Posted on 05/11/2005 7:01:28 PM PDT by white trash redneck
http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=15814#c0077
#77 Kenneth 5/11/2005 01:13PM PDT
The alleged Saudi plot to booby-trap their oil industry with dirty bombs is an interesting theory, until you start to think about it. Here are a few reasons why it's nonsense.
Firstly, the threat is rather overblown. The isotopes cited all produce low energy beta radiation and are dangerous only if ingested or inhaled. Their presence might be hazardous and likely to cause panic in a city with a large population, but not at remote oil wells and pipeline installations, where the few workers required for service could easily be protected.
Secondly, the logistics don't make sense. Assume a small oil installation of 1 square kilometer. 1 tonne of material dispersed over that area would result in a concentration of only 10 micrograms per square centimeter, barely greater than background radiation levels. The entire Saudi oil infrastructure would require hundreds of thousands of tonnes of these isotopes. Is there any evidence such quantities have been obtained by the Saudis? I don't think so. In any event, the contamination would not stay in place due to wind errosion (it's a sandy desert out there!) I would be more worried about a getting a sun burn, than the effect of 10 micrograms of Sr 90 on my shoes.
Finally, petroleum is not chemically reactive to Sr, Cs or Rb. If the materials were introduced to the oil reservoirs, the isotopes could easily be removed during the normal refining processes. In fact, Sr & Cs both bind readily with sand, which is a rather effective filtering material especially plentiful in Arabia. On the other hand, Rb ignites in air and reacts violently with water, making it easily retrievable.
In short, the risk of such "dirty bombs" is minimal, the amount of material required is unrealistic, & the contamination will just blow away. Which is, I believe, what the author is trying to do: huff & puff and blow away at a junk-science political thriller.
It should be made quite clear to the Saudis that if they were to blow up their oil infrastructure, their country would never belong to them again (should any of them be left alive to live in it).
too far fetched. something this big, alot of people there would know about it and would have talked.
What a crock. Saudi Arabia needs our money more than we need their oil.
If the Saudis destroyed their oil production they would return to the dark ages of clan warfare fighting over precious drops of water and what little food they can scavenge.
They have 24,000,000 (by their count) today.
:-)
Frankly the thought of seeing the Arab world return to their half starved nomadic past makes me that much more anxious for alternative energy.
That is the real truth. People don't blow up their money even if they are crazed Muslims.
Yep, employees of the many Western (ie, American/European) oil field service companies that contract in Saudi Arabia would very quickly notice something like that.
My take on this: it's an author trying to drum up book sales by capitalizing on the mistrust of Arabs we've all been feeling the last couple of years.
ThreeTracks
the royal family could care less about that, they could jump on planes to Europe and live off their foreign investments - and let their people go down the tubes.
They'd be shot down flying to Europe.
The world (including Europe) wouldn't be real happy. After all there are plenty of European oil companies operating out of the mideast.
A three-word solution: "Haliburton Profits Nicely."
by who? the US? no way, the saudis provide the retirement plans for many beauracrats in our own government.
This was my conclusion, after reading this article. Besides, I'm not a fan of Posner, because he claims "Case Closed" about how Lee Harvey Oswald was "the lone gunman," when the evidence to the contrary is overwhelming. I don't have any more confidence in Posner than I do in David Brock, as a research journalist.
Char :)
Doesn't worry me. If the Saudis are stupid enough to destroy their most valuable asset, then fair play to them and don't come looking to me for handouts.
If an AQ-type regime takes power and blows the oil, then what of it. A - They still have the right to since it is their commodity and B - I'd prefer an impoverishged regime of this type than a clever one which kept selling oil at high rates and using the money to fund their own plans.
Anna Huffington's failed blog was hyping this too. I visited her blog from a thread on FR here that described how bad it was.
Sounds like strait hogwash.
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