And, by doing that, effects Iranian oil supplies by one third, domestically.
ISIS is determined to impact world oil markets, and it certainly has the capability to do so. It already set fire to the Baiji refinery north of Baghdad.
From PRI.org:
ISIS fighters and pro-goverment forces battled for a year over control of the oil refinery at Baiji, Iraq’s largest. The plant was crippled but intact, and would have been a key asset for whomever came to control all of the refinery and the pipelines in and out of it. This weekend, ISIS forces, which had controlled much of the facility since April, suddenly retreated. And torched the place on their way out.
This is but one refinery within influence of ISIS.
When the Baiji refinery was operational, it processed more than 200,000 barrels per day of crude, “which,” says van Heuvelen, “amounted to more than one-third of Iraq’s total domestic fuel production.” Iraqi authorities took the facility offline in June 2014 when ISIS forces first seized great swaths of northern Iraq, including oil fields and pipelines critical to the Baiji operation. With ISIS essentially surrounding the refinery, the pro-government forces had to struggle to keep fighters out.
“Now,” says van Heuvelen, “the refinery is probably unusable for several years, if ever again.” Iraqi officials might have seen this coming.
“Might have seen this coming.” The telling paragraph, then:
“They definitely planned poorly,” van Heuvelen observes. “One problem is that they did not devote nearly enough troops to guarding one of the most critical pieces of infrastructure in the country. Another problem is when they realized that ISIS was launching this overwhelming attack on the refinery, they responded without any coherent strategy. So they sent in reinforcements without securing the supply routes between the refinery and the territory that the Iraqi government controlled. As a result, those reinforcements essentially walked into an ambush, and many of them got killed.”
“Without any coherent strategy.” Correct. I see no coherence (much less strategy) applied by Mr Obama to ISIS. The Middle Eastern region, you see, holds sway to roughly 60% of the world’s working oil reserves — and therein lies the problem.
ISIS seems to be cutting a wide swath through much of the Middle East with some bit of impunity — despite their being the “jay-vee” team. To refresh about Mr Obama’s quote:
“The analogy we use around here sometimes, and I think is accurate, is if a jayvee team puts on Lakers uniforms that doesn’t make them Kobe Bryant,” Obama told Remnick. “I think there is a distinction between the capacity and reach of a bin Laden and a network that is actively planning major terrorist plots against the homeland versus jihadists who are engaged in various local power struggles and disputes, often sectarian.”
Perchance Mr Obama will take ISIS seriously when it not just attacks but holds serious refinery capability, production and storage at not just one but a number of ME facilities.
For “sectarians” who are “engaged in various local power struggles,” ISIS doesn’t seem to be very local or very limited. A reminder: ISIS is also using heavy American military equipment left behind and captured as it cuts its way through Syria and now Iraq.
I would remind Mr Obama of his phrase “energy independence.” That would also include, sir, the untapped resources — which have been discovered to be quite vast — under the feet of Americans currently.
BZ
