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Critics argue that politicians meddle in the management of these stocks too much; some even suggest that the stocks do not do much good at all. But Claude Mandil, the IEA's boss, insists that they play an important role as an “insurance policy”, which gives Saudi Arabia an incentive to play its role as swing producer and to prevent future oil shocks. If the Saudis do not release their oil, Mr Mandil argues, they know that the IEA will release its own.

This delicate game of cat and mouse points to the harsh reality of today's oil market: it is Saudi Arabia's willingness to be the swing producer that now insures the world's economy against oil shocks. As long as there is a stable government in Riyadh, the West can probably be confident that the enlightened self-interest of the Saudis will coincide with the interests of western gas guzzlers.

Alas, the stability of the Saudi regime is far from guaranteed. The pro-American, ruling family is deeply unpopular with fundamentalists in the country, and there is no clear successor to the current de facto ruler, Crown Prince Abdullah. As even the Saudis now grudgingly concede, home-grown terrorists regularly carry out attacks in the country. And if a radical like the Saudi-born Osama bin Laden were ever to topple the royal family, the world could well be hit by another energy shock.

The conventional view has held that economic reason and American military might would quickly put an end to any such trouble. It is true that any rational rebel, however anti-American, would still sell oil to the world market in order to feed his people. A wilfully irrational zealot, however, might very well shut down the Saudi spigots in an effort to hurt the West.

As for the notion that American troops could quickly restore oil exports, the current morass in Iraq suggests otherwise. If zealots ever got hold of nuclear or chemical weapons and turned them on essential bits of Saudi infrastructure, then all of America's might could not prevent a prolonged and extremely painful oil shock. At a recent conference held on Capitol Hill to reflect on the anniversary of the Arab oil embargo, James Woolsey, a former director of America's Central Intelligence Agency, said: “There are malicious, 9/11 equivalents in the energy system because of our risky reliance on the Saudis as swing producers.”

There's safety in cells

As the centre of gravity of the world's oil production shifts inexorably closer to Riyadh over the next two decades, this risk can only grow. One statistic makes the point particularly well: even assuming that oil-production technology advances by leaps and bounds, and assuming that four-fifths of all upstream investment in oil takes place outside the Middle East, the IEA still predicts that Saudi Arabia and its immediate neighbours will meet nearly two-thirds of the anticipated increase in oil demand in the years to 2030.

If that is accurate, government stocks, while sensible, will never be able to compensate for the loss of Saudi output for more than a few months. Seeking out new sources of non-OPEC oil abroad, and squeezing out more energy efficiency at home, are surely good things to do as well. But in the end neither will make the world much safer from another oil shock.

Only by finding a radical alternative to oil—another way to power the world's cars and buses—will consuming countries be able to escape a dangerous reliance on Saudi Arabia and its neighbours. Hydrogen-powered fuel cells, and other alternatives such as bioethanol, might provide a means of escape in a decade or two, if pursued vigorously enough in the meantime. Until then, however, the world's addiction to oil remains an increasingly risky gamble on Saudi Arabia.

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