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YEMEN CAMPAIGN IN THE RED SEA CaspianReport: Why the US Navy can’t stop Houthi rebels PLAY YOUTUBE VIDEO Original article: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y_eCu_pW6-4 Peter Burgess COMMENTARY I did some work for the World Bank in Yemen early in the 1980s. At the time, there was the People's Democratic Republic of Yemen (PDRY) and the Yemen Arab Republic (YAR). The capital of PDRY was Aden, and the capital of YAR was Sanaa. Back then, Aden still retained some of its old character as a marine coaling station for ships en route from Europe to India and back. Sanaa was very different ... retaining its character as a really ancient city hundreds of years old! Our job was to assess the investment progress and performance associated with the World Bank programs in PDRY and YAR. There are many things I remember from this work including the disconnect between goals of the World Bank and the priorities and goals of the local 'powers that be'. I do not know what local politics were in play for PDRY and YAR to merge some time later in the 1980s. This merged entity was headed up by the same man who had 'gamed' the World Bank during the World Bank mission I participated in early in the 1980s. In PDRY, the World Bank evaluation team reviewed all the international development initiative from Aden in the South to Nishtun near Oman. Most of the funding was for fisheries projects ... with most of them not functioning well. Mostly, this was because some very bad assumptions had been made about the fisheries resource that were seriously wrong ... something that was common in World Bank projects around the world where experts in agriculture were used to plan fisheries projects. Fish landing data in Makala showed that PDRY had created a massive mismatch between the fish processing capacity and the fish landings possible from the available fish stocks. At some point, someone had made the decision that more fishing effort would solve this mismatch, when the problem was the more fundamental issue of inadequate fish stocks and over-fishing! Perhaps the most egregious investment issue in PDRY was the World Bank project to build a fishing port in the North of the country, in Nishtun not far from the Oman border. This was a major project involving breakwaters, multiple piers for fishing vessels, buildings for fish processing, cold stores and ice making facilities and slipping facilities ... in other words everything needed for a self-contained fishing port. Our World Bank team arrived in Nishtun when the project was almost complete, but instead of seeing a port facility with a number of fishing vessels, there were several large naval vessels from the Soviet Union. They were transport vessels bringing heavy military equipment .. tanks, army trucks, guns, and supplies ... to be unloaded into PDRY. I do not know the whole back-story ... but it was my understanding (and still is) that the World Bank is not allowed to finance projects for military purposes. Our team leader instructed the team to 'sanitise' our work to exclude all reference to the use of the Nishtun Port for a military purposes. After our team's work in PDRY, we moved to Hodeidah in YAR where our main work was in connection with the financing of a fisheries project. Several years before, I was the CFO of Continenetal Seafoods (CSF) which had collaborated with the FAO in Rome to deploy two of our fishing trawlers to Hodeidah to carry out a two year shrimp stock research project in combination with commercial fishing. The conclusion of the FAO/CSF study was that the shrimp resource might be large enough to support two commercial trawlers of the type we had been using. A decade later, YAR together with the World Bank was in the middle of implementing a shrimp fleet investment project in Hodeidah ostensibly based on the shrimp stock research work CSF had done a decade before. Unfortunately the YAR authorities and the World Bank had got almost everything wrong. The decision makers had started off with the CSF study made ten years before. This report was written in English, as was an Executive Summary of the report. Someone translated this material into Arabic to make it accessible to decision makers in Yemen (YAR). On the face of it, this was a sensible thing to do ... but some very serious mistakes were made. It turned out that the Arabic version of this material had confused a number of technical terms used in fisheries work including 'bio-mass' and 'sustainable yield'. Bio-mass is the total amount of the fish (in this case shrimp) in the resource and Sustinable yield is the amount of the fish (shrimp) than can be extracted season after season in a sustainable way. CSF had concluded that the resource would support the operation of two trawlers. The Yemen project that was being implemented was for a fishing fleet of 16 trawlers ... many times bigger than the resource could sustain. But there were other problems. The rrawlers were being built in the Netherlands by a reputable company ... but the prices being charged for these trawlers was massively inflated. Exactly how the 'kick-backs' were reaching those involved was not clear, but it was obviously a serious matter. During the course of our investigation work, I was helped by the project accountant wo shared with me all the financial information that was available. Though the text was in Arabic, the numbers were also in Arabic ... which of course is the numbering system used throughout the English speaking world! After the project and I figured out how to translate the text headings, I had all I needed to understand all the accounting reports of the project. I was shocked that even though the project had been in-process for several years, not a single bit of meaningful financial information had been deliverd to the World Bank nor to Danida, that was a co-financer of the project. Our evaluation team recommended that the project be terminated immediately. After a number of long-distance telephone calls the World Bank and Danida understood the gravity of the situation. At this point our team travelled from Hodeidah where the shrimp project was to be located to Sanaa, the capital where the Government was located. It is normal for a World Bank evaluation mission tomeet with Government and to present its findings and deliver an interim report before leaving the country. The Government avoided this meeting, day after day after day. President Ali Abdullah Saleh had learned about the results of our mission and was not happy. Our team never had a final meeting ... and President Saleh subsequently argued that because there had been no final wrap=-up meeting, none of our work has been done. The World Bank and Danida money continued to flow into the project to fund all sorts of pet projects of Saleh and his corrupt collaborators. For me, this outcome was about as bad as it could be ... Salah remained a powerful figure In Yemen until he was assassinated in 2017. While a lot has changed over the past 50 years ... a lot has remained the same. For most ordinary people on this complicated world, life has not improved very much, if at all! Peter Burgess
Why the US Navy can’t stop Houthi rebels CaspianReport Sep 13, 2024 1.55M subscribers ... 841,606 views ... 23K likes #Houthis #ad #Navy 👉 Register for ChatGPT & AI workshop for FREE: https://link.gs.ht/CAR 👉 100% Discount for first 1000 people 🔥 ✅ Join Top1% AI Community for regular AI updates: https://link.gs.ht/CARW The #US #Navy finds itself in the most intense naval engagement since World War II. Six months on, the #Houthis remained undeterred. Why is that? Support CaspianReport ✔ YouTube membership ► / @caspianreport ✔ Patreon ► / caspianreport ✔ PayPal ► https://www.paypal.me/caspianreport ✔ Merchandise ►https://teespring.com/stores/caspianr... Crypto endorsement ✔ Bitcoin ► 1MwRNXWWqzbmsHova7FMW11zPftVZVUfbU ✔ Ether ► 0xfE4c310ccb6f52f9D220F25Ce76Dec0493dF9aA0 ✔ Bitcoin Cash ► 1BKLti4Wq4EK9fsBnYWC91caK7NZfUhNw9 Join us on Facebook or Twitter ✔ Twitter ► / caspianreport ✔ Facebook ► / caspianreport ✔ My equipment and editing software ► https://www.amazon.com/shop/caspianre... Watch CaspianReport in other languages ✔ Spanish ► / historiageopol%c3%adtica ✔ Russian ► / thecuriouscat #ad #sponsored Transcript 0:00 smoke Rose above the yemeni port city of Hoda in Late July as the Israeli Air Force carried out a series of strikes on transportation and energy infrastructure the operation which marked Israel's First Direct involvement in the country came in response to houie strikes against Tel Aviv the week prior yet such strikes also occur in the context of the broader Red Sea crisis in October 202 3 in response to the Gaza conflict the houthis began a partial blockade of the bab al-mandab Strait by January 2024 traffic through the Red Sea had haved drawing the ire of the West the United States launched operation Prosperity Guardian deploying a carrier strike group alongside 20 Regional and international allies the Americans had planned to take the fight directly to the hou 1:00 whereas their European allies sought to provide escort missions through their own separate task named Operation as speedies 6 months on however the houis remained undeterred and more than 100 incidents have been reported with no end in sight on the contrary June saw a significant spike in attacks on shipping the sinking of the MV tutor the second major vessel sunk by the houthis since the start of the crisis drove insurance premiums Skyhigh not necessarily outgunned but certainly out maneuvered the US Navy finds itself in the most intense Naval engagement since the second world war Warfare is expensive and the operation costs are already amounting to close to $4 billion yet Washington has made little to no progress in the fight against the houthis but why is that why is the 2:00 world's Premier Naval power unable to overcome a ragtag band of rebels Perhaps it is true even Giants can fall hoi attacks have increased global trade issues and AI is now driving the race for control jobs are disappearing and without AI skills you risk getting behind today's sponsor can help you with that growth school is organizing the world's biggest 3-hour online AI Master Class covering more than 25 AI tools and I would like to invite you personally the best part is that it's usually a paid mini course but our first 1,000 viewers who join using the link below will get free access yes for free plus you'll get bonus resources worth $500 I and my team attended the master class we loved it and would rate it 5 out five it covers everything from job 3:01 hunting and salary negotiation to mastering Excel and content creation whether you're in sales marketing Tech or an entrepreneur this master class is for you growth school is the go-to platform to join the top 1% in an AI first world click the link below to register for free now despite its current prominence the houthi movement has humble Origins beginning its existence as a minor youth group in the early 1990s it rapidly Rose to prominence under the tutelage of its namesake Hussein al- Hui initially focused on zidi revivalism which is one of the major branches of Shia Islam the huis soon took on a more revolutionary character in response to the US invasion of Iraq before long the group was questioning the legitimacy of the yemeni 4:01 state in the 10 years that followed yemeni president Abdullah alale would attempt to crack down on the movement driving the houthis into the northern mountains squeezed between Yemen and Saudi Arabia the houis began to move closer to other Shia factions in the Middle East ultimately courting the support of Iran and its axis of resistance with the outbreak of the yemeni revolution in 2011 local hostilities evolved into a front in The Wider Iranian Saudi proxy war as the revolution collapsed into a Civil War the houthis skillfully navigated Yemen's internal Dynamics they partnered with the then deposed Sal to take the capital sah by February 2015 having seized power once more Sal turned on the houis by this stage however houthi agents had infiltrated Sal's forces 5:00 after a brief struggle the houthis deposed s and took over the Army overnight the ragtag rebel movement came into possession of the military and demographic wealth of North Yemen more importantly however the houthis had broken out of their confinement and gained a coastline consequently the group came to possess a valuable geopolitical position just across the bab Al mandab straight at about 30 km wide at its narrowest point the babal mandb is a vulnerable Gateway for shipping and an opportunity for pirates the ranks of which the houthis rushed to join access to the ocean allowed the houis to establish new supply lines and engage in the arms trade abroad thus even as the houis later lost the port city of Aiden revenues from Maritime related activities and piracy remained High surpassing one $ 1.5 billion by 6:02 2020 the viability of the houthis provoked fear in Riyad and in 2015 Saudi Arabia led a direct intervention in the conflict under the fog of war the houthi Insurgency sustained itself and even Advanced owing to the inflow of Aid and materials from sponsors in tran and Beirut years of the Saudi Le air campaign had taught the houthis the value view of force dispersal and asymmetric Warfare through capturing several of Yemen's ports the houthis came into possession of the defunct yemeni Navy anti-ship missiles and Limpet mines but with Iranian assistance such Technologies were reverse engineered into viable and deadly weapons by 2022 the growing Fleet of explosive boats was complemented by the delivery of a host of anti-ip Rockets 7:00 from Iran these include the 120 km ranged no and the 200 km ranged cader anti-ship missiles as well as the 300 km ranged College fars anti-ship ballistic missile loitering Munitions such as the Samad 3 drone and the Tolan 3 Blowfish have likewise gradually found their way into the houthi Arsenal the deployment of these weapons is believed to be coordinated by the Iranian intelligence cell on board the MV bashad which is a commercial cargo vessel that is used covertly for reconnaissance and intelligence operations in the Arabian Sea as such over time fighting the houthis became expensive too expensive by 2021 the Saudis signaled their intention to withdraw the houthis that emerged from the years of war were unrecognizable from the organization that had marched on saana in 8:01 2015 as a truce was negotiated with Saudi Arabia the houthis sought to shore up their domestic and international standing the outbreak of hostilities between Israel and Gaza provided that opportunity by attaching its actions to a wider political narrative the houthis were able to re-engage in piracy politically costree War had made the houthis and now the houthis were Poise to make [Applause] war in July of 2002 the US Navy conducted a war game known as the Millennium challenge focused on a hypothetical war between the United States and Iran the war game was notable in that it demonstrated the topheavy US Navy unpreparedness to defend against an asymmetrical threat throughout the war game the team representing Iran dispersed their forces and utilized 9:02 analog Technologies such as motorcycle Messengers and light signals to avoid detection in combating the US Navy the Iranian team employed fleets of waterborne improvised explosive devices simultaneously with massive salvos of cruise missiles the Strategies employed by the Iranian team resulted in the deaths of an estimated 20,000 Sailors and the destruction of 16 War ships one aircraft carrier 10 Cruisers and five amphibious ships two decades later and the US Navy is confronted by a similar threat profile whilst the houthis Do Not possess the same capabilities of a besieged Iranian State the US Navy is similarly restricted due to wider geopolitical considerations with tensions increasing in the South China Sea Washington cannot afford to relocate its Force westwards 10:00 resources are scarce such considerations also limit other aspects of American engagement between the ongoing Ukrainian War and the evolving hotspots in South America and the Middle East American diplomatic and intelligence assets are stretched thinly where force can be applied it is limited by the costs of deployment which is not always measured in dollars since America is the chief global Naval power the US Navy must maintain a presence worldwide political disruptions Force Washington to redeploy its forces away from one region to the next yet in doing so it downgrades its threat response in the affected region in the case of Yemen Washington has already had to make such concessions deciding to pull the USS Theodore Roosevelt carrier out of the South China Sea during a serious escalation of tensions between China and the 11:01 Philippines by deploying the carrier to the West Washington incurs the Strategic cost of one less carrier in the East another problem with modern warships is that they're pricey and designed for combating other conventional warships they're not made for asymmetric Warfare and so no one wants to risk damaging their assets to an unsophisticated attack it doesn't look good for the Ergo warships are like poker chips you don't use them unless you're willing to lose them for instance each Arley Burke class destroyer deployed by the United States costs $2 billion to build and another $7 million to operate monthly as for repair costs these can be in the hundreds of millions even if the damage is quite low take the case of the USS coal bombing in the year 20 2000 12:00 Al-Qaeda built an explosive boat that cost less than $1 million yet it was able to cause $240 Million worth of damage and take the lives of 17 Sailors this economic logic also functions in the inverse each missile launched by the US Navy has caused taxpayers between one and $4.3 million when these types of missiles are used to take out budget drones worth $2,000 it is the cost equivalent of using a bazooka to kill a fly in such cases it is hard to ascertain who killed who not surprisingly the total cost of operation Prosperity Guardian according to Al jazer has amounted to$ 1.8 and4 billion these are not rookie numbers and American taxpayers will consider such expenses as they go to the polls in November 13:00 the legacy of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan has left the American electorate with little appetite for Foreign Wars particularly not Wars that necessitate deep commitments such as Israel's war in Gaza and its Associated spillover the nature of this conflict has also deprived Washington of relying on its traditional strategy of Coalition building due to the intense controversy in Gaza none of the Middle Eastern powers are willing to get directly involved that leaves only the European powers which are not much of help the European task force operation aspides has totally different rules of engagement for one its mandate discourages direct strikes on yemeni soil and instead limits European involvement to escorting operations yet in deploying a naval Mission apart from the US the European navies face a dual 14:01 crisis of capability and confidence simply put the European Fleet lacks the number of ships necessary to defend against the houthis because it doesn't have the proper mission to start with even where such ships can be gathered the absence of a unified EU command structure as well as the lack of communication with the American British Mission has been disastrous faced with such difficulties it is no surprise that both operations have proven to be ineffective the ineptitude of the US Navy has emboldened the houis who have scaled up their attacks in recent months for comparison between January 2017 and June 2021 the houthis performed 24 Maritime drone attacks on average one every 70 days days however 15:00 from November 2023 to July 2024 they have performed 77 on average one every 3 days such Havoc has not been lost on insurers who have increased premiums substantially costs are extrapolated along the supply chain with each diversion around the Cape of Good Hope increasing the duration of shipping by 10 days in global trade everyday added is accounted for in costs associated with fuel crew salaries and insurance premiums so Logistics get expensive really fast lacking a military solution Washington is increasingly forced to pursue a just as unpalatable diplomatic solution but this disengaged policy only bolsters The Prestige of the houthis still even in an unpalatable situation there are choices between bad and worse a few strategies are worth considering 16:02 on the one hand Washington could resort to strengthening the official yeny government in Aiden which is unpopular underfunded and considered as illegitimate as the houthis given its reputation for incompetence corruption and infighting a clear alternative to the houi Insurgency must be shown to the yemeni public so that they can decide what kind of country they want for themselves America can count on Decades of experience from Afghanistan in what works and doesn't including the appropriate levels of funding foreign involvement political processes and autonomous organic growth on the other hand a concerted un effort will be necessary to enact change Russia and China can sometimes act as spoilers in the security Council but this does not mean that they are immune to the hou's actions in addition to direct and 17:00 indirect economic costs both are sensitive to Saudi Arabia's needs and may be persuaded to pressure Iran and the houthis to subtly back down America would likely need to make geopolitical concessions elsewhere to get the Russians and Chinese talking however saving the Red Sea might not justify sacrificing Ukraine and Taiwan which is what Russia and China would undoubtedly bring up so backchannel diplomacy would probably not work lastly if America is to stop the houthis it could try to bring about a reasonable end to the hostilities in Gaza robbing the houthis of this justification for their actions in the Red Sea would be a powerful incentive to make them sit down at the negotiating table and abandon behavior that they have hither to benefited from admittedly settling any deal that that crosses Israel's interests would result 18:01 in political backlash for the executive office so this might not work either by all accounts Washington has inadvertently become a hostage to contemporary international relations there is no immediate resolution in sight that is both practical and politically redeemable it is unable to stop the houthis by military means just as it is unable to stop them by diplomatic means meanwhile for the destitute houthis now is their window of opportunity every time they open fire they are ringing The Dinner Bell so they might as well make it count I've been your host chivon from caspan report thank you for your time and S [Music] [Music]

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