Eric Watkins
Oil Diplomacy Editor
It should come as no surprise to the oil and gas industry that Osama bin Laden, erstwhile head of the al-Qaeda terrorist network, believed in targeting oil tankers.
Just recall the October 2002 attack on MT Limburg off southern Yemen. That attack took the life of one seaman and barely missed sending the Limburg to the bottom.
One thing is for sure, it sent insurance rates soaring, and brought down the house on the Aden Container Terminal, a project operated by the Port of Singapore Authority.
Al-Qaeda knew then what it was doing and did not hesitate to makes its message heard around the world.
Al-Qaeda's message
"The strike on the French oil tanker was not an incidental strike at a passing tanker but a strike on the international oil-carrying line in the full sense of the word," the group said.
So, it should come as no surprise to learn that Bin Laden's recently captured personal files revealed plans to hijack oil tankers and blow them up at sea last summer, creating explosions he hoped would send oil prices through the roof and the world's economy through the floor.
The newly disclosed plot apparently showed that while Bin Laden always schemed for the next big strike that would kill thousands of Americans, he also believed relatively simpler attacks on the oil industry could create a worldwide panic.
The tanker idea was little more than an al-Qaeda fantasy, according to unnamed US officials, but the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Department of Homeland Security still wasted no time in issuing a confidential warning to police and the energy industry.
"We are not aware of indications of any specific or imminent terrorist attack plotting against the oil and natural gas sector overseas or in the United States," said DHS spokesman Matthew Chandler.
Tankers still targeted
However, Chandler did say, "In 2010, there was continuing interest by members of al-Qaeda in targeting oil tankers and commercial oil infrastructure at sea."
Industry insiders had no doubt about the importance of the warning or what the newly discovered files meant in terms of danger.
"You start blowing up oil tankers at sea and you're going to start closing down shipping lanes," said former FBI counterterrorism agent Don Borelli, now senior vice-president of the Sufan Group security firm. "It's going to cause this huge ripple through the economy."
Bill Box, a spokesman for the International Association of Independent Tanker Owners, said, "This has been a possibility on everyone's minds for some time now. Everyone is aware of what might happen."
Still, it never hurts to have a reminder.
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