Droning on
On oil refineries, Eisenhower, and the new scope of conflict that is taking root before us
Satellite imagery seems to indicate that a large oil refinery in Saudi Arabia has been targeted in a weaponized drone attack. Unsurprisingly, Saudi Aramco doesn’t seem eager to confirm the reported events, but they seem likely to be real.
■ Those who haven’t been really keeping up on matters may not realize just how much certain aspects of warfare have evolved in just a few short years. It is not the case that everything about grand strategy is suddenly irrelevant and that large multinational alliances should be torn up. It is the case, however, that the cost of causing significant and expensive damage has plunged, placing it well within the reach of non-state belligerents. In other words, the marketplace for war-like damage no longer contains high barriers to entry.
■ All other things being equal, this means a much more unpleasant future. If the cost of waging war (or something like it) drops radically, we should expect much more of it to take place. When facilities like oil refineries become the targets, that means more people will be affected more often, even when they have nothing to do with any of the conflict.
■ It’s a genie that won’t go back into the bottle, either. Drones, cyberattacks, and other rapidly-spreading vectors of trouble can’t be shut down in isolation. The knowledge behind them is already too well diffused to be contained, and that’s distasteful but basically pointless to lament. What matters now is getting to work, with all due urgency, on bringing down the cost of defending against the new, cheap weaponry -- and on making the potential targets of attack more resilient or easier and cheaper to repair.
■ There’s no time to waste on performative displays of backwards thinking about what matters in warfare. Physical attributes can matter a lot in certain specific forms of combat, but at least since World War II, it has been equally (or, usually, much more) important to have the right mental attributes. Dwight Eisenhower even noted it, writing: “[T]he American soldier, in spite of wisecracking, sometimes cynical speech, is an intelligent human being who demands and deserves basic understanding of the reasons why his country took up arms and of the conflicting consequences of victory or defeat.” Thinking troops were important 80 years ago. They are only more important now that the emerging problems have become more complex.
