Desert Kingdom: How Oil and Water Forged Modern Saudi Arabia

321 Pages·2010·1.06 MB·English

by  Toby Craig Jones

Desert Kingdom

Desert Kingdom
How Oil and Water Forged Modern Saudi Arabia
Toby Craig Jones
HarvardUniversityPress•Cambridge,Massachusetts,andLondon,England•2010
Copyright©2010bythePresidentandFellowsofHarvardCollege
Allrightsreserved
PrintedintheUnitedStatesofAmerica
LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData
Jones,TobyCraig,1972–
Desertkingdom:howoilandwaterforgedmodernSaudiArabia/
TobyCraigJones.
Includesbibliographicalreferencesandindex.
ISBN978-0-674-04985-7(cloth:alk.paper)
1.SaudiArabia—Politicsandgovernment—20thcentury.
2.Naturalresources—Governmentpolicy—SaudiArabia—History—20th
century. 3.Waterresourcesdevelopment—Governmentpolicy—Saudi
Arabia—History—20thcentury. 4.Water—Governmentpolicy—Saudi
Arabia—History—20thcentury. 5.Petroleumindustryandtrade—
Governmentpolicy—SaudiArabia—History—20thcentury. I.Title.
DS244.52.J66 2010
953.805—dc22 2010013253
For Sandy, Mackenzie, and Danielle

Contents
1
TheNatureoftheState 1
2
ImperialGeology 20
3
TheDogmaofDevelopment 54
4
EngineeringtheGarden 90
5
TheBlackGoldCoast 138
6
TheWagesofOil 179
7
Nature’sRetreat 217
Epilogue:HouseofWisdom 236
Notes 247
Acknowledgments 295
Index 301

TheNatureof theState
1
In November 1976,flush with billions of dollars from
therecentboominoilprices,SaudiArabiacommissionedastudyof
theimprobable,aprojectsofancifulthatoneengineerwouldcharac-
terizeitashorrifying.Hewentontoremarkthattheprojectlay“sev-
eral orders of magnitude beyond anything within [the] experience”
oftheexpertsassembledtoconsiderit.1Thestudyaimedtomeasure
thefeasibilityoftowinga100-million-tonicebergfromAntarcticato
the Red Sea, where it was hoped the melting ice would slake the
desertkingdom’sdesperateneedforfreshwater.Overthenextseveral
yearsMuhammadal-Faisal,anephewoftheSaudiking,collaborated
with a French polar explorer and a French engineering firm to ad-
vance the endeavor. So bullish was al-Faisal on the project that he
investedmillionsofhisowndollarsinthecreationofIcebergTrans-
port International, a company whose sole purpose was to haul ice-
bergs to the water-poor. He bragged to the New York Times that he
thought tugging icebergs “a better enterprise than oil,”believing he
coulddeliverdrinkablewaterfromtheSouthPole,anddosoonthe
cheap.2
In spite of massive logistical challenges, the forty-one-year-old
prince insisted that he couldbring to Saudi Arabia a mile-wide ice-
berg,towing it on a 5,000-mile voyage in six months to a year,for a
costof around$100million.Muchliketheicebergitself,thescaleof
thetaskwasenormous.Themostdauntingchallengewasdelivering
thebergwithoutitsmeltingfromthecombinationofthesun’spow-
erful glare and the ocean’s battering waves. The prince’s technical