The White Swan off Yemen

Civil wars are nasty and unpredictable things. The longer they go, the more the thin veneer of civilization starts to strip away for even the most advanced nations and their people. Less advanced nations devolve to Madmaxistan rather quickly.

All governmental efforts, money, and attention goes towards weapons, food, and fuel. Industries, infrastructure, and parts of civil society that do not support that get left as if frozen in aspic.

If you don't live in a nation suffering that civil war, it is easy not to pay attention to that which does not effect you.

There is one aspect of the Yemen civil war that no one should ignore - and it is at sea.

This isn't a disaster that anyone can state will be a surprise in the likely event nothing is done in time and it reaches its ultimate end. This isn't a "Black Swan" - this is a White Swan.

In a real world version of "Life After People" there is a ticking timebomb off of Yemen. Via Maritime-Executive;

Floating in the Red Sea, attached to an oil pipeline that runs nearly 300 miles to the war-torn city of Marib, the FSO Safer was established as a Yemeni oil export facility in 1988. The massive converted tanker was due to be decommissioned and replaced by a land-based terminal when the Yemen civil conflict erupted nearly eight years ago. Owned by SEPOC, a company which itself is owned by the Government of Yemen, the Safer sits off the coast of Ras Isa, an area controlled by Houthi rebels.

The vessel is still loaded with 1.14 million barrels of oil. While roughly 15,000 barrels have evaporated over the last eight years, and a thin layer has polymerized, the majority of that cargo remains liquid and liable to spill. The portion of the pipeline that runs for five miles beneath the Red Sea has an additional 17,000 barrels of liquid crude in it.  Without intervention, the Safer will either explode or corrode and spill its contents - and likely take the pipeline with it. 

Of note, Safer is a single hulled old-school tanker just rotting in the water. There is little to any margin of error left.

What could the results of inaction be?

For context, the amount of oil spilled off Mauritius (which destroyed an entire marine protected area) was 8,450 barrels. This is less than one percent of what is at stake with the Safer, and less than half of what is in the subsea pipeline. And while the Ever Given disrupted trade through the Suez Canal for six days, some projections suggest the Safer's spill could slow or stop trade through the entire Red Sea for weeks or even months, forcing ships to divert around the Cape of Good Hope to avoid spreading the oil by sailing through it.

The combined risks of a massive explosion, the blockage of international commerce, and a devastating oil spill form only part of the concern with the FSO Safer.  Add in the deaths of millions of people (already in famine) from loss of drinking water, caused by the contamination of desalination plants, and limited access to food caused by the blocking of Hodeida, and we will have a humanitarian emergency at a level the world cannot currently sustain. 

Furthermore, with the annihilation of the world’s most temperature-resistant coral system along with 10 unique species of fish, and the long-term damage to economic activities like fishing and tourism, the effects of this one vessel’s demise would be felt for generations. The potential consequences dwarf the various other maritime disasters experienced in the last few years. 

Usually when there is a cause for international action it is either military related or the disaster has already happened. 

This looks to be a space where those maritime nations who are hesitant to get involved militarily to maintain the global order, make a lot of noise about being "green," and generally make long speeches at the UN about such issues ... well ... they could take action.

The UN even has a "Go Fund Me" like pledge drive going to raise enough funds to get a cheap fix instead of an expensive clean up. I'm not sure if you get a tote-bag or not, but...I mean, really...this is embarrassing.

So much time and money spent on imaginary or exaggerated threats to the environment are flooded with billions of dollars, but a real one has to beg for scraps?

I'm pretty sure a fraction of the money spent at the latest Davos gathering by the WEF would have covered the cost, but there would be no power to be gained and the skiing in terrible in Yemen, so I guess not.

Time is ticking. 

h/t E.

Bab al-Mandab and the Persistence of Geography

Are we giving China an opening in one of the last places we would want them to be?

Maybe ... but if not, at least someone just decided to put down a marker on an important bit of forgotten real estate.

Details over at USNIBlog.

Nice Oil Trade You Have There. Shame if Something Happened to it

Have you been surprised that Iran and her Houthi proxies in Yemen have not gone after the Saudi's oil industry more?

What are your thoughts on home-grown cruise missiles and mines?

I'm pondering both over at USNIBlog.

Come on over and give it a read.

The War in Yemen, with Katherine Zimmerman - on Midrats

It is a civil war, tribal war, religious war, and proxy war with local, regional, and global implications.

The specific and larger implications of the war in Yemen will be our topic for the full hour this Sunday from 5-6pm Eastern with our guest Katherine Zimmerman.

Katherine Zimmerman is a research fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) and the research manager for AEI’s Critical Threats Project. As AEI’s senior analyst studying terrorist groups, she focuses on the global al Qaeda network and covers the Salafi-jihadi movement and related trends in the Middle East and Africa. She also specializes in al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and Yemen, al Shabaab in Somalia, and al Qaeda in the Sahel.

Ms. Zimmerman has testified before Congress about the threats to US national security interests emanating from al Qaeda and its network. She has also briefed members of Congress, their staff, and US military, diplomatic, and intelligence community personnel. Her analyses have been widely published, including in CNN.com, Foreign Affairs, FoxNews.com, The Hill, The Huffington Post, The Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post. She is a term member with the Council on Foreign Relations and a member of the RESOLVE Network Research Advisory Council.

Join us live if you can, but if you miss the show you can always listen to the archive at Spreaker. 

If you use iTunes, you can add Midrats to your podcast list simply by clicking the iTunes button at the main showpage - or you can just click here.

Yemen - a Long Way to Go

ACLED continues to be an exceptional source for data-nuts when it comes to areas of conflict in the world.

Their recent Yemen numbers - combined with the ongoing talk about what is very much a nasty civil war - needs to be put in some context.

#YemenWar Death Toll Exceeds 90,000 According to New ACLED Data for 2015: https://t.co/GluwkQWLSZ #Yemen pic.twitter.com/11Tv9O1sVQ

— Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (@ACLEDINFO) July 15, 2019

Civil Wars are a nasty bit of business and I don't want to diminish 90,000 lost souls, but there needs to be a note of caution for those who think - or hope - that this is close to burning itself out.

In 2016, Yemen had a population of ~28 million. 90,000 is 0.3% of the population.

In 1860, the USA had a population of 31.4 million. 0.3% would be 94,200.

Estimates vary, but sources say between 600,000 and 1-million total deaths North and South in the war. Let's use a nice round compromise of 750,000 dead.

750,000 would be 2.4%.

For Yemen to exhaust itself to the same degree as the USA did in its civil war, 672,000 will need to die.

No, odds are, the killing is a long way from being over.

Another datapoint. By 2016, the UN estimated that 400,000 were killed in the Syrian Civil War. That is about 1.7% of the 2012 population of 22,500,000.

As I said - in Yemen, there is a lot more killing to be done.

Off Yemen, the Future Speaks

Ignore the PPT.

Blow off the Beltway prophet.

Bind your mind instead to what is happening now.

This week, look to Yemen's main rebel held port.

I'm discussing over at USNIBlog.

Come on by and give it a read.

So, you want to play varsity football?

Last week, the varsity team took the field;

Three U.S. warships are operating off the coast Yemen following a guided missile attack against a UAE operated ship by Houthi rebels, two U.S. defense officials confirmed to USNI News on Tuesday.

The ships – guided-missile destroyers USS Nitze (DDG-94), USS Mason (DDG-87) and the afloat forward staging base USS Ponce (AFSB(I)-15) – are on station off Yemen near the Bab Al Mandeb strait that links the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden.

Reports as of late Sunday tell us the locals decided to scrimmage.

"USS Mason detected two inbound missiles over a 60-minute period while in the Red Sea off the coast of Yemen. Both missiles impacted the water before reaching the ship," Pentagon spokesman Captain Jeff Davis said.

"There were no injuries to our sailors and no damage to the ship," he said.

So far, well done all.

The Near Death Nature of Near Shore Operations

History, on large scale and small, will give you hints what should concern you when the next war comes.

On operating near shore, the history can be mixed in the messages it sends if you don't look at the details. In the last real big war, you had successful defenses such as the approaches to Oslo and even the sporty use of field artillery against ships by the few Marines defending Wake in the early days of WWII.  Shore based defenses - immobile and a frustration at most - are seen as ineffective as those we faced in our last gunfight outside of Haiphong during the Vietnam War.

It is this history that can be misleading in the second decade of the 21st Century. The edges of living memory is good to understand, but you need to look closer.

Don't look too far. Are we worried so much about the sexy but rare and unproven Anti-Ship Ballistic Missile (ASBM) right now, as well as other exotic items you only see in a PPT, to the point we are ignoring a larger, legacy threat of a proven and effective threat scattered around the world by the hundreds to thousands? They may be old to oldish - but so are our ways to defend against them.

They are the cost effective answer to those who do not have the luxury of having a navy to throw up against an overpowering USN at sea - but want to have the ability to bloody the nose of those who would assume they own the sea. Of course, we are talking about what we believe took out the SWIFT, the shore based anti-ship cruise missile. Harpoon, Exocet, Styx/Silkworm, C801, C802, etc ... they are out there and waiting. They aren't fixed. They can be in any garage or "lorry" seen on the road. They would even fit in the parking bay of a MSF hospital.

The first practical big hint about the dangers of going close ashore in the modern era was the HMS Glamorgan attack in the closing days of the 1982 Falklands War. The 2012's strike on the INS HANIT is the most germane to what we saw over the weekend to the former (JHSV 2) SWIFT;

AN Incat catamaran has been sunk in the Red Sea by the Yemeni Army, say Arab news agencies.

Al-Masirah Television and Tasnim News Agency report that the 98m wave-piercing HSV-2 Swift, built at the Prince of Wales Bay Incat shipyard in 2003, was destroyed in a rocket attack off the shores of the Red Sea port city of Mokha early on Saturday.

Al-Masirah reports that the Swift was carrying aid and equipment for the United Arab Emirates Army when it was targeted by an anti-ship missile. There have been no reports of casualties but Yemini Houthi fighters claim to have sunk the ship.
...
The aluminium-hulled catamaran had a helicopter flight deck, vehicle deck, small boat and unmanned vehicle launch and recovery capability, and a communications suite.

It was capable of carrying 350 personnel and military vehicles and had a 2600 sq m mission deck.

Swift returned to Incat at Hobart in July 2013 for a refit and in July 2015 was reported to be operated by the UAE’s National Marine Dredging Company.

Most who served in the last few decades know the Bab-el-Mandeb area at the southern end of the Red Sea well. It is a classic choke point and "near shore" operating environment. How do you define "near short?" In the modern era, I wouldn't judge near shore by distance, but by time. Here's why.

Almost any poorly resourced military or non-state actor have the ability to do over the horizon targeting using over-the-counter communications equipment, using fishing boats as intel collection nodes, commercial radars for targeting, or even recreational drones (you should see some of the scouting by drone some of my duck hunting acquaintances are doing. For the record, I hinted how great an idea that is, but Mrs. Salamander shot that down pronto. Not a drone, just the idea of me buying one to, "Save time scouting." I failed on the sale).

Let's put the latest generation of supersonic ASCM to the side and go with the affordable previous generation of sub-sonic cruise missiles. They go +/-9 NM a minute. From launch to impact, a 2-minute flight time from the parking lot of KFC to your ship 18-NM out at sea. How long does it take for your watch to go from detect to engage (that assumes you have a good radar designed for such, have ES gear, have an awake & well trained crew, are expecting an attack, and nothing is CASREP'd)? Depending on the missile, these can be shot in "line of sight" mode where the targeting radar comes on right after launch (easiest to counter), they can have the radar come on at the last minute, or some can even be IR guided.

Ponder that threat a bit and ask yourself - how close to you want to get? Yes, you are a bit frustrated at all those glossy advertisements for DDG-1000 that showed them happily firing away a thousand yards or so from a nice white beach and green shore with nary a village in sight ... but that was marketing, this is war where you have hundreds of thousands of possible hiding places for shore based, mobile ASCM. How close are you comfortable with the risk vs. how close you have to do to accomplish your mission? That overlap is the rub.

Once you get your head around that legacy threat, then ponder the latest ASCM that in the next decade will probably be sold like Hilux trucks, the BrahMos and their fellow travelers. 

How do you defeat that threat? Dowe have the right defensive measures to fight through the envelope? Are we properly taking in to account this threat in how we design our fleet? How we man, train, and equip it?

As for this instance, I would expect a lot more to come out in the next 48-hrs, but here's the video we have of the attack.

USS SIROCCO (PC-6) - Bravo Zulu

In the finest traditions of the naval service ... like from the beginning of the republic.

BZ to the crew of the USS Sirocco (PC-6).

The U.S. Navy says it has seized a weapons shipment in the Arabian Sea from Iran likely heading to war-torn Yemen.

The Navy said in a statement Monday that the USS Sirocco on March 28 intercepted and seized the shipment of weapons hidden aboard a small dhow, a type of ship commonly used in the Persian Gulf and Indian Ocean.

The Navy said the shipment included 1,500 Kalashnikov assault rifles, 200 rocket-propelled grenade launchers and 21 .50-caliber machine guns. It said those aboard the dhow were released after sailors confiscated the arms.

I'm old enough to remember when we wanted to get rid of all these PC to the USCG ... is it too soon to discuss a proper ... and I mean proper ... follow on to this bit of kit?

Yes, too soon. Let's just show the wee crew's good work to start the week off right.

Politics of the Narrative does not Work Well Internationally

Adult leaders of adult nations speak clearly about what is happening in the world.

We try to teach out children, heck our Sailors, one fundamental; if you make a mistake, own up to it. If you get something wrong, it is better to admit it early than to double down or hide.

Then again, you have the rule of some politicians; never apologize, never admit a mistake. ... and we wonder where the kids get their ideas ...

This habit on the world stage can get dangerous. No one is perfect, the world gets a vote, and human beings have a tendency to do what they want regardless of what you will them to do. Well meaning people will cut you some slack.

They key to remaining credible and to ensure the right intellectual effort is going towards making the best of a changing situation is to ... gird your loins ... admit mistakes and move forward.

First;



I will grant you that Yemen is a success, in a fashion, if your goal is to increase Iranian influence - which Administration is doing quite grandly in Iraq and Syria - then sure, it is a great success. If not, well ...

Now, let's look at where we are in the White House this week;



... and the truth on the ground;



So, where does that leave us? The late night cynic in me sees an administration that is relying a lot on hope and in a large measure are trying to run out the clock on hard decisions so the next President will have to the dirty work.

I don't know if you can run out the clock on this wreck of a foreign policy in the Middle East - but one thing is for sure, we're about to find out.