Posted on 10/15/2015 9:34:56 AM PDT by Freelance Warrior
On the outskirts of al-Omar oilfield in eastern Syria, with warplanes flying overhead, a line of trucks stretches for 6km. Some drivers wait for a month to fill up with crude.[...]
This is the land of Isis, the jihadi organisation in control of swaths of Syrian and Iraqi territory. The trade in oil has been declared a prime target by the international military coalition fighting the group. And yet it goes on, undisturbed.[...]
But more than a year after US President Barack Obama launched an international coalition to fight Isis, the bustling trade at al-Omar and at least eight other fields has come to symbolise the dilemma the campaign faces: how to bring down the “caliphate” without destabilising the life of the estimated 10m civilians in areas under Isis control, and punishing the west’s allies?[...]
The oil is sold at the wellhead for between $20 and $45 a barrel, earning the militants an average of $1.5m a day [...]
While al-Qaeda depended on donations from wealthy foreign sponsors, Isis has derived its financial strength from its status as monopoly producer of an commodity consumed in vast quantities throughout the area it controls.
Indeed, diesel and petrol produced in Isis areas are not only consumed in territory the group controls but in areas that are technically at war with it, such as Syria’s rebel-held north: the region is dependent on the jihadis’ fuel for its survival. Hospitals, shops, tractors and machinery used to pull victims out of rubble run on generators that are powered by Isis oil.[...]
“It’s a situation that makes you laugh and cry,” said one Syrian rebel commander in Aleppo, who buys diesel from Isis areas even as his forces fight the group on the front lines.”
(Excerpt) Read more at ft.com ...
Thanks Obammunist jihadist.
Why aren’t these wells, trucks and subhumans manning them obliterated?
Except given that oil consuming countries around the world are getting increasingly leery of buying oil from the politically unstable Middle East, Nigeria and Venezuela. Small wonder why everyone is searching for alternatives, including reducing dependence on oil, period.
It should have been bombed. A line of trucks 3 miles long. THAT is our air campaign. A total joke. Maybe a Sukhoi will nail it.
Well, the FT has said that the civilian Syria depends on the wells. So the wells must be taken from ISIS intact. This requires a ground operation (likely a special forces' one).
Probably for the same reason we never wiped out the poppy fields of Afghanistan. If I were Putin, knowing that heroin is the opium of the people and not religion, I would napalm the fields.
So who said “take the oil away from ISIS”? Oh yeh Trump.
Sales from Nigeria are down because their biggest customer of the light sweet was the US. Our shale oil production has greatly replaced the need at the refineries that used it. Plus production problems due to their own internal sabotage and theft of oil.
Venezuela exports are down because their production is down from lack of investment.
Middle East oil exports are up.
Those trucks aren't ISIS, but ISIS's customers, including the US-supported 'rebels'. Once a Sukhoi's nailed it the [Obama's] USA will decry Russia for barbarism, genocide, etc.
It's a classic "words are easy" situation. WHO will take the oil from ISIS? US Seals? Russian General Staff's spetznaz? Nobody's ready to take the risk.
I see what you are saying but how about a few gunships to shoot up the trucks and any one who tries to get near the place? To let these animals carry on unmolested is wrong.
I expect Russia to start destroying it. It will help boost the global market price.
This will probably happen after Syria when Putin has realised what he can and what he can't dealing with the USA, which are at control of Afghanistan. Or supposed to be in control.
Some people say that another year of low oil prices will destroy the US fracking industry completely. Probably, that's the reason.
This would skip ISIS and kill civilian buyers - any Syrian kindergarten or hospital gets electricity from diesel made from the ISIS oil.
Only said by those without knowledge and understanding of the hydraulic fracturing and shale production industries.
Continue to reduce, yes. Destroy? not a chance.
The oil fields won't be gone. The knowledge won't be gone. The equipment won't be gone. Also:
So what? I couldn’t give a hot defecation. You buy from isis, at the isis refinery, you deserve to get blasted.
This is how wars are won.
Cutting off their fuel and cash is top priority. Who cares if they are “our” rebels? And why are “our” rebels that cozy with isis?
“This would skip ISIS and kill civilian buyers - any Syrian kindergarten or hospital gets electricity from diesel made from the ISIS oil.”
So what? You blast them from the air. No Special Forces, no economic games, etc. You flatten the refinery. It can be rebuilt by Halliburton later.
Avoiding hitting their infrastructure, because the Syrian people NEED their services? That is utterly insane, why not just give ‘em the deed to that part of country and be done with it?
And as for special forces, yeah,,, lets send them into a battle, inside a refinery. Think that all the way through.
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