The proxy war between Iran and Saudi Arabia in Yemen is heating up. Reuters.

Loyalist militia prepare for battle against the Houthi rebels. Reuters.

The war between the Sunni Yemeni government, backed by Saudi Arabia, and the Shia Houthi rebels, backed by Iran, is heating up. Reuters. Houthi rebels have taken a major air base and are threatening the critical port city of Aden. Aden is not only a strategic city, it is where Yemen's president, Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, fled after losing the capital city of Sanaa to the rebels. Airstrikes from unknown aircraft also struck the city. The conflict is widely being seen as a proxy war between Saudi Arabia and the other Sunni states in the region, and the government of Iran. The Arab states are considering intervening while the Saudis are moving weapons to the boarder of Yemen. Meanwhile, Houthi rebels are pushing hard to take the city of Aden before a meeting of the Arab League. Pro-Hadi forces are gathering weapons and preparing for the attack. 

My Comment:

Looks like Yemen is going to hell in a hand-basket right now. The whole war is a major embarrassment for the United States. Just a little while ago Obama was claiming that Yemen was a model partner in the war against Al-Qaeda. Now look at them. American forces are fleeing from the area. We already evacuated the embassy when the Houthis took Sanaa, with our tails between our legs mind you, and our special forces have withdrawn from the country. 

This is very bad news for the fight against Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). Much like ISIS and the Al-Nusra front grew in the chaos of Syria during their civil war, and how Libya fell into factions and Jihadism, AQAP may do the same thing. With the Houthis and the Hadi loyalists fighting each other, and the American military largely pushed out of the country, there will be little opposition for AQAP. Like ISIS and Al-Nusra, they could end up taking and holding territory in Yemen. That is very bad news for us as AQAP is a terror group that has proven capable of sophisticated and complex terror attacks. 

Of course there are other players as well. The conflict in Yemen is a proxy war between Iran and the Arab States. Both groups are competing for control of the Middle East and want to have control of the future of the region. It's not just Yemen either. Iran is supporting Syria, Lebanon, and Iraq as well, while Saudi Arabia and the other Arab states are opposing the Iranians in all of those countries. The tensions between Saudi Arabia and Iran are so high that Saudi Arabia has improved relations with Israel, which would have been unthinkable before. 

There is also the religious angle as well. I've said dozens of times on this blog that the Iraq War is primarily a battle between Sunni Muslims and everyone else, with the largest opponent being Shia Muslims. It's largely the case in Yemen as well, though there are fewer religious minorities in the country that aren't aligned to either group. The conflict between Shia and Sunni Islam is centuries old and has broken out into open warfare before, but this conflict is the largest in recent memory. Back when the Iraq War had just broken out there was conflict but it stayed in Iraq. Now the entire Middle East is burning. 

So who do I want to win? Can't they both lose? I'm not a fan of either Saudi Arabia or Iran. I both think they are repressive theocracies with a terrible record on human rights. Neither of them have any moral authority. The Saudis were decent allies of convince against Iran but President Obama has pissed that away for what looks like a joke of a deal on Iran's nuclear weapons program. That managed to alienate our other major ally in the region... No matter who wins or loses the whole region will be full of angry young people that hate America. The only advantage I can think of is that if Iran wins, they might be able to destroy the Sunni terror groups, like ISIS, Al-Nusra and AQAP that are giving the western world so many problems right now. But that could take years or even decades. 

There are no good options in the Middle East and no matter who wins, our interests will not be served. Yemen is probably going to end up just like Iraq, Syria, Libya and Egypt. With overthrown governments, conflicting ethnic and religious groups and eternal war. It seems like the entire region is heading that direction...