Over the weekend, swarms of explosive drones struck at the heart of Saudi Arabia’s oil production and sent the world’s biggest crude processing plant up in flames. About 5.7 billion barrels of output per day, as well as 2.5 billion cubic feet of natural gas, was put out of production. This amounts to over five percent of the world’s entire supply of oil. Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels claimed responsibility, but U.S. officials believe they are merely front men. Iran, they say, is truly responsible.

If there could be a better case-in-point for why America needs to wean itself off of greater dependence on foreign sources of oil, it would be hard to find.

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