Saudi Arabia Goes To War (Sort Of)

The Saudis have a very fine record of buying weapons systems, the more expensive the better. The House of Sand also has a good history of talking tough, at least regarding Israel. However, the armed forces of the Kingdom usually have been either absent or very late arriving whenever and wherever there are real bullets being fired with genuinely hostile intent.

This has changed of late. The Houthi insurgents of Yemen had the temerity to cross the border into the Land of the Two Mosques with unpleasant results for the local Saudi outpost. The Saudis responded with air attacks on villages in Yemen suspected of supporting or hiding the Houthi fighters. Along with the fast mover hits on the adobe and rock hooches of Yemen, the Saudi ground forces moved back into the border area after the Houthis had withdrawn either with or without prisoners. (Reports on that vary and an assessment as to which might be more likely is a bit risky since the Houthi are not noted for their propensity to take prisoners, but balancing this is the potential for propaganda.)

The background of this border operation is murky. The Houthis maintain that they had a deal with the Kingdom to use a piece of border terrain. They aver the Saudis had promised not to allow the Yemeni forces to cross this area in order to attack the Houthis but reneged on the deal. The border raid was in revenge for this Saudi sell-out.

The air strikes conducted by the Saudis were complemented by artillery fire from the Yemeni army. Most of those downrange were probably civilians as the fighters normally disperse to the rugged, cave pocked terrain outside of the mountain villages when under threat. Whatever the reality on the ground, the Saudis have claimed success in killing "infiltrators."

The operations against the Houthi will be time limited and involve few, if any, ground forces. The Kingdom is not at all willing to find itself drawn more deeply into the affairs of Yemen despite the threat presented by Yemen based al-Qaeda assets. The assertions by the Saudi military and government that only territory on the Saudi side of the border was attacked is credible if one limits consideration to ground force actions only. It is not credible with respect to air strikes.

It will be hard for the Saudis to maintain their hands-off approach if the Houthi insurgency continues much longer. The Kingdom and other Sunni members of the Gulf Coordination Council have already made repeated references to the role Iran is playing in the Houthi war.

There is little doubt Iran has provided some assistance to the Houthi even though the nature and amount of that assistance is a matter for debate. At the same time the Kingdom has provided military materiel as well as financial assistance to the Yemeni government. So far the Saudi aid has been a matter of too little even if not really too late.

The Kingdom has also responded to the out-of-Yemen threat with a high-tech Maginot fence which is both much longer and orders of magnitude more expensive than the American Great Fence of the Southwest. The Saudi excursion into fence building will probably prove to be a great expenditure for nothing. Even Saudi officials have admitted the fence will not stop infiltrators. (They hope it might deter vehicles.)

The US, not surprisingly, has expressed "concern" over the recent escalation in fighting. It would be in the overall American (and Western) interest to be more than merely concerned.

There is more at stake in this particular armpit of the globe than either the rights and immunities of civilians or the sanctity of the Saudi border. Armpits come in pairs. Yemen is one. Conveniently right across the Gulf of Aden is the other. Somalia.

As al-Shabaab gains both sway and momentum in Somalia, it has been joined by an ever increasing number of fugitive Islamist jihadists from Iraq and even Afghanistan and Pakistan. Unless a hostilities termination and conflict resolution formula can be found for Yemen, there is little doubt that Islamist jihadists will find a supportive environment in the rocks and deserts of that monument to Muslim instability.

The presence of profoundly anti-Western, anti-American Islamist jihadists in full flourish on both sides of the Gulf of Aden would put a severe crimp in the maritime commerce through the Suez Canal. The repercussions of this would not be beneficial to either the West or the feudal sheikdoms of the Mideast. It would be surprising in the extreme if the mullahs and their stooges in Tehran are unaware of this.

The Saudis will continue to try to bribe their way out of the unpleasant situation developing on their border. The House of Sand will probably try to induce the Americans (or other infidels from, say, the EU) to do the heavy lifting so that stability might be imposed in Yemen before the noise of exploding VBIEDs disturbs the Kingdom's tranquility unduly.

The operative word for the Obama administration to be considering in this venue is "leverage." The question is which country has the longer, greater lever: The US or Saudi Arabia and its cohorts in the Gulf Cooperation Council.

The Obama team had best consider the matter seriously and quickly. More depends upon the use of leverage than the fly rich rocks and sand of Yemen. Can we say, "Comprehensive Mideast peace?"

You betcha, bubba, there is a lot of potential in the Yemen-Houthi affray. It all depends on how it is viewed--and used.