Gunshots, Bomb Attack at Major Oil Facility

[Post continually updating.  Scroll for the latest.]

Crude oil futures jumped nearly $2 on news of at least one car bomb detonating at Saudi Arabia's Abqaiq oil facility.

An Arab satellite television station reported that one pipeline was damaged in an attack by suicide bombers in two explosives-packed cars.

One vehicle detonated when guards opened fire as it attempted to drive through the facility's gates, according to the Saudi-owned channel Al-Arabiya, which did not give a source for the report.
...
A second vehicle was stopped and two people inside it were killed, Al-Arabiya said. None of the guards were hurt, it said.

Nice shootin', guards.  Ever thought about getting into the seaport protection game?  Maybe you should take our card.

Dismaying as the incident was, I must say it's nice when suicide bombers succeed only in the suicide part.  The only damage so far reported (other than to the scumbags' cars and persons) was to a pipeline at the refinery.  Processing was reported to have halted temporarily, but is now back online.

The Abqaiq facility handles two thirds of the output of Saudi Arabia, the number one global oil producer.  By my calculations, that's nearly 6 million barrels per day coursing through the monster plant.  More than $100 billion worth of oil per year.

Sounds like a very major event was just prevented.  Beyond the economic implications, this could have been a very bloody day.  According to the Aramco jobs site, about half of Abqaiq's nearly 2,000 residents are North American.

Intraday prices for April crude oil futures are available here (times are GMT):

So who was behind the foiled attack?  Al Qaeda is obviously the first name to jump to mind.  Saudi oil fields haven't been their typical targets in the past, but in a recording that surfaced in December of 2004, Osama bin Laden called for attacks on oil assets in the Gulf to choke off supply to the Western infidels.

"Targeting America in Iraq in terms of economy and loss of life is a golden and unique opportunity... Be active and prevent them from reaching the oil, and mount your operations accordingly, particularly in Iraq and the Gulf."

Add to that the high concentration of Americans that live and work at the Abqaiq facility and it begins to sound like an ideal Al Qaeda target.

The Officers Club and Macsmind don't see Al Qaeda fingerprints, pointing to the ease with which the attack was thwarted and the implicit poor planning and general amateurishness of the perpetrators.  Then again, the distributed, cellular nature of the Al Qaeda network would tend to allow for a wide range of sophistication and skill level.  It's seems likely that we typically don't hear from the more dilettantish terrorists simply because their sloppiness leads to their being caught, blowing themselves up in their own caves, etc.

Unless and until we learn otherwise, I think Al Qaeda has earned the benefit of the doubt as suspect #1.

Terrorism Unveiled sees the culprits as "almost definitely members of al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, although this does not rule out some support from senior leadership."  TU offers some compelling insights on this attack in the context of other incidents in the region and Saudi-based terror cells.

8:15 pm: The Saudi branch of Al Qaeda has claimed responsibility for the thwarted attack.

"The heroic mujahedeen of the squadron of Sheikh Osama bin Laden, god protect him, have successfully penetrated the oil and gas refinery in the town of Abqaiq... where two car bombs were able to enter," the 'Organisation of Al Qaeda in the Arab Peninsula' wrote on its website.

Elsewhere: The Counterterrorism Blog, Michelle Malkin, The Moderate Voice, Vital Perspective, Lawhawk, The Corner on NRO, Macsmind, Outside the Beltway, Terrorism Unveiled, The Anchoress