Brian M Downing
The Yemeni civil war has been underway for three and a half years. The Houthis took hold in the Shia north, drove deep into the Sunni south, and neared Aden. The drive south was unwise from the start. It took the Houthis into hostile land and elicited more foreign support for the Sunnis, especially from Saudi Arabia. The campaign faltered, the lines stabilized, and casualties, military and civilian, continue to mount.
The port city of Hodeida has been under siege for several months. Preliminary talks between north and south have begun in Sweden. A ceasefire around Hodeida has been announced but fighting there continues and the humanitarian crisis worsens.
Saudi Arabia was not present at the talks, even though it’s a major supporter of the south. The embattled crown prince, Mohammad bin Salman, has more say in the outcome than all parties in Sweden. His position will be critical and if he opts for continuing the war, which is likely, it will reveal much about him and his approach to foreign policy.
The war
The view from the Riyadh palace, or at least its official position, is that the war is an act of Iranian aggression – part of an effort to destabilize the region and expand Tehran’s control. The Trump administration supports this view and puts forward evidence of Iranian arms delivered to Houthi hands.
However, the Houthi movement began several years ago to counter the growth of Wahhabism – the austere, intolerant Saudi brand of Islam which Riyadh propagates in schools and mosques across the region. The Houthis took power in the north and seized the bulk of the national army’s weaponry before heading south.
Iran, then, is neither the driving force behind the Houthis nor the main source of arms. Saudi claims of IRGC and Hisbollah cadres in the war have never been backed up by evidence.
The settlement
The fighting between north and south is the third conflict since the early 60s. None has been chiefly over religion. Regional differences have been more important, as the north was long under Ottoman rule, the south under British control.
The two regions are incompatible and continued efforts to hold Yemen together will lead only to another futile effort to build a nation out of two distinct, antagonistic regions. Neither parliamentary coalitions nor power-sharing arrangements will prevent another round of fighting in the not-so-distant future. The only solution is a partition of north and south.
The prince
The ruthless heir apparent will oppose such a settlement. His approach to Yemen is shaped by personal ambition and religious animosity.
The prince is determined to gravely weaken Iran and establish himself as master of the region. The effort to overthrow Shia/Alawi governance in Syria has failed badly but this makes victory in Yemen all the more necessary to him. Failure in both theaters could bring internal problems. Members of the royal family left out by the recent succession may coalesce into an effective opposition. The general public may become restive. The Shia population may become difficult to suppress.
Former Saudi princes had a more pragmatic approach to Yemen. They looked past religion and supported the Shia north against the Sunni south when the latter was backed by Egypt and the Muslim Brotherhood. Today, however, the prince sees the northerners as loathsome heretics. They cannot be negotiated with; they must be subjugated – through airstrikes and famine if need be. Arabic must have an equivalent of Untermenschen.
Yemen is one part of the prince’s regional ambition. He wants to establish himself as master of a league of Sunni countries stretching from North Africa to Pakistan. Most GCC countries are already on board. Egypt, Pakistan, Sudan, and Tunisia depend on his subsidies. Talks with powerholders in Iraq are underway. Qatar has been isolated. Syria remains a painful defeat that makes success in Yemen all the more necessary to him. (The prince may now try to win over Assad with reconstruction aid.)
The US and UK would do well to examine the Yemen war in terms of the crown prince’s ambitions and animosities. The democratic allies might come to realize that a victorious autocrat in Riyadh will one day be a formidable problem, if not a dangerous enemy.
© 2018 Brian M Downing
Brian M Downing is a national security analyst who’s written for outlets across the political spectrum. He studied at Georgetown University and the University of Chicago, and did post-graduate work at Harvard’s Center for International Affairs. Thanks as ever to Susan Ganosellis.