DFR Daily News Brief 3/25 Yemeni Conflict Escalates as Houthis Advance on Aden

TOP OF THE AGENDA

Yemeni Conflict Escalates as Houthis Advance on Aden

Shia Houthi forces seized (Bloomberg) a strategic air base on Wednesday, thirty-five miles outside of Aden, the stronghold of embattled President Abdo Rabbu Mansour Hadi. Residents in Aden reported that warplanes (Reuters) fired missiles at the district where the presidential compound is located. On Tuesday, Hadi requested (Al Jazeera) UN military intervention in Yemen to defeat the Houthis. In the cities of Taiz and Torba, witnesses said Houthis used tear gas and fired (AP) on protesters, killing six demonstrators and injuring many others. Meanwhile, U.S. officials said that Saudi Arabia, whose government accuses Iran of sowing sectarian strife in its support for the Houthis, was building up heavy military equipment (Reuters) in areas along the Yemeni border on Tuesday.

ANALYSIS

"But while there’s much to be anxious about in Yemen’s future, there’s nothing inevitable about the country’s descent into civil war. After all, it has managed to avoid slipping into complete chaos until now. This is in large part due to the self-interest of Yemen’s key political factions: Unable to guarantee a win, most groups are skittish about launching full-scale battles against each other," writes Adam Baron in Foreign Policy.

"If the proxy war route is pursued, the conflict is likely to rage for years. Rugged geography and broad spaces will make it hard for any side to hold land, and poor populations with little to lose will find themselves used as cannon fodder by one side or another. Jihadi groups of various stripes are bystanders to the principal fight between the rump government and the Houthis, but they will surely benefit from the widespread suffering," writes Jon B. Alterman at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"There are strong reasons for believing that the Houthis will not launch an assault on Aden. Such an act would intensify calls from the international community for intervention, which is something that the backers of the Houthi rebels—in particular, Iran and the former president Ali Abdullah Saleh—don’t want. More probably, the group will simply seek to use the threat of an assault to force concessions from Mr Hadi," writes the National.