Saturday’s drone attacks on Saudi oil infrastructure did some financial
damage, but for Yemen’s Shi’ite Houthi movement, which is taking credit,
they see it as more meaningful than just a one-off strike.
After 4+ years of Saudi airstrikes on north Yemen, they see it as a symbol of their continued defiance.
Many Houthis see their ability to not just survive the Saudi war but
start to strike back as a testament to their resistance of the invasion.
So while the US is trying to pin the attack on Iran, Houthis are proudly
painting “Made in Yemen” on the drones, and promising that there will
be more like that in the future, so long as the war continues.
That could be a problem for the Saudis, who despite the world’s third
largest military budget and a lot of US-provided air defenses seem to be woefully incapable of downing either drones or a lot of the missiles fired from Yemen.
There seems to be no obvious immediate solution for the Saudis, and so
long as they continue to attack Yemen, the Houthis are going to be
hitting back. This could be bad news for the Saudis, who’ve destroyed
much of northern Yemen at this point but who have a lot of valuable
infrastructure targets in range of the drones.
Karma is a bitch…
The articles that Jason cites unfortunately soft pedal the deep embarrassment this attack is both to Saudi Arabia AND to the US. Houthi attack devices have penetrated the US defense systems upon which the US taxpayers and gullible Saudi medieval tyrants have spent untold billions. These are obviously worthless. If Iran had carried out this attack, at least it would not be quite so pathetic for the US as the low tech Houthis’ doing it. So of course the US must claim Iran did it to save face for its worthless defense systems.
The case for that is shown here:
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/52278.htm
Moreover, Putin stuck the nose of the US in this failure of the US “defense” systems like the Patriot missiles by suggesting the Saudis buy Russian systems which have protected the Turks and the Iranians.
He also reminded the Saudis that the Koran justifies only wars of defense and so they should cease and desist their attack on Yemen. Imam Vlad gave them good advice there.
The case for that is shown here:
https://www.rt.com/news/468948-putin-saudi-arabia-missiles/
At times it is necessary to quote from non-Western sources to get at the truth. The truth is becoming scarcer than a hen’s tooth in Western MSM.
Either way you want to spin this- as a Houthi attack or an Iran attack- it doesn’t look good. We’ve either got ‘home made’ drones defeating our air defense systems, or Iranian drones defeating them- no matter who you pin the attack on, the end result is that the US-made air defense systems we sold the Saudis failed to do its job. But that’s okay, no refunds on used materials.
Taking out low flying drones like this is a job for short range point defense systems (like the Russian Panstir). The Saudis only have some outdated German AAA weapons, and the US short range systems (of which the Saudis have zero) are also half assed. This is obviously a mission that NATO countries have put very little effort into, perhaps because it isn’t expensive enough.
This looks like a job for the “Iron Dome”. I’m sure the Saudis can get a deal on it from their BFFs.
I hope you understand that Iron Dome is a hype, like most of things coming out of Israel. Even though Palestinians never had anything approaching a serious weapon, quite a few rockets routinely get in.
Keep in mind that North Yemen was a country long time before being united with South. It had Soviet weaponry from the seventies, students on scholarship in all former Eastern Block countries where they received scholarships and took advantage of opportunities to study engineering, medicine and oil/gas technologies. Yemen still has universities, and they continue work — no doubt today in service to defense needs.
Compare to Palestinians that cannot even procure or import materials that can remotely serve for military purposes. Like fishermen nets or musical instruments — we are talking two different worlds.
Yemen, before the revolution in fifties toppled the last hereditary ruler, had a dynasty that continually ruled there for over 1,000 years.
The faith in Dome is misplaced. It is not even as good as Patriots — and Patriots compare very poorly to even Russian S-300, never mind 400, 500. The information for non-experts is provided by a number of American sources.
The real thorny issue is, who manned the Patriot batteries in Saudi Arabia including radars?
Why did not super-radar in Manama’s Fifth Fleet location detect and record any flying objects? Or is it something that will be doctored in due course to keep the Middle East boiling?
Sarcasm. I should have so specified.
“That could be a problem for the Saudis…”
Ya think?
Again, what happens the next time the Houthis hit the Saudis hard? How long does Trump keep up the pretense that he “doesn’t want a new war” while Saudi Arabia’s oil fields burn?
Can we think beyond the next 24-hour news cycle, please?
The next time, they could aim at oil, instead of sulfur dioxide storage. In that huge complex, as series of big oil fires could be devastating.
Those Patriot missiles were put there to stop Scud ballistic missiles from Iran. The deployment was quite specific and specialized.
The Patriots actually did not do as well against Scud missiles as we’d said. However, the myth lived on, and with it the purpose of the Saudi deployment.