Palestine Tet – 55 – “Operation Prosperous Guardian”: Yemeni Rebels throw a monkey wrench into global maritime trade at Bab al Mandeb

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Gaza horror story of the day; there are so many; here is but one:

1. This from Scott Ritter this morning about the naval armada being assembled to attack Yemen:

I woke up this morning to the news that my country, the United States of America, is preparing to go to war against Yemen. A superpower that spends nearly a trillion dollars a year on its military is preparing to fight an impoverished nation where 70 percent of its population is in dire need of humanitarian assistance. The reason? Because the Houthi of Yemen demand Israel stop committing genocide against the people of Gaza. Our choice was between pressuring Israel to agree to a ceasefire, or a war with the Houthi. We chose war. It speaks volumes about who Americans are as a collective. PS: I don’t think this will end well for either the U.S. or Israel.

What was Ritter talking about?

The Biden Administration prepared to go war against Yemen?

Yes, that is it – exactly.

In its own original way, Yemen has imposed sanctions on Israel!

What Ansar Allah/Yemen is doing by targeting ships heading to Israel is a game changer with little resources, no loss of lives, it can really influence Israel and the Collective West. What Yemen is asking is ONLY the end of Gaza Genocide and end of Gaza blockade, something the whole world should be asking. The Yemenis have made it clear that as long as Israel is engaged in its genocidal campaign to ethnically cleanse Gaza that no shipping headed for Israel will be permitted to pass through Bab el Mandeb.

That a small group of guerrillas recently come to power in a part of Yemen, one of the world’s poorest countries, could effectively interfere with one of the world’s most important maritime transit alleys, striking blows both to Israel and international trade, suggests how fragile security is in that part of the world. Yemen’s Ansar Allah, all by themselves, are hitting the West where it hurts, imposing a comprehensive trade embargo, and creating a massive logistics crisis.

The Global South should take note!

That neither Washington nor Tel Aviv has been able to stop these attacks has been a great embarrassment to both and yet another indication of Washington’s growing weakness to dictate Middle East policy. The Biden Administration expressed earlier hesitations of challenging Yemen militarily but the increased attacks on shipping have forced its hand. More than an “embarrassment,” it is humiliating. First Israel is humiliated by the Palestinian guerilla attack on October 7; now Washington is humiliated by its inability to reign in the Yemeni rebel group.

The United States cannot permit the imagery of this strategic failure to unchallenged. One can almost feel the strength of “Western leadership” declining. It must flex its muscle and as it often does by exercising an extraordinary degree of military overkill. Finding it increasingly unable to defeat Hamas in Gaza and actually fearing provoking Hezbollah into more intense action in S. Lebanon, Washington has chosen to focus its wrath on what it believes to be a weaker link: the Ansar Allah movement (referred to as the Houthis) in Yemen.

This emerging coalition and its regional allies appear to underestimate what Yemen is capable of, to say nothing of Iran. Classic example of American-W. European hubris – also known less metaphorically as racism – to underestimate opponents. As Biden contemplates striking the Houthis in Yemen for seeking to force a ceasefire in Gaza by attacking ships in the Red Sea, Houthi spokesperson Al-Bukhaiti declares that if Saudi or UAE side with the US, the Houthis will strike all oil and gas fields in Saudi and UAE.

As the Yemenis have done so before there is every reason to believe they would, under attack from this naval coalition, do so once again. 

To plug this growing hole in global trade the United States is organizing a coalition and sending warships to the Red Sea and Gulf of Oman to organize armed convoys of ships. Washington has sent 3 more destroyers to the Mediterranean Sea, which could be heading for the Red Sea suggesting that Washington is preparing for a war with Yemen. Three Arleigh Burke class guided missile destroyers, the USS Mason, USS Carney and the USS Laboon will join three others already in the Red Sea area not far from the Yemeni coast. They join destroyers attached to the Eisenhower air craftt carrier attack group, the Eisenhower Carrier Strike Group now leaving the Persian Gulf heading for the Gulf of Aden.

A joint Arab-Israeli international coalition may be announced shortly by U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, which will include carrying out a military operation against the Yemeni armed forces to “secure the Red Sea” from attacks against Zionist Israeli ships. Most likely participants in the international coalition: Israel, Saudi Arabia, Egyptm UAE, USA,  France, Italy, Australia and Britain. To date none have agreed; all are “considering.”

Pressing Saudi Arabia to join means ending Saudi-Yemen peace talks to end their eight year war and pressing Saudi Arabia to distance itself again from Iran, thus striking a blow to a regional reduction of tensions as well as undercutting China which had engineered the reconciliation. Iran has warned Washington against its Red Sea naval armada, asserting that it would face “extraordinary problems”. Here is Washington’s “conundrum”: how to stop the attacks without triggering a military response from Iran. (Although “the military response” could come elsewhere in the region). 

There will be – Red Sea – blood and the heightened possibility of igniting more regional war. This maritime offensive even has a name “Operation Prosperous Guardian”.  The heart of the matter is the effort of neo-cons in Washington DC to take advantage of the current militarized moment not only to strike a blow at Hamas in Gaza. They have the Ansar Allah Yemenis and Hezbollah in Lebanon in their crosshairs. If they could get away with it Biden, Blinken and Sullivan are also itching to go further and attack Iran.

The plan – at least the details that have surfaced – is to establish armed convoys to accompany merchant ships passing through the danger zones as was done in World Wars One and Two. This naval alliance has the goal of accompanying all ships through the Red Sea to prove that Washington can still maintain and deliver on global maritime security.

Ansar Allah has responded to the U.S. maritime build up by issuing its own threat, relating its attacks on shipping passing through Bab al Mandeb with the situation in Gaza:

Any escalation in Gaza is an escalation in the Red Sea. Any calm in Gaza is considered a calm in the Red Sea. Any party that comes between us and Palestine, we will confront it.

As Executive Vice President of the Quincy Institute, Trita Parsi noted in a recent interview, arguing along similar lines:

The approach of the Biden Administration is to try to de-escalate by threatening further escalations; it actually leads to the type of conundrum we’re in right now because the options the Administration is looking at is to see how it can punish the Houthis militarily in order to get them to stop.

Whereas the most obvious measure that would be far more effective and truly de-escalatory would actually be to work to make sure that there is a ceasefire in Gaza. Because if there is a ceasefire in Gaza – first of all because there were not attacks by the Houthis prior to the war – the Houthis have made clear they will stop the bombardments if the Israelis stop the bombardment of Gaza.

This is a logic, as rational as it is, that is beyond the mental abilities of the Biden Administration to even consider.

2.

A lot more has come to light over the past 24 hours concerning the impact of this  Yemeni solidarity with Palestine.

Part of my blog entry yesterday was about the Yemeni Ansar Allah group. also referred to as the Houthis, interfering with the flow of traffic through the Bab al Mandeb Straits separating the Gulf of Aden from the Red Sea by firing missiles at ships heading to and fro Israel. This they insist they are doing in solidarity with their sisters and brothers in Palestine and that they will continue to target these ships until Israel ends of bestial attack on Gaza.

The major European container lines are currently avoiding the Red Sea.

These missile attacks have disrupted traffic between the Bab al Mandeb Straits and the Suez Canal along the Red Sea. In response to these attacks, on December 15, just a few days ago a number of the world’s biggest shipping companies have announced they are pausing their Red Sea voyages. Maersk, Hapag-Lloyd, CMAC Transportation and AGM Deliveries, four of the biggest shipping lines, are diverting their their vessels from entering the Red Sea though the Bab al Mandeb channel.

Citing “operational issues” (meaning their concern ships might be blown up or hijacked), this morning the big Chinese shipping out of Hong Kong, OOCL, likewise, announced it has has halted shipments to and from Israel in an apparent response to recent threats to commercial shipping. Joining in and noting “the deteriorating security situation”, BP said it will pause all its tanker traffic through the Red Sea following this increase on attacks on commercial shipping.

3.

Bab al Mandeb is one of the strategic choke points of global maritime trade.

As the map above indicates the region of Yemen that Ansar Allah controls butts up against the Red Sea very close to Bab al Mandeb giving the Houthis (another term for Ansar Allah) a fine vantage point from which to interfere with Red Sea Trade. An estimated 12% of all global trade by volume passes through Bab el Mandeb and perhap s as much as a full 30% of all container trade.

Ansar Allah’s missile and drone attacks have been going on for weeks but in the past few days their numbers have escalating forcing Washington, supposedly the global guarantor of global trade to respond in force.

The attacks on tankers in the Red Sea has led to a diversion of shipping to and from the Suez Canal.  From 55 to 60 cargo ships and tankers have announced they are either cancelling triops through Suez or heading around the Cape of Good Hope. 55 ships of the 2128 ships going through the Suez Canal and Bab al Mandeb is a small percentage of the 2128 ships that pass through that route annually, less than 2.5% in all. But the damage done is greater than this statistic suggests. For Egypt, which gets around $500,000 per ship passing through the Canal, the lost of 55 ships amounts to $27.5 million in income. Usually some 55-90 ships pass through the Canal each day.

The shipping companies mentioned above represent more than 50% of all container capacity. Halting shipping through Bab al Mandeb and Suez triggers a myriad of complications for world shipping. The possible impact on the world economic should not be underestimated.

As 90% of everything is shipped from one part of the world to another, the longer route around Africa slows global economic activity some. Datelines for docking and unloading shipments are thrown off schedule. The additional mileage around the Cape of Good Hope adds costs to the process. It is estimated that a container ship from Singapore to Rotterdam going around South Africa adds an additional 3500 miles and two to three weeks to the journey spiking additional transportation costs the final products. Shipping facilities in S. Africa and along the African coast are not equipped to handle increased docking and maintenance.

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