diego. Europe too will be ringed by missile defense. In many respects it already is. It's vulnerability is far closer. Today it is vulnerable to Iranian missiles. Over the next decade and change, it'll go far beyond that.

I'm going to put this quite plainly. We are going to spend a trillion dollars over the next 40 years on exotic types of missile defense. Hell, I fully expect space-based missile defense - Star Wars - latent since the 1980s, to come into fruition in the next 15 years. Even Democrats are getting on board with that idea. Because technology has caught up to vision, and the emerging threat has made it self clear.

So get ready for it. Get ready to see battery after battery as you drive down I-95. Get ready for when the US strikes Country X in 2055, for Virginia-based missile defense to intercept cruise missiles fired at Norfolk by Country X. It's missile defense spending, or suburban America looking quite a bit like Aleppo. one day

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I mean to be fair, opening the strategic reserve is exactly what it is for in a situation like this.

Jesus fucking christ what fear-mongering bullshit.

Report me. I don't care. This crap is as bad as trumpkins claiming the browns are gonna replace whites. Fucking horseshit.

[Xarkan]

Jesus fucking christ what fear-mongering bullshit.

Report me. I don't care. This crap is as bad as trumpkins claiming the browns are gonna replace whites. Fucking horseshit.

More importantly there is a cheaper way to avoid that then missile defences

Dont stomp countries into the ground

[Locklen]

More importantly there is a cheaper way to avoid that then missile defences

Dont stomp countries into the ground

Countries that seek hegemony (such as Russia, and China) are also benefitting from these advances in attacking, and will not be so easily held back.

[PC2]

Jesus fucking christ what fear-mongering bullshit.

Report me. I don't care. This crap is as bad as trumpkins claiming the browns are gonna replace whites. Fucking horseshit.

We shouldn't fear monger in the sense that we shouldn't expect life to get worse or more violent overall. However science and technology is getting better and since tech is always neutral that means we have to expect every generation will produce some creative miscreants who invent new modes of warfare. Especially as it relates to what may be called "cheap shots". IMO, what Skroe is referring to in the next era is just a part of an eternal process where in we can never expect to achieve a conflict-free utopia. Though I think it's safe to assume that the good guys will always have an edge over the bad guys as long as they don't get complacent.

[Skroe]

Jesus fucking christ what fear-mongering bullshit.

Report me. I don't care. This crap is as bad as trumpkins claiming the browns are gonna replace whites. Fucking horseshit.

Here is a RAND publication from 2002 that's an excellent and up to date primer:
https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_briefs/RB3023.html

Here is a RAND research artcile about the Hypersonic missile threat:
https://www.rand.org/blog/2018/03/hy...challenge.html

An excellent (and perhaps most topical) publication about UAV and Cruise Missile threats to the continental US. Says pretty much what I just said.
https://www.rand.org/pubs/monographs/MG626.html

Here is an entire e-Book that looks at how air bases and government facilties could defend from missile attack (and thus indentifies the challenge. This is a very influentual publication for people interested in the topic.
https://www.rand.org/pubs/monograph_reports/MR1028.html

And here is a follow up:
https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR968.html

Here is a commentary on technology lowering the barrier for entry by adversaries and it challenging American security.
https://www.rand.org/blog/2019/02/am...e-paradox.html

Here is a topical article on A2/AD
https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR1820.html

And a look at Iranian missile threat and defense options:
https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR957.html

Here is the official US government thread primer for missiles of all types:
https://fas.org/irp/threat/missile/bm-2017.pdf



If you can actually stand to look into the blazing rising sun that is this emerging threat for a few minutes, the ironically named @Sunseeker, you'd see this long anticipated challenge is very far from "fear mongering".

The future has arrived, as many knew it would. Sorry if this inconveniences your political agenda. FWIW, I think it's a disaster. But I won't just turn away and deny the clear reality because of what it means.

And no, I won't report you. This is happening, like it or not.

[jeezusisacasual]

There is no money for this until first the social fabric of american society has been invested in: education and universal healthcare and mental healthcare for the domestic mass shooting loonies who keep getting weapons pushed into their hands.

This is dangerous thinking because America can do more then a few things at the same time. A mass shooting does not matter if you are hearing sirens to hide under a desk instead. America will handle those things but they will not be in the forefront like the rising threat out of would be world leaders. I say this as a Type 1 Diabetic who despises the profit motive in healthcare.

[Skroe]

We shouldn't fear monger in the sense that we shouldn't expect life to get worse or more violent overall. However science and technology is getting better and since tech is always neutral that means we have to expect every generation will produce some creative miscreants who invent new modes of warfare. Especially as it relates to what may be called "cheap shots". IMO, what Skroe is referring to in the next era is just a part of an eternal process where in we can never expect to achieve a conflict-free utopia. Though I think it's safe to assume that the good guys will always have an edge over the bad guys as long as they don't get complacent.

Bingo. Somebody gets it. Thank you.

Its the old game of move-counter move. Advance-counter advance. One side grows in sophistication, then everyside has an equal playing field.

I think a good example is GPS / Global Navigation Systems in general.

GPS started as a military program for ship and force movements and early precision guided weapons. Then on September 1st 1983, the Soviet Union shot down Korean Air Lines Flight 007 that had strayed through Soviet Airspace by accident. Back then airplanes didn't use GPS. They have navigators. One of the policy responses to that incident was Reagan ordering the military to open up GPS to the civilian market, with the airline industry being a primary recipient of the technology, in order to prevent future episodes. And that was a big deal because Space Launch in the 1980s and 1990s was so expensive only governments could do it. You were having early GPS satellites launched on $500 million per flight space vehicles.

But it got GPS over the next 20 years into civilians hands and revolutionized how every industry and every body things about their physical "place" in the world and how to get from where they are to where they want to go. In a sense it gave everyone a "gods eye view".

But it was also government built and government controlled. The US government namely. And we had a switch.

And now, in 2020, countries are making their own Satellite Navigation systems. China has BeiDou, which has global coverage. Russia has GLONASS. the EU has the Galileo program, which was built for the purposes specifically of freeing Europe from dependence on the US for this technology (it is also interoperable with GPS). India and Japan have their own regional systems. Brazil and Iran want to build and launch their own regional systems. And private industry certainly will over the next decade. Don't be surprised when Elon Musk turns SpaceX Starlink into a GPS network as well.

So the monopoly is gone. The US can't flip the switch anymore. The only thing it could do is jam or shoot down satellites. And what we've seen is the world move from one where only the US, with its GPS could drop precision bombs and fly drones, to a world where all China, Russia and sorts of rogue states and terrorist groups have the capability as well, because receivers are cheap, the software is easy and open to the public and the space-based infrastructure is already there and diverse. When Russia staged military strikes on "terrorist groups" in Syria a few years back, their missiles and bombs used GLONASS, which was not a thing 20 years ago. Russian Artillery in Europe, which is superior to US artillery (for now), utilizes GLONASS guided shells (just like the US uses GPS guided shells), and they also use cheap drones as spotters. In fact, one of the big take ways from the War in Ukraine is that Russian forces, while still very deficient in expensive and mid to big sized drones, have learned how to very capably use cheap, small drones at the squad level to give units (from infantry to artillery) unprecedented situational awareness... an RTS style "gods eye view". That also wasn't a think 20 years ago.

There is simply no such thing as any kind of military advantage frozen in time.

One of the more dangerous to the world - and it's a while off but its still coming - is undersea and maritime drones. Ballistic Missile submarines work largely because up to this point the economics of finding them are daunting. Sensor nets at the bottom of the sea or sonar bouys on the surface are fixed and easily detectable or avoided. And attack submarines - Ballistic Missile sub hunters - exist in limited numbers... mere dozens, and only a handful on patrol at a given time by Russia or China. But what happens when Russia or China manufacture a cheap, mass-producible undersea or martime drone and little the ocean with hundreds of thousands of them that can maintain a patrol, or dynamically move as a unit (making them difficult to avoid). Where because there are no people, they have extreme endurance. And because of of size and the need to not fit people inside, they're very hard to detect? What becomes of the permanent at sea deterrent then? It's not so reliable. And we have to remember, that historically that's a new creation. They started to show up in the early-mid 1960s, and weren't really "good" at what they did until the 1980s. We're kind of living in the "golden age" of them where they peaked can't get much better. The next US ballistic missile submarine and it's missile that are planned are a lot like we already have, and not nearly the jump compared to what they replaced. But on the horizon, we already see a new technology emerging to undermine the advantage they provide, just like very other one "unbeatable" technology too. Recall, jet fighters once made people think that airplanes would be impossible to shoot down from the ground, until some enterprising individuals created the surface to air missile. And within 20 years the surface to air missile made non-stealth bombers obsolete over contested territory.

We're not there yet with undera and maritime drones. That's something for the second half of this century or later. But there will be a day where the US doesn't build Ballistic Missile submarines anymore than it doesn't build non-stealth bombers, because the other side has imagined and produced a cost-effective countermeasure, and our deterrent will have to shift to a new paradigm of some sort.

It's simply not fear mongering to say "history and technological advancement don't stand still, and military affairs are always at the leading edge of them, so don't think we're ever in a perpetually stable state. We are not.". The cruise missile threat was forseen in the 1970s. The drone threat in the 1990s. And it took a while, but they have arrived. Because they were always going to. Because the spread of the technology is inevitable. Just as some of the best cyber warriors in the world are Iranian.





.

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There is no money for this until first the social fabric of american society has been invested in: education and universal healthcare and mental healthcare for the domestic mass shooting loonies who keep getting weapons pushed into their hands.

There is absolutely the money for this. I'll just quote myself.

The reliable rule of thumb when it comes to budgeting is that any politician or political adviser who says the phrase "we can't afford __________" is really just saying "I don't want us to pay for ___________".

America is the richest country in the history of man with a net tax burden that historically very low, and low with respect to the rest of the world. Unlike many other countries that have a much higher tax burden and their ability to extract additional revenue from their taxpayer base is limited, the US has an enormous amount of resources at its command.

This is not advocating higher taxes. It is a statement of fact. We are rich enough to build Yankee Stadium on Mars if we wanted to.

But the thing is, this country, despite having a pretty broad spending consensus on about 85% of things it pays for, has an enormous disagreement on the additional 15% that gums up everything.

The Tea Party spent years making up fairy tales about how government spending got us into the Great Recession, and how cutting discretionary spending (because they didn't have the balls to go after Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security) had to happen because we're in an era of "tighter budgets" and "leaner times". Translation: they didn't want to pay for the EPA, minorities, kids, science, the arts, and that sort of thing. Farm subsidies though? Oh we got plenty of money for that!

And the Democrats... I mean the saga is going on in the House Right now. They'll move heaven and earth to pay for grandma's pills. But renewing the nuclear triad that is aging out of 30 years? Oh no, we're too poor for that. We have to make "difficult choices" and re-balance our defend commitments to reflect current budgetary realities. And all that horse shit.

In the United States, when a politician says "we can't afford", they are lying. 100% of the time.

The things you are describing are a political decision on the part of government to finance once a political consensus has been formed. There is no consensus on universal healthcare (even among Democrats), or gun control. There is a functioning political consensus on missile defense.

And that is why missile defense will continue to be lavishly funded while universal healthcare will not be. It's not a matter of finite resources. It's a matter of getting stakeholders to agree.

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This is dangerous thinking because America can do more then a few things at the same time. A mass shooting does not matter if you are hearing sirens to hide under a desk instead. America will handle those things but they will not be in the forefront like the rising threat out of would be world leaders. I say this as a Type 1 Diabetic who despises the profit motive in healthcare.

Also very true. Imagine if Americans had to live like the Israelis do... with actual missile alarms every third electrical pole down the road. How long would our country tolerate that before the political consensus formed to do something about that missile thread? I'm laughing just thinking about it actually. We would be positively herculean on our response because of what it would do to our every day lives.

Politicians would be crawling over themselves, like they were after 9/11, to show who is tougher on the threat du jour. And it would be a vote getter, because Americans mostly want peace and quiet.

The thing is, what I've laid out is what people in Israel and South Korea (and to a lesser degree Japan) have lived with for many years. Japan is even procuring two Aegis Ashore batteries and some THAADs to cover their country, just to defend against North Korean missiles. Is it really outlandish to say "as technology improves and missiles like North Korea has gain more range and lower cost, it'll bring the continental US into its envelop as it has South Korea and Japan?" I think not. I think that's just another way of saying "technology will get better because time is a thing".

Case in point:

This was North Korea's missile range 10 years ago:


And this is it today:



And yeah sure they probably don't live up to the hype yet. But is there any reason to think they won't with more time and development? Nope. It was a decade ago where intelligence services said that North Korea, though detonating a nuclear "device" had not managed to miniaturize it and put it on a warhead. And here in late 2019... they evidently did that at least a few years ago. Because they had time.

In response to the above picture, you can bet every dollar you have that if the US didn't have National Missile Defense already, that North Korean development would have spurred a crash program to develop it.

Now judging by the likes of what Sunseeker wrote above, he would probably take this as more fear monger. But it's really not, because we've been born and lived under the Sword of Damocles known as the Russian/Soviet nuclear deterrent since the late 1950s. But we developed a countermeasure to that (our own deterrent) that allows us to live our lives without having to think that today is our last day on Earth. Just the same, missile technology and drone technology, once the province of industrialized powers due to costs and technological limitations, are reaching the hands of those with far less traditional means, but substantial non-traditional means... and they're getting results off of it. We'll be living our lives just fine, as we do with the Russian deterrent always aimed at us... we'll just need to develop and deploy a countermeasure to make that possible.

I don't think that's fear mongering. I think that's... an observation about history and applying the lessons of it to the present.

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satellite image of the attack. This is how precise it was.

Very precise. Very very precise.

[Skroe]

The unnerving part is that any defense is far, far costlier than the offense and always has at least some failure rate.

Yup. For National Midcourse Missile defense, Patriot, THAAD and Aegis, the military always launches at least two interceptor missiles for one incoming missile / warhead. Like when in the fall of 2016, Houthi's launched two cruise missiles at the USS Mason (a destroyer) and USS Ponce (an amphibious transport dock), the Mason launched two SM-2 missiles and the one Evolved Seasparrow Missile. They also had their Nulka anti-ship missile decoys out and used EW. The three missiles together took at one of the cruise missiles, and the other cruise missile malfunctioned and hit the water. It was the first time the SM-2 was ever used operationally against an incoming threat.

The "defensive interceptor" clip just isn't that big.

One thing the Pentagon is developing to counter this for exoatmospheric threats is this:



The Multiple Kill Vehicle. Each interceptor would carry that, which itself is a carrier vehicle. The small white things are the actual kill vehicles. So in this case, each interceptor would carry 12 kill vehicles, thus giving the defender the cost-curve advantage. It would replace this:




This ungainly thing is the current kill vehicle. One interceptor = one kill vehicle. It's the size of a refrigerator. That gold thing on the front is a telescope. If you ask how such a bad design got built, its because George W. Bush prematurely declared the Groundbased Midcourse Missile Defense system operational for pure political reasons in the early 2000s. This made the Pentagon force Raytheon, which builds the Kill vehicle, to mass manufacture (dozens) of these things. Problem is, what you see is effectively a proof of concept science experiment. It was never designed to be built as the actual operational kill vehicle. It was supposed to lead the way to a successor system that would be produced. But because of political reasons, they had to mass produce the prototype.

And it kind of sucks. After 18 years of development... it works... sort of. The Pentagon has been wanting to replace it for years with a new kill vehicle. They just canceled its designated successor, the Redesigned Kill Vehicle, in August, which was another monolithic approach, because they want something like the Multiple Kill Vehicle now.

But you nailed the problem. Right now, defending against 100 North Korean or Iranian missiles means at least 200 interceptors. Defending against 1550 Russian warheads means 3100 interceptors (a ridiculous number).

If you have something like the multiple kill vehicle though, you can defend against a Russia-sized attack (which will never come) with about 300 interceptors, each carrying 12 kill vehicles.

This just furthers my argument above about technological advancement changing the attacker/defender situation. Because were the US to actually do that, what would the Russian response be? To just take it? Nope. They''d MIRV the hell out of their arsenal to an even greater degree, and add exotic re-entry vehicles to try and prevent interception.

This actually happened before. One reason warhead numbers in the 1980s got the 30,000 range was because of the brutal calculus of MIRVing. Simple explainer version: US puts 5000 warheads on 1000 launch vehicles. US can now strike 5000 targets in USSR with one warhead or more realistically, 1666 targets with 3 (incase one fails or is intercepted). USSR says "okay, so we need to defend against this. They now build 5000 launchers, so the US has to either launch one warhead per target (unlikely) or accept thousands of Russian warheads will get off the ground. And on top of those 5000 launchers, they put 6 warheads. Now they have 30,000 warheads. Now the US is like "oh crap... we have to target 5000 launchers". So they build another 10,000 warheads and puts them on a total of 3000 launch vehicles. The US can now hit every Soviet site three times. And the USSR goes "oh crap, they can hit us 3 to 1 again... so let's build more launchers and more warheads"

and around and around we go. Attacker and defender. Always chasing the other's tail.

[Corvus]

The precision of those strikes and the range that the drones had to fly to even reach the target (I've seen 1500km mentioned) would suggest we aren't talking off the shelf or kit built models here, which would suggest a state actor is involved.

[CostinR]

Besides the Suicide Drone Angle, and it is a fairly significant one for future as was noted by @Skroe in great detail here in this thread, we're now staring down the barrel of a US strike against Iran.

Because it's one thing to shoot down a drone in international airspace and get away with it because Trump does not feel like killing 150 people and severely escalating things with Iran, it's another for you to shut down 5% of the entire world's oil supply and raise prices by 20% overnight. Iran does not get away with that, and before some well meaning poster points out the Houthis did it: Who do you think gave them the drone exactly? Santa?

[PACOX]

Besides the Suicide Drone Angle, and it is a fairly significant one for future as was noted by @Skroe in great detail here in this thread, we're now staring down the barrel of a US strike against Iran.

Because it's one thing to shoot down a drone in international airspace and get away with it because Trump does not feel like killing 150 people and severely escalating things with Iran, it's another for you to shut down 5% of the entire world's oil supply and raise prices by 20% overnight. Iran does not get away with that, and before some well meaning poster points out the Houthis did it: Who do you think gave them the drone exactly? Santa?

Iran was behind the attack?

Last time the US jumped to conclusions it led to the 2nd Iraq War. That turned out great.

[Skroe]

Besides the Suicide Drone Angle, and it is a fairly significant one for future as was noted by @Skroe in great detail here in this thread, we're now staring down the barrel of a US strike against Iran.

Because it's one thing to shoot down a drone in international airspace and get away with it because Trump does not feel like killing 150 people and severely escalating things with Iran, it's another for you to shut down 5% of the entire world's oil supply and raise prices by 20% overnight. Iran does not get away with that, and before some well meaning poster points out the Houthis did it: Who do you think gave them the drone exactly? Santa?

A big part of me kind of doubts the Houthi's did it.

This is why.




The triangle marked 8 is the one that was struck. Doesn't that seem a little far from the Houthi-controlled territory in the south for rebels, even rebels armed with Iranian drones and missiles? You still need a fair bit of infrastructure to support drones and missiles that can fly that far. Never mind that such weapons being in the hands of Houthi Rebels would mean that a lot of US forces are at direct risk from missile attack. As would parts of Egypt, most of Kenya, Ethiopia, and Somalia and both Sudans. It also means the entirety of the Red Sea, which is crucial to global trade, could be targeted by drones and missiles.

Oh yeah and it has to fly adjacent to Ridya, which is ringed with missile and air defenses.

And it has to not set off any US missile or air defense radars radars in the region, that would have to launch interceptors, lest they be targeted at US forces (because midflight, the ultimate trajectory would not be known).

It stinks. It stinks real bad. If the Houthis indeed did this, they must be prompty disarmed of this capability, regardless of whatever sins have been committed in Yemen by the Saudis.

But my completely speculative gut instinct, thinking about the range involved, and how much defense structure lays between the supposed launch region and the target, is that all this stuff came from Iran, over the Persian Gulf. A quick skip and a hop. Fast enough too for US defense sensors to have little time to respond on their own (since they happened next door to the US Fifth Fleet).

It's possible it was the Houthis. But I have a kind of hard time believing even the Iranian IRCG is reckless and stupid enough to give rebels drones and missiles with that range. That's not just causing havoc on the border regions. That's being able to hold almost all of Saudi Arabia at risk.

So if I had to guess, Iran decided to stage a little military strike on their mortal enemy and counted on the Houthis being used as a scapegoat of sorts. And Saudi Arabia is saying "The Houthis" because paradoxically, getting kicked in their collective balls by what they consider terrorists in a sneak attack is less humiliating and destabilizing to the regieme than having the country come under direct attack by Shiite Iran, which would call into question the basic competency of the Royal Family.

What to look for: if any Saudi Air Force Generals and or Air defense commanders in the Army have unfortunate accidents or suddenly disappear in coming weeks.

[ParanoiD84]

Iran and Saudi do like their little proxy wars.

[Belize]

satellite image of the attack. This is how precise it was.

Very precise. Very very precise.

[IMG]https://i.imgur.com/K75fMeo.png[/I

[IMG]https://i.imgur.com/1yaZ1kA.png[/]

Are you saying that these blast point are too accurate for sand-people?

... I'll show myself out...

[Draco-Onis]

Iran was behind the attack?

Last time the US jumped to conclusions it led to the 2nd Iraq War. That turned out great.

Also we have to take the word of the Saudis you know the people who bones saw journalists they don't like. I guess Satan wasn't available to give evidence so they are going with MBS.

[Ghostpanther]

The precision of those strikes and the range that the drones had to fly to even reach the target (I've seen 1500km mentioned) would suggest we aren't talking off the shelf or kit built models here, which would suggest a state actor is involved.

That's a good point. But I would want to know for certain this was true and who it was helping it take place. Striking back and making things worse based on assumptions, would not be a smart thing to do. It also sounds like Saudi Arabia needs better air defense system. With all their oil income, they can afford it.

[CostinR]

Iran was behind the attack?

Last time the US jumped to conclusions it led to the 2nd Iraq War. That turned out great.

Do you seriously think that a bunch of people fighting a war for the last few years while being bombed by the Saudi coalition have the capability to launch drones and missiles that can take down 5% of the entire world's oil supply without that capability being provided by some foreign actor?

If the answer is yes then you should be really really afraid of what the next ISIS or Taliban or Al'Qaeda can do.

If the answer is no then Iran did it: Either directly as suggested by @Skroe bellow your post or by supplying them.

By the way I just wish to say this as someone horrified by the massacres in Yemen commited by Saudi Arabia: Thank you Iran, the whole world will lose any sympathy they had for the Houthis now, because they just raised prices at the pump for everyone and people might care about a bunch of hungry children in Yemen, but they won't care if they pay up more at the gas station.

It also sounds like Saudi Arabia needs better air defense system. With all their oil income, they can afford it.

Missile defense is a fairly tricky affair, and it's not a certainty.

Speaking about it: Saudi Arabia has fairly high quality defenses for what they've been able to buy from other countries. Perhaps they need Iron Dome and THAAD...fun fact about those two: One is designed by Israel...the other Congress would not have let them buy until recently.

I suspect Congress will shut the hell up about Saudi Arabia now. Oh they might want the Crown Prince strung up for killing a journalist...but they are not politically suicidal to accept a 10% increase in oil prices.

My point: Iran just gave Trump carte blanche to attack them: No ONE will lift a finger when he inevitably does.