If you think the price of gas is high now, imagine what might have happened if this plot succeeded.
Police in Saudi Arabia have arrested 172 suspected militants in an alleged plot to blow up the country's oil fields.
The apparent plan, which has echoes of classic al-Qaida moves, is said to have involved training pilots to fly aircraft into buildings and facilities to wreak as much havoc as possible. Among the targets were some as yet unspecified places outside the country.
Saudi authorities also claim public figures were set as targets for assassination, and the plot was about to have a start date set when authorities swooped in.
"They had reached an advance stage of readiness and what remained only was to set the zero hour for their attacks," Interior Ministry spokesman Brig. Mansour al-Turki relates. "They had the personnel, the money, the arms. Almost all the elements for terror attacks were complete."
He refused to confirm the 911-style plot involving jets, but did say the pilots were preparing to get their training in foreign countries.
The point of the entire alleged attack? To free prisoners from Saudi jails.
Whatever was going to happen, it was well financed. Officials recovered more than $35.6 million that was to be used to fund the plan.
Footage broadcast on Saudi TV revealed a huge cache of weapons that had been buried in the desert.
Among the haul: plastic explosives, ammunition cartridges, handguns and rifles wrapped in plastic sheeting.
It's not clear if al-Qaida was involved in the operation, but Osama bin Laden has repeatedly called for attacks on his native country's oil reserves as a way to hurt the current leadership and cripple the economy of the West.