WHY IT MATTERS: The Saudi-led intervention in Yemen

Washington Post ^ | March 26, 2015 | AP

[Jim Robinson]

Airstrikes by Saudi Arabia against Iran-backed Shiite rebels in turbulent Yemen have added a regional dimension to the conflict in the Arab world’s poorest country. Five reasons why the world should care about what is happening there:

Yemen is home to al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, or AQAP, which Washington has viewed as the most lethal branch of the global network founded by Osama bin Laden. AQAP has been linked to several attempted attacks on the U.S., including the underwear bomb plot of December 2009, and it claimed the January killings at the offices of the French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo.

President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi was a close U.S. ally in the fight against al-Qaida, but he fled Yemen on Wednesday as his forces were routed by the Shiite rebels, known as Houthis, and loyalists of former President Ali Abdullah Saleh.

The Houthis, who control the capital Sanaa and nine of Yemen’s 21 provinces, are sworn enemies of al-Qaida, but they are also hostile to the U.S. Their slogan is “God is great, death to America, death to Israel, damnation to the Jews, victory for Islam.”'

The U.S. drone campaign against AQAP is now in disarray. About 100 U.S. military advisers withdrew last weekend from al-Annad air base, where they had been leading the campaign. The Houthis have overrun the base, which was hit in Thursday’s air raids.

For more than a decade, the CIA and the military’s Joint Special Operations Command have carried out parallel targeted killings in Yemen, and the U.S. military has trained elite Yemeni counterterrorism units. In September, President Barack Obama cited Yemen as a success story when he detailed his strategy against the Islamic State group in Iraq and Syria, which involves targeted U.S. strikes on militants with the cooperation of friendly ground forces.

[BeauBo]

The NY Times and the Financial Times are now reporting that the the former long term President of Yemen, Ali Abdullah Saleh, is a major force behind the Houthi takeover in Yemen.

Saleh was forced out in 2012 during “Arab Spring” tumult, under pressure from the Saudis. These reports say that Saleh loyalists throughout the government enabled the Houthi advance.

The NY Times reports that Saleh wants to install his son as the next President. It also reports that Egypt has committed air and Naval assets to the operation, and will commit ground forces if needed.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/27/world/middleeast/saudi-arabia-houthis-yemen.html

[DoughtyOne]

I hope you’re wrong with the analogies to WWI, but these things start out like this.

ISIS is at war, and we’re still playing patti-cake.