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Much of What You Think You Know About the Yemen War Is Wrong
[War is Boring] The truth is that Yemen’s government lacks popular support. Its military has largely sided with the insurgents. Iran probably plays very little role. And the terrorists in Yemen are, at best, a side show to the main fighting.Saudi Arabia’s official position is that the coalition is supporting forces loyal to the internationally-recognized government of Pres. Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi as they battle insurgents from the Iranian-backed Houthi political movement. The Houthis’ position is that they are fighting back against U.S.-supported “Saudi-Zionist” aggression. The Americans’ position is less clear. Washington insists that the U.S. military is merely providing intelligence and logistical support to its regional allies in their operations against … someone. Who exactly the enemy is from the American point of view is something the U.S. government seems uncertain of or unwilling to clearly state. The only target in Yemen that Washington has clearly defined is the so-called Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula terror group, or AQAP. However, AQAP is not the Saudi coalition’s primary target. Among the coalition members, only the United Arab Emirates routinely cites AQAP as its main enemy. There’s little doubt that the Houthis — an armed religious-political movement of Yemeni Shia Zaidis — expresses strongly anti-American, anti-Jewish and anti-Saudi views. The group, which calls itself Ansar Allah — “Supporters of God” — operates from strongholds in northern Yemen. Its 20,000-strong militia force has fought a series of bitter campaigns against the central government in Sana’a since 2004. Since taking over the capital of Sana’a in September 2013, the Houthis’ rule has increasingly been characterized by violence against any sort of political opposition. Indeed, the methods of rule they apply in the parts of Yemen under their control are as bad as those of the most oppressive Middle East regimes. There’s scant evidence of direct Iranian support for the Houthis. Authorities have intercepted one or two small ships loaded with small arms and ammunition heading for the Yemeni coast. The truth is, with Syria gobbling up money and men, Tehran cannot afford a major proxy war in Yemen. Likewise, there are reasons to doubt Saudi Arabia’s claim that it’s defending Yemen’s legitimate government. Actually, Pres. Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi has next to no popular and political support in Yemen. His predecessor, Ali Abdullah Saleh, is much more popular than Hadi is within the Yemeni armed forces. Between September 2014 and March 2015, up to two-third of the Yemeni army either sided with the Houthis — because Saleh also did so — or were overrun by them. In total, more than 50 out of around 90 brigade-size formations of the Yemeni military aligned with the Houthis, only four or five with Hadi and three with southern separatists. AQAP overran four. Moreover, it’s not the Houthis who are firing ballistic missiles including Scuds, Frogs, SS-21s and SA-2s at Saudi Arabia, at Saudi bases inside Yemen and — more recently — at the American destroyer USS Mason. Rather, the three brigades of the Yemeni army Missile Defense Command and several air-defense units are the ones lobbing the missiles. But you won’t read that in many mainstream news reports. Most of what we in the West think we know about the war in Yemen bears little resemblance to what’s actually happening on the ground. Posted by: Pappy 2016-10-16 |
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