How Saudi Arabia failed to protect itself from drone and missile attacks

Questions have abounded all week as to how Saudi Arabia, the planet’s third-highest defense spender and steward of the world’s largest oil facility, allowed itself to fall victim to a drone and missile attack that wiped out half of its crude production in a day.

Quite simply, the kingdom’s defenses — no matter how high-tech — are designed for entirely different kinds of threats. The low-flying and relatively cheap drones and cruise missiles purported to have been used in Saturday’s attack are a fairly new challenge that many nation states are not in fact prepared to counter. It also doesn’t help that massive oil plants are just easy targets.

Twenty-five drones and missiles were used in the Saturday strikes on state oil giant Saudi Aramco facilities Abqaiq and Kurais, Saudi’s defense ministry said. While claimed by Yemen’s Houthi rebels, Saudi and U.S. officials say Iran was responsible, a charge Tehran has denied.

Saudi Arabia boasts an arsenal of sophisticated and expensive air defense equipment. They have the American-made Patriot missile defense system, German-made Skyguard air defense cannons and France’s Shahine mobile anti-aircraft system, and they’ll soon have Lockheed Martin’s highly advanced THAAD (terminal high altitude area defense) interceptors.