[RAldrich]

The Saudis spend billions and billions acquiring arms, mostly from US arms manufacturers. This includes defense equipment. How come they failed so completely in defending their most important oil installations? Why is that?

[TnTnTn]

If we don’t know who launched the missiles and where they were launched from we are totally inept.....

[PA Engineer]

The Saudis spend billions and billions acquiring arms, mostly from US arms manufacturers. This includes defense equipment. How come they failed so completely in defending their most important oil installations? Why is that?

First, they have far more important installations. These two facilities are a fraction of what they have. Second, I think they lacked imagination.

I posted this on another thread:

You are able to discern the difference in severity of the situation had these missiles been fired from Iranian territory correct? The Saudi’s bomb Yemen all the time, that’s not an escalation.

Go to google earth and study Saudi Arabia (SA) and the surrounding geography. I am intimately aware of both the Khurais and Abqaiq GOSPS. There are multiple in each field. I have been to each one and the surrounding fields.

The Yemen and Saudi boarder is porous.

Look for the old Riyadh highway from Khurais to Hofuf and then Abqaiq. I know the attacks came from the west northwest. I have commented on it in other threads. Khurais is remote with some SA air assets in the area. Beyond that it is easy for Iranian "boots on the ground" to attack both facilities and then disappear with logistical support from the Houthis and potentially tribal support in Hofuf.

The NG tanks were low hanging fruit, however ingenious. It did not take sophisticated weapons to penetrate a pressurize vessel and ignite the gas. SA at one time flared all the gas until they began gathering it for desalination, electric power and export via a new parallel NG line in the east west pipeline corridor to Yanbu. We'll never know, however I would not be surprised that internal security was lax and unimaginative.

SA can easily start production again by flaring it. The flares are still there. The repairs will take place quickly. Anyone that has worked in Kingdom with Aramco knows this.

The "missiles" could have been fired from Iranian territory, however I believe Iran launched them in country with the help of the Houthis. Either way it is till Iran. Launched from Iran or smuggled into Hofuf. The attack on Khurais was the biggest tell. I don't expect the US or SA to reveal all of their intel. I do expect to see a lot of beheadings in the coming months.

Launched from within SA by Iran would be a major escalation. I can understand why they don't want the real truth to come out if that is the case.