Hostilities in Israel and Lebanon without doubt raise the vulnerability of oil and gas workers throughout the Middle East. But the risk must be kept in perspective and addressed with concern for local communities, says a security consultant who once developed counterterrorist techniques for the British military.
Andrew Kain, managing director of AKE Ltd., Hereford, UK, discussed terrorist risk in the energy industry at a presentation to insurers July 25 in London.
“Energy and oil will be a priority” of terror groups, Kain said. Terrorists seek to achieve aims out of proportion to their group sizes and resources. While oil and gas facilities provide that kind of opportunity, they’re not as easy to blow up as most people think.
“Terror groups are in fact constrained,” said Kain, who founded AKE in 1991 after a career in the British Special Air Services (SAS) that began with 6 years in the Parachute Regiment.
Terrorist risk
He described risk as “threat plus vulnerability plus criticality.”
The latter term relates to the question: “What can we not afford to lose?” And threat, Kain said, amounts to “modus operandi plus capability plus opportunity.”
For oil and gas workers in the Middle East, though, the searing question is vulnerability. Kain elaborated on that subject for Oil & Gas Journal in the broader context of the war on terrorism, which he considers impossible to win by purely military means.
“In fact,” he said, “ill-conceived use of military force or use of ill-prepared military in a complex counterterrorist campaign is likely to exacerbate the situation.”
Behind every terrorist movement, he explained, is a cause or at least a sense of injustice. A successful strategy against such a movement must involve turning populations toward methods of addressing grievances that don’t involve terrorism.
“There is, to my knowledge, no historical example where brute force and intimidation have been successful,” Kain said. “In effect, the hearts and minds of the population have to be won over.”
In the Middle East, sentiment is rushing in the other direction as people witness manifestations of what many see as double standards applied by the West in Iraq and Lebanon.
Kain expects “further radicalization of parts of the population” and aggravation of the threat. Terrorists will find it increasingly easy both to move within sympathetic populations and to recruit operatives. Attacks will increase against targets seen to represent “the aggressor.”
“As a result, expatriate [oil and gas] staff will become more vulnerable in that there is likely to be a higher number of attacks,” said Kain, who was an SAS instructor when he created counterterrorist tactics that remain in use. “If this then leads to higher turnover of personnel, it could at some time reach a point where supply of qualified personnel becomes critical.”
While the terror risk to expatriate oil and gas workers may be rising, however, it remains below that of a road traffic accident, said Kain, recommending that companies address the issue carefully.
“They should ensure that personnel have a good understanding of the real risk and that things are put into perspective,” he said.
Staff members should define conditions of their region in terms of the elements of threat: the methods and capabilities of potentially menacing groups in the area and the need of those groups for opportunity, which targets usually provide by conforming to routine.
“Any preparatory training should be aimed at enabling staff to retain as much control over their personal and work environments as is possible,” Kain said. “This is partially achieved through better understanding of risk along with the skills and confidence to deal with most likely situations.”
The emphasis, however, should be on “avoidance,” which requires the ability to assess and monitor risk, which in turn requires intelligence.
In his presentation to insurers, Kain described major methods of mitigating vulnerability as employing physical security measures, developing teams for company processes such as communications and risk-management, and the shaping of community relations.
Community relationships
For OGJ, he emphasized the last category.
“The most important relationship, in my view, will always be the one with the community,” he said. “This will define the level of conventional security required in all circumstances.”
For any long-term project, the emphasis should be on “protecting the integrity of the operation in order to maximize potential,” Kain said. “This will not be achieved by what are perceived to be aggressive and obtrusive security procedures and systems.”
