CT TASK FORCE: CRITICAL INFRASTRUCTURE

UNCLAS ATHENS 000216 SIPDIS SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: ASEC ECON PTER PREL PGOV ETTC EAID EFIN GR SUBJECT: CT TASK FORCE: CRITICAL INFRASTRUCTURE REF: SECSTATE 6461 ¶1. (U) As requested in Reftel, this message contains Embassy Athens' assessment of critical infrastructure and key resources in Greece which, if destroyed, disrupted, or exploited, might have an immediate and deleterious effect on the United States. ¶2. (U) Greek Shipping Industry: Greek companies own almost 3,400 merchant vessels, making the Greek-owned merchant fleet the largest in the world. The Greek-owned fleet represents 8.4 percent of the world,s total number of cargo ships and 13.7 percent of the world,s tonnage. Greek-owned ships are docked all over the world, and fly under a variety of flags. We assess that while an attack or natural disaster that incapacitated this industry would have a direct and negative impact on US commerce, the diffuse nature of the industry makes such events highly improbable. ¶3. (U) Port of Piraeus: With an annual throughput of approximately 1.4 million TEUs (twenty feet equivalent unit),the Port of Piraeus is one of the ten busiest container traffic ports in Europe and the top container port in the eastern Mediterranean. In 2007, approximately 5,500 containers were shipped from the port to the United States. The port is also the largest passenger port in Europe and one of the largest in the world. We assess that an attack or natural disaster at the port, depending upon its nature and severity, could have severe consequences in terms of lives lost and regional transport and could impact directly on US commercial interests. ¶4. (U) Energy Pipelines: By 2013, Greece will be home to two of the most important energy pipelines in Southern Europe: The Burgas-Alexandroupolis oil pipeline and the Turkey-Greece-Italy gas interconnector (TGI). Damage to the former pipeline, which will bring Caspian crude to the Aegean in a way that bypasses the Bosporus, could have a moderate impact on international oil markets. If it were just one part of a joint attack or major disaster in the Straits, this could be a severe blow to global oil markets. A disruption of the TGI would have a devastating effect on the Italian gas market, which will be receiving 8bcm of gas through TGI. We assess that it would have no effect on the US gas market. ¶5. (U) Souda Bay, Crete: Naval Facility Souda Bay, Crete is a major logistics and support base for U.S. forces flowing through the Mediterranean, both in and out of the Middle East. A catastrophic attack or natural disaster, conventional or unconventional, would likely have a significant, but not catastrophic, short term impact on US and coalition operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Although difficult to implement, other basing options could be quickly amended to ensure the maintenance of logistics support to Coalition Forces. An attack on US forces at Naval Facility Souda Bay would have a significant effect on US military operations in the Mediterranean, particularly U.S. Navy and Air Force. ¶6. (U) Rail/Road Lines in Northern Greece: Major logistics support to ISAF forces flow overland via rail and road through Thessaloniki. A catastrophic attack or disaster on the rail or road lines leading into and out of Thessaloniki toward the North would significantly impact overland support to ISAF. However, there are other logistics options that could be implemented quickly to reestablish logistic support to the region. ¶7. (U) Submarine Telecommunication Cables: There are a number of international fiber-optic telecommunication cables that run through Greek territorial waters in the Mediterranean, most notably SEA-ME-WE-3, which provides links to Europe, the Middle East, and Asia, and Mednautilus, which connects the Mediterranean region to Western Europe and the US. Though the destruction of one of these cables would cause significant damage to US communication to these areas, we assess that it is unlikely that terrorists would have the technical capability to cut these cables because of their location deep in the Mediterranean. We presume that the cables were designed to withstand natural phenomena. SPECKHARD