Shifrinson Interviewed on Saudi Arabia Oil Attacks
Joshua Shifrinson, Assistant Professor of International Relations at the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies at Boston University, was interviewed for an article on the recent Saudi Arabia oil attacks that also featured his research.
Shifrinson was interviewed for a September 16, 2019 article by NPR entitled “Outside Experts See Iran’s Hand In Attack On Saudi Oil Facility.”
From the text of the article:
Abqaiq is the linchpin of oil production for the Gulf nation, according to Joshua Shifrinson, an associate professor of international relations at Boston University who has conducted an extensive analysis. A number of chemical processes are carried out at the site, but perhaps the most important is the separation of oil from highly flammable hydrogen-sulfide gas.
That separation is done on-site using a series of custom-built “stabilization towers.” At least some of those towers appear to have been damaged, according to commercial satellite imagery released by the U.S. government. “Whoever did it knew what the right towers were,” Shifrinson says. That’s no small feat on the sprawling site.
Joshua R. Itzkowitz Shifrinson’s teaching and research interests focus on the intersection of international security and diplomatic history, particularly the rise and fall of great powers and the origins of grand strategy. He has special expertise in great power politics since 1945 and U.S. engagement in Europe and Asia. Shifrinson’s first book, Rising Titans, Falling Giants: How Great Powers Exploit Power Shifts (Cornell University Press, 2018) builds on extensive archival research focused on U.S. and Soviet foreign policy after 1945 to explain why some rising states challenge and prey upon declining great powers, while others seek to support and cooperate with declining states.