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Arabia

Saudi oil fields set with 'radioactive bombs'

2005-05-12

NEW DELHI, MAY 12: A book being published next week says Saudi Arabia has wired its oil fields with radioactive explosives to discourage invaders from trying to take control of the kingdom's reserves, but Saudi Arabia denied it had any explosives at all attached to its oil facilities. In "Secrets of the Kingdom" Gerald Posner says 'dirty bombs' would not only destroy the oil-rich country's energy infrastructure in the event of an invasion, but would make the oil fields unsafe to work in for decades, according to an advance copy of the book seen by Reuters.

Not that he would make stuff up to sell a book.

Saudi Arabia has decided that "leveling the major oil production facilities and blasting away the core of the industry's infrastructure was not enough to deter an enemy from seizing its prized commodity," it says. "We have not seen Mr Posner's latest book. However the allegation that the kingdom of Saudi Arabia has explosives or any other type of weapon, much less nuclear weapons, attached to its oil facilities, is false and has no basis in fact whatsoever," Nail Al-Jubeir, director of the Saudi Information office in Washington, told Reuters. Nawaf Obaid, a Saudi security consultant and co-author of reports into Saudi oil field security by the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, said: "This is complete made-up fantasy." He added: "If (Posner) had studied the Saudi petroleum security infrastructure he would realize it's impossible to do what he claims the Saudis have done.

I'm sure the ex-pats who do all the heavy lifting in the Magic Kingdom's oil industry would have noticed their workplaces being wired.

Saudi Arabia does not have dirty bombs. It does not have any radioactive substances."

"Plus, as you may have noticed, we have a shortage of people who know the difference between red and blue wires. "

The book, to be published by Random House on May 17, attributes the claims to electronic intercepts of Saudi communications from the U.S. National Security Agency.

Which they leave lying around the office for hack reporters to read. You may ask, who is this guy? This is from his website; .

Best-selling books from the Pulitzer Prize finalist ranging from Nazi war criminals, political assassinations, organized crime, politicians, and now terrorism and 9/11. Investigative articles breaking news from Pete Rose's gambling addiction to questions over the death of Princess Diana. And now a new column, Cultural Chatter, together with his wife, author Trisha Posner, in Ocean Drive magazine.

Posted by:Steve

#11 Great conspiracy stuff, but yeah, it's all pretty silly. On the other hand, since that feckless crapweasel Nail Al-Jubeir flatly denies it, I'm almost ready to believe.

Posted by: SteveS 2005-05-12 17:44

#10 I'd like a fine blue glowing exhaust for my ride.

Posted by: Shipman 2005-05-12 17:00

#9 No, but it will make you a boffo hit at parties.

Posted by: .com 2005-05-12 14:23

#8 More importantly, will radioactive gas foul my spark plugs?

Posted by: Cassie 2005-05-12 14:18

#7 mojo - Dead right - the Saudi Royals are beyond paranoid, one of the seeds of truth that conspiracists like Posner start with, and have no other income sources. Would they endanger it intentionally? No, not ever. They'll spend a good fraction of the income it produces to protect it, however, and have. How effective that protection is - well - that's another issue, lol! The human components are questionable, while the physical impediments are substantial.

Posted by: .com 2005-05-12 14:10

#6 DN / sc - Thanks (!!!) for the detailed info - proving the notion is absurd on its face. Way past my expertise, lol! *applause*

Posner will probably go after nano-tech next...

Posted by: .com 2005-05-12 14:05

#5 What nonsense.

The Saudi's are not going to booby-trap their cash cow, certainly not while there are nutcases running around who might set off the self-destruct on their own, for their own reasons.

Posted by: mojo 2005-05-12 14:03

#4
From Little Green Footballs site --->>>

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.

Posted by: sea cruise 2005-05-12 13:47

#3 .com
Good take. You got Gerald Posner's number. His target audience is the liberal elites of the NorthEast and those who wannabee in other parts of the USA, such as Berkley, San Fran, Ann Arbor, Madison. His target audience is NY Times readers. But I will admit others also buy his books.

Posted by: sea cruise 2005-05-12 13:45

#2 Dot,

Right on. The dirty bomb thing is also a dead giveaway. In order to have enough radioactive material (say Cobalt-60) to make this doable, you'd either have to put up an enormous amount of shielding or risk all your workers dropping dead from radiation sickness. And, since Co-60 has a half-life of 5.2 years, you'd be perpetually scurrying around replacing your dreaded radioactive crud.

Posted by: Dreadnought 2005-05-12 13:41

#1 Lol - too much, heh. Silly drivel from the fad hack master of pulpy toilet reading material / backup tissue.

Posner's gig, apparently, is to pick some topic in which "public" interest (read: fools and loonies) is rising, then milk it with just enough cherry-picked fact to slip a trainload of innuendo and bullshit past his carefully targeted and willingly complicit audience - the Natl Enquirer / Star / The Nation / NewsWeak / et al folks, methinks. He's a hero to the conspiracists and Moonbats... That Huffenpuff thinks he's a wizard sorta helps bracket his tripe.

Indeed, Steve, the expat engineers who spend a LOT of time out in the field at the plants, the exact people I worked with at Aramco, would've noticed "packages" attached to important bits of the production, refining , or distribution systems. Sheesh. But it'll sell in Blue America, I'm sure. Hmmm. Does he mention Halliburton, anywhere?

Posted by: .com 2005-05-12 13:23

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