Is the Pentagon Prepared for East Med Gas?

Is the Pentagon Prepared for East Med Gas?

From Will at THE OTHER NEWS:

Is the Pentagon Prepared for East Med Gas?HT: PhantomReport.

Source: Commentary Mag
More good news out of the Eastern Mediterranean, as even more gas has been discovered in the Levant Basin between Israel and Cyprus. The last decade has seen new gas and oil fields discovered around the world, but the Levant Basin is special: It is close enough to major markets in Europe to make it easy both to produce and distribute. Eastern Mediterranean gas can bypass Russia, Iran, and Turkey—all sources of regional instability—and also need not transit choke points such as the Strait of Hormuz, the Bab al-Mandab, or the Suez Canal to get to market.

As Eastern Mediterranean gas development continues, and the region becomes increasing strategically important, it behooves the United States to plan ahead to ensure the safety not only of American personnel working in the region, but also of the energy infrastructure. To do so would not simply be to spend American resources to defend the flow of oil and gas to China, as the United States effectively does in the Persian Gulf, but rather to protect an energy corridor which undercuts and diminishes the leverage and income of American adversaries.


German scholar Niklas Anzinger highlights growing threats to the region in an essay he wrote for the American Enterprise Institute:

• First there’s Turkey: “After Noble Energy Inc. began drilling for oil and gas in the Eastern Mediterranean in September 2011, Turkey’s European Union Affairs Minister Egemen Bağış threatened to use military force against Cyprus. ‘This is what we have the navy for,’ he declared, adding, ‘We have trained our marines for this; we have equipped the navy for this. All options are on the table; anything can be done.’”
• Then there’s Russia: “In 1967, Moscow formed the 5th Operational Squadron in the Mediterranean to counterbalance the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the US Sixth Fleet. The 5th Operational Squadron remained in the region until 1992, when it withdrew after the Soviet Union’s fall. In May 2013, against the backdrop of the Syrian civil war, Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a new Russian taskforce comprised of 16 warships and support vessels to the Eastern Mediterranean.”
• Next there’s Lebanon: “While Kofi Annan, former secretary general of the United Nations, certified Israel’s withdrawal from Lebanon in 2000, the countries’ maritime boundary and 330 square miles of territorial waters remain in dispute… Nabih Berri, speaker of the Lebanese parliament and a close ally to Hezbollah, said in September 2012 that ‘we will not compromise on any amount of water from our maritime borders and oil, not even a single cup.’”
• Hezbollah, of course, remains a particular problem: “During its 2006 war with Israel, Hezbollah crippled the Israeli warship INS Hanit, which was cruising eight to nine miles offshore, with an Iranian version of the Chinese C-802 missile… Hezbollah may also maintain an amphibious sabotage and coastal infiltration unit. Recruits may receive training in an IRGC underwater combat school in Bandar Abbas and in a camp near the Assi River in the northern Bekaa Valley.”

There’s much, much more, and the whole essay is worth reading. Too often, American military planners focus on the last conflict. There is no shortage of discussion about what resources are needed to counter Iranian ambitions, but too little strategic planning about what resources the United States might need to protect interests in the Eastern Mediterranean in the years to come.

Related: 

NATO’s Energy Security Strategy: Break Russia’s control over European gas markets.