Once again, Yemen is in the news. This time it isn’t to glorify the Yemenese president for allowing the use of American drones against Shia rebels. This time it isn’t the subsequent riots ensuing as a result of the leaking of that information. This time it’s a full blown rebellion that has, so far, culminated in the seizure of the capitol at Sanaa.
On the 27th of March Saudi Arabia launched its first overt unilateral attack on Yemen with a bombing campaign against the Houthi Shia rebels. The Saudis fear the Houthis for a variety of reasons. For one, they fear them because they are Fiver Shia, which is reason enough for puritanical Wahhabis. Saudi Arabia has a large twelver Shia population in its oil producing eastern areas which has proven to be a source of repeated unrest, so they take their fight against heretics very seriously.
Second, they fear them because they fear encroaching Iranian influence. Although such influence is nowhere to be found at present it would undoubtedly coalesce if the Houthis consolidated power. After all, the Saudis fear the Houthis and will take deadly measures to destroy them, for which Iran is a useful counterweight. It is not a matter of Iranian guilt or the like, it is simply the situation. The Houthis must be dismantled before they gain strength to be those natural allies the Iranians so desperately need.
But here’s the strange thing about this situation; The point at which Houthi strength, with their allies, might be stopped has long been passed. After all they virtually control the country now in fact. And this isn’t because of a sudden explosion of deadly Houthi rebellions. This rebellion has been going on for years! And by and large, the Houthis have won it. They are more than 100,000 soldiers strong and are allied with the Yemeni military which we saw in action last year when they bombed the Presidential Palace.
And that strange President is at the center of this drama. President Hadi is a power mongering, corruption affirmed puppet of the Saudis. After being defeated last year by the Houthi forces he was forced to come to a power sharing agreement. A major cause of the current crisis is his failure to uphold his end of the bargain, in any way shape or form. Instead of doing so, he chose to flee to Aden, that critical southern city and from there flee again to Saudi Arabia. He could not be a better servant.
And that’s the trick here. The Houthis and Yemeni factions of note are fairly sick of Saudi and other Western influence in their little country. Yemen of course has all the geopolitical attributes of a blessed nation, with a key strategic chokepoint on its doorstep and potentially immense oil reserves that have yet to be fully explored. But foreigner domination of the country for the last century has made them, and kept them, as a third world hell hole that produces nothing but oil and stays poor.
The response of the various parties is telling. The Arab states aligned with Saudi Arabia, and therefore America, have been explicit in their support, nay, their demands for a negotiation with the twice-ousted President Hadi. Obviously that’s a sick joke, since the man is a liar in every way and constantly acts contrary to the interests of Yemen’s sovereignty. He is nothing but a puppet in the opulence of Riyadh, demanding a throne with the guns of another. And a lot of guns at that. More than a hundred thousand Saudi troops wait near the border as the airforce bomb Yemeni Houthi positions near Sanaa, the Yemeni capitol. Meanwhile the American separatist machine is into work, with media sources already mulling a (re)split between north and south Yemen.
Key to this drama is the response of Russia and Iran which is also critical. Both nations have been unusually vehement in demanding Saudi restraint and in rhetorical support of the Houthis. This is to be the new normal, I think. With the nuclear deal no guarantee for Iran and America’s overt hostility to Russia, there is no need to pull diplomatic punches. The Saudis act as a puppet of the Americans and an enemy to both countries and their interests are being treated accordingly. Meanwhile an anti-Saudi Yemen, regardless of who runs it, would be an immensely useful asset to the Eurasianist forces.
For the West itself, this whole situation is a disaster although the state department does not yet know it. Lines are being drawn in the sand, and motioned to with greater and greater vigor. All the while the legitimacy of the West leaks slowly like blood from a stabbing. The patient doesn’t always notice the numbness and the shock furthers the fatality of the act. By supporting the extremely overt Saudi intervention and the de facto uprising of Al Qaeda factions in the east of Yemen, America is acting as the ultimate hypocrite. Interventions are too be damned, except when America approves. By the same token revolutions in Syria, Libya, and Tunisia are to be glorified, except when they threaten American interests like in Yemen. Then they must be crushed with the mighty Wahhabi jackboot and the tacit support of their masters in Washington.
Every time the West engages in act of such diplomatic retardation it butchers its standing and prestige in the political world, for the rest of the world does not care for the solipsism the West so embraces. It is as if America is inviting diplomatic insult and scorn. Such is the degeneracy of our elites.
Very good analysis of the situation, and it bears saying that Saudi Arabia is actually driving the Houthi rebels into the arms of Iran much faster than would happen otherwise. Who else are they to turn to when they are being aerially bombarded with American made weapons?
“But foreigner domination of the country for the last century has made them, and kept them, as a third world hell hole that produces nothing but oil and stays poor.”
While foreign domination has certainly hurt Yemen, its greater problem is that it is essentially another made-up nation invented whole cloth without any consideration of its people, who are perhaps some of the most tribal in the entire Middle East. North and South Yemen was actually a pretty sensible divide in this case. Diversity is forever a failure.
I can’t help but get the sense that something ‘big’ is going to happen in the Middle East very soon… its like the ticking of a clock in the back of my mind.
A sensible divide? Sure, maybe. I don’t agree that diversity is forever a failure. Every empire in history has been multiethnic. It certainly requires more care an attention, and single ethnicity states definitely have advantages, but its not at all a dealbreaker. for me.
I share your sense of anticipation. As I’ve posted on my blog, it feels like everything is speeding towards a dramatic conclusion of some kind or another.
What’s more, I just don’t see how Saudi Arabia really wins this. The Houthi’s are the only well organized military force in Yemen, the army there has simply joined them or melted away. The next most organized group after the Houthis are Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. Saudi Arabia would actually have to launch a full ground invasion, sparking off a massive, bloody war in which Shi’ite children getting killed is going to enrage Iran and Hezbollah to action.
Talk about a tinderbox.
Indeed, this is not a front that the Americans and Saudis wanted to go hot, but here we are. Notably Al Qaeda in Yemen is a useful ally for the Saudis and Americans as long as the deals are kept out of sight. They deal expertly with them in Iraq, and the Wahhabi ideology, though of different strains for each, remains a binding force.
Do remember that the Saudis haven’t been bombing Al Qaeda in the East of the country and that’s not a coincidence.
It’s at once that cut and dry but also not that cut and dry. So for example Iran has deployed its navy in the Gulf of Aden to stop piracy and protect shipping routes.
http://www.presstv.com/Detail/2014/11/04/384763/Iran-Navy-sends-fleet-to-Gulf-of-Aden-
Of course they are actually supplying arms and at least advisers if not soldiers to the Houthi militia.
The Saudi/American ally is the former vice president now president Hadi who was supposed to negotiate a federalization of Yemen so each of the ethnic factions could have a lot of local autonomy.
The Houthi basically demanded way too much in the negotiations. They wanted to have sole authority to appoint key members of the Sana government. They basically wanted to eat their cake and have it too, get to choose who would make up the government, but not have any real responsibility for seeing that the country is well governed.
This led to renewed fighting this year, which Al Queda affiliated groups have taken advantage of by pushing their rebellion in the southeast.
The purpose of the bombing campaigns is to weaken and bleed the Houthis enough to bring them back to the negotiating table with a more reasonable set of demands, hopefully leading to an agreement which will allow Sana to take the fight back to Al Queda. From an American perspective it is a desperate policy, which, if it works, will be a good thing.
If I had to sum up the post-911 middle east in one sentence, it would be:
Iran is much better at fighting proxy wars than the United States and Saudi Arabia.
Amen to that. Amen. We’ll see how this all plays out. It may lead to a real invasion by the Saudis, finally giving those wahhabis a taste of the Iraq war they spurred on.
Time will tell. I highly doubt the Houthis will back down at this stage though.
I doubt the Saudis are stupid enough to actually invade. But if they do the Iranians will be singing praises to Allah from the rooftops, as they’d get to bleed the Saudis in a fight with one of their proxies.