UAE dividing Yemen strategy
Over the years of its criminal war in Yemen, the UAE has worked to push the country apart and divide to serve its ambitions to expand, influence, loot resources as well as control its strategic ports.
These days, with Abu Dhabi announcing the withdrawal of its forces in a few numbers from some areas of Yemen, Abu Dhabi is entering a more serious stage in the reality and future of Yemen through the tens of thousands of foreign mercenaries and militias in the country.
Observers believe that the UAE has worked to formulate its criminal role in Yemen to guarantee the impunity for the deaths of thousands of civilians throughout the years of the war and at the same time to push the plots of Yemen’s fragmentation into isolated and warring geographies run by its local allies.
According to the observers, the announcement by the UAE of reducing its military forces in Yemen does not mean the end of the UAE presence in Yemen, but a new phase to deal with the reality it created in Yemen after achieving its goals of direct military intervention.
Since the beginning of its criminal war in Yemen, the UAE military presence has witnessed many changes, imposed by Abu Dhabi strategy in dealing with its priorities in Yemen.
The UAE intervention came under the Saudi-led Arab coalition, claiming to defend the legitimate authority, as claimed by the media propaganda of the alliance.
But, the UAE has identified its military intervened in Yemen only from the areas that ensured the creating reliable local partners, as they were not concerned about the war between the legitimate authority and the Houthi group on the northern fronts, only in accordance with its impact on its interests in southern Yemen. Therefore the UAE presence in the northern fronts was symbolic, as opposed to relying on the Sudanese forces to fight against the Houthi group.
The current situation in southern Yemen, with its complexities and political and military components, is a vivid example of the objectives of the UAE military intervention in Yemen. The UAE has succeeded in finding political and military structures loyal to it, outside and within the framework of the Yemeni legitimate authority.
During the years of war in Yemen, the security belts and the elite forces in all the southern regions have become a battleground force, imposing the priorities of the UAE in southern Yemen, including its struggle with the legitimate authority over power and wealth.
The UAE also worked to unite the radical southern forces calling for independence from northern Yemen within the framework of the Southern Transitional Council, where it provided financial and political support and the existence of a future authority in southern Yemen.
Thus, the UAE through the Southern Transitional Council and the military formations loyal to it ensured its sovereignty over south Yemen now and in the future.
The UAE strategy also sought to create a similar situation in northern Yemen, including trying to penetrate closed areas and finding local partners representing its agendas but failed.
In spite of the attempt to present the Salafi groups affiliated with the Yemeni resistance as their military and political arm on the northern fronts, they were not a reliable ally for it, because they recognized the authority of President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi as representative of Yemeni legitimacy.
However, the killing of former President Ali Abdullah Saleh not only enabled the UAE to penetrate the northern regions, but also managed the struggle of the Yemeni forces for its own benefit. In its political alliance with the Popular Congress Party, Saleh secured a political and social force in all regions of the north, led by Brigadier Tariq Mohammed Abdullah Saleh.
The UAE is betting on its victory in the battles of the West Coast and the Hodeidah Front against the Houthi group, which will enable it to become a governing authority in northern Yemen in the future.
The reality of the field in Yemen shows that, unlike other northern fronts, the Hodeidah front was strategically important for the UAE in order to complete its effective control of the main Yemeni ports. The progress of the military formations loyal to it led by Brigadier Tariq in the outskirts of the city of Hodeidah gave the UAE a great hope to change the equation of the conflict in the city for its benefit.
However, the outcome of the Stockholm agreement last December of political and military complexities in the Yemeni scene in general, including the internationalization of the conflict in the city of Hodeidah, and the continued refusal of the Houthi group to withdraw from the city so far, has made the UAE seriously consider changing the form of its intervention in Yemen.
The UAE’s announcement of withdrawing its military forces from Yemen was not due to the adoption of a peace plan, as some of its leaders said. During the years of war in Yemen, UAE diplomacy was not keen to move the political process forward.
The withdrawal of the UAE forces did not come in the context of understandings with the legitimate authority, as required by diplomatic norms, as they intervened in Yemen to restore Yemeni legitimacy to power.
On the other hand, Saudi Arabia, the leader of the Arab Alliance, has not adopted the political line announced by the UAE, which shows that it is still moving in Yemen according to its own strategy, as it seems to have exhausted its goals of direct military intervention in Yemen.
Along with the Yemeni map, the UAE has created a complex network of local allies, loyal military formations that run their interests in Yemen, and their battles are fought on behalf.
The UAE, after agreeing with Saudi Arabia, has appointed Mo’in Abdul Malik as prime minister of the Yemeni government, controlling some of the hostile discourse within the wings of the legitimate authority or at least limiting it to manage the Yemeni file in the next stage, without significant economic or human cost.
Reuters quoted a senior UAE official saying they were not worried about a military vacuum in Yemen, in the time Abu Dhabi’s recruited about 90,000 Yemeni troops.
The Yemeni political researcher Abdul Baki Shamsan said that the UAE’s transfer of hundreds of recruits for training is part of its strategy of media exit, not military, from Yemen. Some sectors of the UAE military were transferred but the funding of forces affiliated to it remains in a complete absence of the legitimate authority.
He added that the UAE has managed through these militias and its affiliates to tighten control of southern Yemen and that the benefit of its announcement of withdrawal from is easing international pressure without losing the advantages of presence, control, and influence exercised by its groups and militias.
On the other hand, the Yemeni writer, Nabil Bakiri, said that Abu Dhabi has already trained thousands of individuals, and what is happening now may be a new polarization of hundreds of elements that were previously working within the national army, and was merged and polarized as a result of the imbalance at the level of state and the interruption and weak salaries.
In parallel, a report by the Guardian newspaper said that the UAE will hand over its positions in Yemen to foreign mercenaries and local militias loyal to the UAE and not subject to the legitimate authority of the Yemeni government.
The newspaper said that the withdrawal marks an important moment in the four-year civil war.
The Guardian quoted the UAE’s claims that its remaining forces in Yemen would focus on counterterrorism efforts against the Isis and al-Qaeda rather than the Huthis.
The report revealed that the UAE would continue to support the separatist movement in Yemen, while many analysts warned that the current stalemate in Yemen could backfire.
The newspaper said that the withdrawal of the UAE “weaken the Saudi military capabilities in Yemen, which increases the pressure on Riyadh to continue the political solution instead of the military war,” noting that while it may be said that the withdrawal of the UAE from Yemen, even in part may be a recognition of defeat, but UAE officials insist that the redeployment was a deliberate step that reflects the UN’s diplomatic progress in Hodeidah.
A senior UAE official told AFP that his country is withdrawing troops from there as part of a “redeployment” plan for “strategic and tactical” reasons.
The agency was quoted as saying in Dubai that the UAE was moving from a “military strategy” to a “peace first” plan.
Later, the New York Times reported that the UAE was withdrawing its troops from Yemen at a rapid pace after it realized that the crushing war that turned the country into a humanitarian disaster can not be won.
The newspaper quoted Western diplomats familiar with the details as saying that a reduction in the number of UAE troops had already occurred, driven by the desire to get out of war too expensive even if angered by their Saudi allies.
She stressed that Emiratis avoided announcing the withdrawal step publicly to ease the discomfort of their Saudi counterparts. However, Western diplomats noted that the Saudis were very disappointed by the UAE decision and that senior officials in the Royal Court tried to discourage UAE officials from the withdrawal step.
A few days ago reliable sources revealed the details and circumstances of the UAE withdrawal scenario in Yemen and that a European country played a key role in decision-making and implementation.
The sources pointed out that a European country wants to go on huge deals to sell weapons to the UAE but it is under intense internal pressure, forcing it to influence the UAE regime to decide to withdraw from Yemen.
According to the sources, this country has advised the UAE to withdraw its troops from Yemen, especially that the number of hundreds in exchange for keeping the dependence on foreign mercenaries and Abu Dhabi militias scattered in different parts of Yemen.
The sources confirmed that the plan of the UAE regime is to conduct a proxy war in Yemen through its militias and foreign mercenaries, allowing Abu Dhabi to manage operations from outside the picture and allow the continuation of military supplies and the removal of the UAE from the forefront.
