Conflicted
S01E04
Thomas Small Welcome back to Conflicted. This is the podcast where I, Thomas Small, co-producer of Path of Blood, and Aimen Dean, former MI6 double agent inside al-Qaeda, try to unpick the tangled web of the War on Terror and sundry Middle Eastern conflicts for you, the listener.
Aimen Dean You should be on radio. You have a very perfect voice for it.
Thomas Small I—. This is—. I am now on radio. This is how—. It's happening. It's happening.
Before we get into this episode, I'm just going to recap what happened in episode three. Last time, Aimen and I talked about the Iraq War, the great mistake of American foreign policy, which opened the floodgates to a whole host of unexpected tragedies, though perhaps they could have been foreseen.
In this episode, we're going to start wading through the murky waters of issues like Arab nationalism, we'll get to the fallout from the Arab Spring, and, eventually, we're going to come to the sad story of Yemen, a beautiful country that some would say has been held hostage to the eschatological ideals of the Iranian regime via a group called the Houthis. Some call them terrorists. Others call them freedom fighters. Aimen and I have our own opinions of what we think are pretty tell-tale signs of who the Houthis are.
Aimen Dean The flag of the Houthis have four sentences on it. al-mawt li-ʾAmrīkā. Death to America. al-mawt li-ʾIsrāʾīl. Death to Israel. al-laʿnah ʿalā 'l-Yahūd. Damn the Jews. an-naṣr lil-ʾIslām. Victory for Islam. So, is that a kind of group that we should sympathise with?
Thomas Small This is Conflicted.
So, Aimen, last time ended the episode with you quite passionately articulating your belief in the fundamental importance of the nation state as an institution in contradistinction to internationalist ideologically globalist movements like al-Qaeda, like the Muslim brotherhood, I suppose. Organisations and ideologies that seek to undermine or destroy the nation state. Now, what I'd like to ask you, though, is given the checky record of Arab nationalism, you have from Abdel Nasser to, now, you have the spectre of names like Saddam Hussein, Muammar Gaddafi, Hafez al-Assad, his son Bashar al-Assad. How can you defend the idea of nationalism in an Arab context given what we've seen unfold over the last decades by these dictators?
Aimen Dean I do not defend nationalism. What I do defend actually is the nation state.
Thomas Small It's actually a very important distinction that people don't make enough these days.
Aimen Dean Indeed. Not just only as an institution, but as a concept. Because the problem we have now throughout the world is that the narrative, the prevailing narrative, that there is a war between Islam and the West. In reality, there is actually a war within Islam. A war between those who believe in the nation state as a concept and as an institution, and those who do not believe in the nation state. Instead, they believe in transnational ideologies. So, if you want an accurate picture of how this civil war within Islam is taking place, I would say that there are four distinct factions here.
The first one is a nation state. With all their faults and shortcomings, but they are still the nation states, as we know them, modern nation states with, you know, flags, passport borders, you know, national anthem. You know, identity. You have, whatever, the baggage of the nation state. Then, you have three other factions. All of them seek to undermine the nation state and they are very relevant, all of them, funny enough, to our subject today.
Thomas Small Okay. So, what are they? The first one?
Aimen Dean The first one is political Sunni Islam.
Thomas Small So, that's, like, the Muslim brotherhood.
Aimen Dean Yeah, you're right. The second one is a militant Sunni Islam.
Thomas Small So, that's, like, al-Qaeda, ISIS, these kinds of guys.
Aimen Dean Hamas. You know, Al-Shabab. You know, Taliban, even. Boko Haram.
Thomas Small Yeah.
Aimen Dean And the last faction is the political and militant Shia Islam.
Thomas Small This is the Iranian revolution, the Iranian regime, its proxies, Hezbollah, and, actually, its semi proxies like Hamas, because there's an overlap between these groups.
Aimen Dean Indeed. And in fact, one of the proxies of Iran will be very essential to today's podcast.
Thomas Small The Houthis in Yemen.
Aimen Dean Absolutely.
Thomas Small Yes. We will get there. We will get there.
Aimen Dean Yeah.
Thomas Small So, I mean, I think it's very interesting that you say there's this civil war raging within Islam over the question of the nation state or transnational ideologies, because, in fact, I think for Western listeners, especially, they might feel that this resonates with what we in the West are going through at the moment, because things like Brexit, things like what's called the rise of populism. To some extent, that's participating in something like a civil war within the West, between those who still see the sovereignty of the nation state as the most fundamental building block of governance, of politics, and those who are seeking, well, at least in the eyes of the nation state people, seeking to undermine the nation state in pursuit of larger globalists aims, institutions like the WTO, you know. Like the EU, I suppose. Other such institutions.
Aimen Dean Absolutely, you know. And this is why while the debate and the civil war within the West over the question of the nation state remains peaceful. May it forever remain peaceful.
Thomas Small Well, I want to ask you that. Why in—?
Aimen Dean Yeah.
Thomas Small Why in – in the world of Islam is this debate raging with such unbelievable violence?
Aimen Dean I think the fundamental reason for the violence is because the transnational ideologies I describe, with the exception of the Muslim brotherhood, they have taken up arms to begin with. Because, basically, for them, there is no other avenue reaching power apart from armed struggle. So, armed struggle is an idea that, you know, comes with heroism, chivalry. You know, the idea that, you know, you are a part of an elite vanguard that would take over and remodel the whole society as you see fit.
Thomas Small You use – you see the word "vanguard." This sounds very much like, you know, Bolshevism, Marxism, Leninism. That sort of movement of the early twentieth century, which was very violent, which was revolutionary in its intense. Unlike, say, an institution like the EU or the WTO, which is consensual, which is incremental, which is liberal, in fact. Though, global, it is liberal. Unlike these movements that you're describing. They are radical. They seek a root and branch and violent transformation of society.
Aimen Dean Yeah. I mean, you asked me the question, you know, why the debate within the Islamic world over nation states on one hand and the transnational ideologies on the other hand became violent. You know, however, I want to ask you this question. You know, as an observer, as someone who really looked into the Middle East throughout many, many years, and you've learned the language, Thomas. By the way, you know, for those who never heard Thomas speak Arabic, it's one of the most beautiful accents in Arabic I ever heard.
Thomas Small You're far too generous. You're far—. Arabs are so generous. Any idiot who can sue – who opens his mouth and speaks a few words of Arabic suddenly sounds like the prophet himself.
Aimen Dean Well, you know. But nonetheless, I want to hear your take. Why do you think that the conflict between the nation states and the transnational ideologists became so violent?
Thomas Small In the Middle East?
Aimen Dean Yes.
Thomas Small In the Muslim world? Well, I mean, the fallback answer is always, well, Islam is violent. Islam is a violent religion. The Qur'an calls for violence in a way that, certainly, the New Testament does not. The Old Testament does.
Aimen Dean Indeed.
Thomas Small And – and other religious texts, like the Bhagavad Gita, which is a Hindu text, which is based around the idea of a war. But nonetheless, there's this idea around – in – in – in – around. You know, I've sometimes contemplated it. That Islam is just inherently violent and that Muslims, when they seek to change the situation, they tend to reach for their weapons.
Ultimately, I'm not satisfied with that answer, because no amount of reading the New Testament prevented western Europeans from slaughtering themselves in unbelievable unspeakable acts of violence during their transformation from a feudal/ aristocratic/traditional political structure to the modern nation state consensual liberal democratic structure. It does – it does seem to require violence. Why is that? God only knows. But I suppose it's tempting to see the Middle East going through a situation in the twenty-first century, with all things being equal, might resemble what Europe went through in the seventeenth century, during the thirty years war, which ended in the Peace of Westphalia and the establishment of the nation state system, which the Middle East is still growing into, I guess, 'cause to a certain extent, the nation states were imposed on them by the French and the British to some extent. And to another extent, because it didn't – they didn't rise from within, they didn't involve the same level of—.
Aimen Dean Evolution.
Thomas Small Of evolution and of – of destroying the previous way of doing things. So, you have a kind of uncomfortable mix, on the one hand, of the authoritarianism, of the pre-modern way of doing things and the tools of the nation state, including the police, including secret police, including armies, including weapons. And that combination is slightly uncomfortable. Does that sound like a good answer? [crosstalk].
Aimen Dean I – I totally agree. I couldn't have put it better myself. And I think that is why, you know, some models of the nation states succeeded more than others. For example, I have always been pro-monarchist in the Middle East. Just within the context of the Middle East. Not beyond that. Or the Arab world, at least. The monarchical system in the arable that have survived so far.
Thomas Small So, that includes Morocco, Jordan, the Gulf states.
Aimen Dean Indeed.
Thomas Small Basically, that's what it is these days.
Aimen Dean Eight countries. That's it. You know, only eight countries in the Arab world basically have monarchies. But these eight countries, including the poor ones, you know, like Jordan and Morocco have far better stability than their autocratic republics.
Thomas Small Well, this became blindingly obvious to everyone, I think, when the Arab Spring broke out, you know. This episode is going to talk about the situation in Yemen. But you can't talk about the situation in Yemen without talking about the Arab Spring, because the war in Yemen and everything that proceeded it is a chapter in the unfolding story of the Arab Spring. And in the Arab Spring, we saw quite clearly that those Arab countries that were shaken to the ground were the republics whereas the monarchies were much, much, much more stable. They were much better able to neutralise opposition, neutralise discontent, and respond to that sudden upsurge of unrest.
Aimen Dean Indeed, actually. You know, if we want to quantify this, because the listener wants us to quantify this for them, you know, there were ten countries in the Arab world that suffer the consequences of the Arab Spring. The five republics were Egypt, Tunisia. You know, both of them are semi stable right now. Then, you have Libya, Yemen, and Syria, all three are going through civil wars. The death toll in all these ten is almost reaching a million.
Thomas Small Unbelievable.
Aimen Dean That includes Syria and Yemen and Libya.
Thomas Small Unbelievable.
Aimen Dean A million dead in seven or eight years.
Thomas Small That's something, like, twice the dead in the American Civil War just to put that in context.
Aimen Dean Indeed. Absolutely.
Thomas Small We're talking about a serious, serious number of dead people.
Aimen Dean And the number of people who are displaced or refugees in all these countries, we're talking about more than twenty-one million. And the number of people who are even going to either experience famine or about to experience famine and hunger and malnutrition is almost reaching thirteen million.
Aimen Dean And those numbers remind one of the sort of numbers that prevailed after the Second World War in Eastern Europe and in the lands of the German. The number of – of refugees fleeing into different countries. The tremendous famine that were going on because of the deprivations of that war. This is what we're talking about in the Middle East right now: apocalyptic levels of suffering and instability.
Aimen Dean Indeed. Then, we con- – contrast that with the monarchies. There were five monarchies that were affected by the Arab Spring. Bahrain, which was the worst affected. The death toll in Bahrain, entirety, you know, whether from the protestors or the, you know, or the police, it does not exceed ninety-five. Ninety-five. We're not talking about millions or hundreds of thousands or tens of thousands or thousands, even. We're talking really about double digits, you know, as far as Bahrain is concerned.
In Saudi Arabia, there were fourteen protestors killed. In Oman, there were six. In Jordan, there were two. And in Morocco, there was zero. Yeah. You know, no one died in the Moroccan uprising, because the king decided to concede, you know, and give as much – as much as he can give. And the opposition accepted as much low they can actually accept.
Thomas Small So, what distinguishes an Arab monarch from an Arab president? What lies behind the stark difference in these numbers? Millions on the one hand. Double digits on the other hand.
Aimen Dean One word, Thomas. One word. "Legitimacy."
Thomas Small "Legitimacy."
Aimen Dean You see, you know, the monarchical system, it's been around in the Middle East since the days of Sumerians, you know, seven thousand years ago.
Thomas Small The Sumerians. Before the Bible was even conceived.
Aimen Dean Indeed. We had kings, you know, since 5,000 BC. So, I think we have come now to the end of the trial periods if – if we want to say that it's been tried and tested. It is actually I tried and tested, you know, system, because it is a system that provides stability. And at the same time—.
Thomas Small But why? What can a king do that a president can't do?
Aimen Dean First, a president who came to power through either rigged elections or military coup will always know that he came there through, you know, thoughtful means. And, therefore, he will always remain in secure that, as he took it by force or by deception, someone else will come and take it by force and deception. So, he always view his people as, you know, the competitors, as people who could, one day, flip against him and he could lose it. That's why those who are in power through presidential means, they tend to be more corrupt, because they want to get as much money as possible, stash it in Swiss banks, and just wait for the moment that they are deposed. And then, they flee. And then, they enjoy the fruits of their corrupt labour.
Thomas Small They flee if you're lucky. If you're unlucky, they – they double down and they turn their – their guns on you.
Aimen Dean Indeed. Because is power is poisonous. Power, basically, stick in the mind of people, and they want to stay. But monarchs, on the other hand, what happened to them is that they inherit that from their parents, you know. So, the father, you know, the – the last king, pass it on to his son, the current king, who wants to leave it even better to his son who will be the future king. Add to this that the oath of allegiance that Arabs give to their kings is exactly the oath of allegiance that we would have given to the religious caliphs. So, it is a religious allegiance, which means that you swear an oath before God to obey the king. And, therefore, it's binding. And people think that, actually, while monarchy is not an Islamic system of ruling, it is actually a Muslim system of ruling.
Thomas Small What do you mean? What's the difference between Islamic and Muslim in this way?
Aimen Dean Islamic means that it adheres entirely to the principles of sharia. But when I say Muslim, it means basically that it has a Muslim character to it and it has Muslim principles to it, but not entirely Islamic according to the theology. So, basically, it is legitimate enough that there would be so many Muslim clerics who would defend kings more than Muslim clerics who would defend the presidents.
Thomas Small Why not actual liberal democracy? Why not through non-rigged elections, civil society, elect politicians to represent them? Why is that not able to take root in the Middle East? Because, ultimately, that's what the Arab Spring was about, wasn't it? That's what we were told.
Aimen Dean In order to have democratic institutions, we need to have a democratic culture. So, the people themselves are actually democrats. But if the people are not democrats, how can you build democratic institutions? The problem is you can't build skyscrapers over a foundation of sand, even in Dubai, where there are lots of skyscrapers [crosstalk].
Thomas Small I think your bias proved you wrong there.
Aimen Dean No. But what's happened is they just build huge concrete foundations, you know, in order to stabilise these skyscrapers. We don't have concrete democracy, as a culture, among the people. The people are not Democrats.
Thomas Small That can't be true. There are millions of Muslims in democratic countries in the west, and they're Democrats. They participate in election.
Aimen Dean You know, we're not talking about Muslims in the West. We're talking about Muslims in the Muslim world. They are not yet ready for democracy. There are some Muslim democracies that have done really well like Malaysia and even Indonesia now.
Thomas Small That's interesting. So, is it—? Are we talking about Arab society then?
Aimen Dean Yes.
Thomas Small Okay. Arabs aren't ready for democracy. This is what you're saying.
Aimen Dean Yes. I know this would be controversial for many people. But until the majority believe in democratic values, believe in pluralism, believe that the opinion of the other, however offensive it is, is as sacred as your own opinion, until that happens, we are not yet ready. And I can tell you we are not yet ready.
Thomas Small Well, I must say my countrymen might think that I'm a total traitor about this, but I – I completely agree with you. I myself am a unapologetic monarchist for all the reasons you say. I mean, especially when you see the poisonous political culture raging in the United States today, where the head of state is such a politicised figure that, as soon as the president is elected, half of the country hates him. Half of the country begins to work to undermine him. It happened when Obama became president. It's happened when Trump becomes president. It is essentially divisive. Whereas in this country, in England, which is going through somewhat of a similar process through Brexit, it is being carried in a much more civilised way. And I think that it's because, at the top of this pack of fools, is the queen, is a monarch, and she does weirdly just sort of bestow a certain grace on the proceedings.
Obviously, people will disagree with me and my passport will not be revoked and I'll never be able to go home. So, now, this reminds me of what we talked about last time with the Iraq War. Because, of course, the neoconservative project was to bring democracy to the Middle East. They thought all you have to do is remove the dictators and democracy will spring up. When it comes to the Arab Spring, something like a spontaneous uprising calling for democratic values occurred. What lay behind that?
Aimen Dean What lay behind that was the fact that the Arab dictators were just suffocating the wrong people. I mean, and you see, whenever I observed what's happening in the Middle East, I realised that what people lacked wasn't so much, you know, the question of freedom of expression or freedom of association. You know, they could live without that. They could. What they actually hated so much was the uncertainty of the future. You see, people will tolerate the darkness of the tunnel if there is that little dim light at the end of it. The problem with the Arab dictators is that they switched off even that very little dim light at the very end of the tunnel and they plunged their people into total darkness about what the future would be like.
Thomas Small And as a result, beginning in December 2010, first in Tunisia when a market seller set himself on fire.
Aimen Dean And set the rest of the Arab world on fire with him.
Thomas Small Exactly. From – from there to Egypt. And then, you—. It was like a domino. Then, you had protests in Syria, protests in Libya, protests in Bahrain, as we discussed, protests in Yemen. Now, Yemen is an interesting and extremely complex story. So complex that even you and I could not do it justice in this podcast. And we won't even try.
Aimen Dean We need ten podcasts, at least, just to discuss, you know, the transition between, you know, imamate monarchy and the Republic of Yemen. That alone, you know…
Thomas Small Exactly.
Aimen Dean …in the '60s.
Thomas Small So, a summary of what went on is that Ali Abdullah Saleh, the president of Yemen from 1979, I think.
Aimen Dean Yeah.
Thomas Small From 1979 to 2011, when the protests first erupted, knitting together a tribal society full of instability, having inherited his presidential throne after a series of assassinations of his predecessors. No one expected him to last. He was a sort of nobody from a minor tribe and a minor village. But he survives. He called it the art of dancing on the heads of snakes.
Aimen Dean Yeah.
Thomas Small He learnt how to do it to neutralise the tribal ambitions, to pay off this tribe in order to fight that tribe, to allow a little bit of al-Qaeda fighters out, so the Americans focus on that while taking the American money and funnelling it into – secretly into the Muslim brotherhood party while also keeping his own party in line. He was brilliant at it. In the meantime, he had erected a tremendously corrupt state apparatus, which had actually neglected the everyday concerns of people. He wasn't actually creating a very strong state apparatus in terms of public services, in terms of welfare services. Is that a fair description of what went on?
Aimen Dean Oh, indeed. And some people say, basically, dancing on the head of snakes, you know, I would say basically he was actually, you know, making the snakes dance to his tune. I mean, he, really, by the end of it was able to, you know, to make so many parts of the Yemeni political mosaic, you know, move according to his will. But it's just the parts became too much for him.
Thomas Small And in the era of the War on Terror, Ali Abdullah Saleh, the president of Yemen, was very important. He had become a key ally of George W. Bush's project of destroying terrorism, but he was not actually a reliable ally.
Aimen Dean No. Because he was actually not just only taking, you know, US counter-terrorism money and then giving some of it to al-Qaeda beneath the table in order for them to become even more powerful and more menacing, so he can get even more money, you know, from the US. [unintelligible]. This is, again, the entrepreneurial, you know – you know, aspect of the War on Terrorism, is that even the Pakistani ISI—. You know, the intelligence service of Pakistan did it, where, you know, you take money, you give some of it, just some of it, initially, to the terrorists who would then carry out outrageous attacks against either locals or westerners. And then, of course, you go back to the US and the UK and France and Germany and others, and scream, "Hey. It's actually getting worse. I need more money." So, actually, this is how, you know, Saleh worked. But then this started to backfire on him.
Thomas Small Backfire indeed. And when the Arab Spring broke out in Yemen, the international community, the United States and the neighbours of Yemen, especially Saudi Arabia, but its Gulf allies, were particularly concerned that Yemen not descend into the anarchy that they could see happening in Libya and Syria, particularly. Why is it so important to maintain stability in Yemen?
Aimen Dean Okay. Yemen and Afghanistan, they share four major issues in common between them. The first one is that Yemen is a mountainous country and Afghanistan is a mountainous country.
Thomas Small Mountains. Okay.
Aimen Dean Afghanistan is heavily tribal country. Yemen is heavily tribal country.
Thomas Small Mountains and tribes.
Aimen Dean Then, you have the fact that Afghanistan is a heavily-armed country, where the people and the tribes are armed to the teeth.
Thomas Small Mountains, tribes, and guns.
Aimen Dean Yeah. Yemen is the same.
Thomas Small So, I mean, you're painting a really, really lovely picture. I'm going to book my ticket tomorrow.
Aimen Dean The last one is the drugs. You know, both countries basically produce drugs. You know, unexplored drugs whence – once there is instability. So—.
Thomas Small Mountains, tribes, weapons, and drugs.
Aimen Dean Yes. You couldn't have asked for worse, you know, four ingredients to be in the same place.
Thomas Small Yemen, quite a large country, really—very mountainous—in the southwest corner of the Arabian Peninsula. So, it borders, to its north, Saudi Arabia and, up to its east, Oman. It's extremely geo-strategically important. The port of Aden is a big port on the Arabian Sea. Yemen is where the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait is, the straight leading into the Red Sea and the Suez Canal. It is the place where all of the world shipping from Asia and elsewhere gets to Europe. Extremely important population, about thirty million people in Yemen.
Aimen Dean Yes.
Thomas Small Yemen, as you say, mountains, tribes, drugs, guns, and sectarianism. Yemen has been the Wild West of the Arabian Peninsula for a long time, a haven for all sorts of criminal activities, terrorist activities, including al-Qaeda, from the very beginning. We mustn't forget the attack that al-Qaeda carried out against the American warship, the USS Cole, in the year 2000. al-Qaeda and other such groups have been in Yemen forever.
Aimen Dean Indeed. Actually, when I was in al-Qaeda myself, I visited Yemen in 1997 and I still remember, you know, the chaotic nature. I remember I emerged out of Sanaa Airport. And there, in front of me, I found a group of young Yemini kids between the ages of nine, ten, eleven. They were well-dressed. Their robes are really well ironed. You know, they looked in the quite middle-class kids. But all them, without a single exception, were wearing, as part of the uniform, AK-47s. So, you can imagine that every Yemeni held a gun as a sign of maturity, as a sign of respect.
Thomas Small I've read that Yemen is the most heavily armed state in the world in terms of the civilian population, and its black market gun markets are proverbial. If you want to get your hands on Kalashnikovs, on rocket launchers, you go to one of the gun markets of Yemen.
Aimen Dean And, in fact, I experienced myself first-hand how weak the nation state was in Yemen in favour of tribalism. To give you an example, my hosts on the suburbs of Sanaa where from the tribe of Yafa. And, obviously, they were talking to me about how easy it was basically, you know, to obtain documents here in Yemen.
And so, for a dare, I dared them that they could actually make me a Yemeni. And then, in the next two days, you know, they dressed me up as a Yemeni. They put the little dagger, basically, like, I mean, wearing around the waist. And I looked so Yemeni. And so, they took me to the local registry just on the suburb of Sanaa. And there, they registered me, you know, as this man. "This is his name. This is his father's name. This is his father's father's name. And we are two witnesses from the tribe that he is one of us." You know, they got me a birth certificate and they got me a ID within seven days. And then, after that, by the end of my trip, I had a Yemeni passport in my hand.
Thomas Small Amazing.
Aimen Dean Just based on the testimony of two members of the tribe, I had a Yemeni identity with different place of birth, different date of birth, different name altogether.
Thomas Small I think that story is really important for the listener. Because we hear about the tribalism of the Arab world all the time, but it's impossible for us in the West to really understand what that means practically, what it means on the ground. But it means something like this. The trust that the tribe gives to other members of the tribe is absolutely.
Aimen Dean Absolutely. And that's why the Yemeni state trusted the tribal system to act. Well, I mean, but the problem is you can see in my story where I became a Yemeni citizen, you know, in a matter of two weeks. In a fortnight, I became a Yemeni citizen with different name, identity, different date of birth, place of birth, based on the testimony of two individuals who were my friends and wanted to make me Yemeni.
Thomas Small I would like to point out that I have met many Yemenis who I think are amongst the most openhearted and wonderful people in the world. And I don't want anyone to think that the Yemenis are just these horrible, horrible people. But, sometimes, when I hear about the way Yemen functions, I am reminded of that line in the first Star Wars film when – when Obi wan Kenobi is standing with Luke Skywalker, looking down at Mos Eisley and says something like, "A haven of scum and villainy will never [unintelligible]." I mean, and when I talked to, my—.
Aimen Dean [crosstalk].
Thomas Small And when I talked to my Gulf Arab friends, they – they say, "Oh. Yemen. Oh, my God. Wonderful people, lovely people. We love them, but they cause us so many problems."
Aimen Dean Indeed. I agree. Totally.
Thomas Small As briefly as possible, tell the poor listener, what is the sectarian landscape of Yemen? Because it matters for the conflict that's raging there. I mean, it really matters.
Aimen Dean Okay. Yemen has always been divided half and half. Half between the Sunnis and the other half is Zaid.
Thomas Small So, Sunnis, I think, people know. Sunnis are the majority of Muslims. Zaidis are an offshoot of the Shia branch of Islam.
Aimen Dean The difference here is that Zaidis are not as antagonistic towards the Sudanese as the rest of the Shia. There are three kinds of Zaidis in Yemen. So, we have the Salafis and the Hadawis on one hand. So, they are extremely closer to Sunnis and Shia to the point where they pray in the same mosques. They marry each other.
Thomas Small And the third Zaidi sect?
Aimen Dean And the third Zaidi sect, which is very important for this podcast today, is the Jarudi Zaidis.
Thomas Small Jarudi.
Aimen Dean Yes. Those are much closer to the mainstream Shia Islam practice in Iran than to the Sunni Islam that is practiced in the Arabian Peninsula.
Thomas Small And it is the Jarudis that gave rise to the Houthi movement.
Aimen Dean Indeed.
Thomas Small Now, the Houthi movement was founded in the early '90s by Badreddin al-Houthi. And the Houthi movement—. We don't want to get into it too much. It really is very complicated. But in short, the Houthis believe that they are the natural heirs to the imamate, to this theocratic monarchical system that had prevailed in Yemen for hundreds of years. That Yemen is theirs to rule over.
Aimen Dean Yes.
Thomas Small At the same time, over the last decades, the Iranian regime, especially through its proxies, Hezbollah in Lebanon, have reached out to the Houthis and have encouraged them to reinterpret their own ideology more in line with the Ayatollah Khomeini's concepts of – of revolution and governance and statecraft. Is that fair?
Aimen Dean Absolutely. Because, you see, Badreddin al-Houthi, he was invited to Iran, to the religious seminaries in Qom in the early 1990s. And he took his son Hussein with him. Hussein would later then become the leader of the Houthi movement in the political and military sense. By the way, even in the 1980s, he went to fight with the Badr Brigade, which was a brigade of Arabs—Arab – Shia from Iraq, Lebanon, and even from Yemen—formed by the Iranians to fight against Saddam Hussein and the Iraq-Iran war. So, he even fought for the Iranians. So, when people say to you that, "Oh, we don't see that much link between the Houthis and the Iranians," they are kidding themselves.
Thomas Small So, by the time the Arab Spring arrives in Yemen, the Houthi the movement is 18 years old. And throughout the noughties, they have engaged in a series of, I believe, six wars with Ali Abdullah Saleh, president of Yemen, over the northern provinces of Yemen. So, when the Arab Spring breaks out, they're well positioned to take advantage of any chaos that might follow.
Aimen Dean What happened in 2011 and 2012 when, of course, there was the movement for change and Ali Abdullah Saleh, who was forced to resign—. Of course, he did not take that resignation lightly.
Thomas Small Ali Abdullah Saleh at first tries to stay like all the other dictators, but tremendous pressure is put on him by Saudi Arabia and its Gulf allies and the US and the UN, which culminates in something known as the Gulf Initiative. This was seen, at the time, as a great achievement. Yemen was considered to be a leading light in the Arab Spring. It seemed like civil war was averted. What happened?
Aimen Dean What happened is that a state within a state was festering in Yemen, and no one took notice of that, which is the Houthis in the north. The problem is all the components of Yemen were concerned with either tribal or nationalist concerns, except for the Houthis in the north, whose concerns were, you know, regional, according to Iranian interpretation of Islam. You know? "National dialogue doesn't concern us. A stable Yemen? What's the point of stable Yemen if we don't become part of the global regional struggle for the return of the Mahdi, you know, for the, you know."
Thomas Small Because the Houthis are also—. They've drunk the Kool-Aid of apocalyptic expectations of prophecy. They believe that they're soon going to take over Mecca and Medina. They believe a whole host of – of such beliefs.
Aimen Dean Indeed. And many people basically who—. Unfortunately, we have a prevailing narrative among the left establishment, you know, in the West where – whether in the media or academia or even in some parliaments, even in Europe, where they believe the Houthis to be some sort of freedom fighters. You know, people basically who were oppressed, who were marginalised, and, therefore, basically, they are rebelling against the status quo. You know, these people never read even the biography of Hussein Badreddin al-Houthi. If they bothered to read his biography, they will know what's an ideologically-driven, eschatologically-influenced person he was. He fought in the Iran – Iran-Iraq war on the side of Iran, even though he was a Yemeni and Arab. That should tell you enough about his ideological leanings. And the fact that he chose the flag, you know, of the Houthis to have four sentences on it. These four sentences was: al-mawt li-ʾIsrāʾīl. Death to Israel. al-laʿnah ʿalā 'l-Yahūd. Damn the Jews. an-naṣr lil-ʾIslām. Victory for Islam.
Thomas Small This is very similar to the kind of chants that were being cried out during the Iranian revolution, weren't they?
Aimen Dean Yeah. But I urge the listener to go to Google and put "Houthi flag" on Google and then click on "Images." And you will see that flag. It's the only flag they have. So, is that a kind of group that we should sympathise with? If this flag doesn't convince you that these people are drug-infused, you know, clueless mountain warriors who are on an ideological and messianic mission, then I don't know what would convince you then.
So, that is why the Houthis remain, to some extent, an enigma to many on the left, in the European and Western context, because they choose to ignore the ideological roots and the ideological symbology of the Houthis.
Thomas Small So, the Houthis are determined to take over Yemen. And in the era of the Arab Spring, they find a very useful ally. On their own, they never could have taken over Yemen.
Aimen Dean No.
Thomas Small Because the sad story is that, even though he had resigned and handed power over to his vice president and was pretending to be participating constructively in the national dialogue, Ali Abdullah Saleh, who still commanded the allegiance of the vast majority of the army, allied with his erstwhile enemies the Houthis, whom he had fought in six wars and killed and hated in order to come back to power. So, the Houthis and Ali Abdullah Saleh and – and Ali Abdullah Saleh's army units take over the country. The UN-backed president Hadi flees Aden. The Houthi Saleh forces chased him to Aden. They are—. They – they get to Aden. They are on the verge of overwhelming the presidential palace there and – and killing him, no doubt. At which point, famously, Saudi Arabia and its Gulf allies…
Aimen Dean Yeah.
Thomas Small …intervened to save—.
Aimen Dean President Hadi.
Thomas Small To save President Hadi. In the name of legitimacy, in fact. That's what they say. So, why would Saudi Arabia in particular have felt it so necessary to intervene in this civil war?
Aimen Dean And that is really the crux of the entire conundrum of Yemen. The Yemen war, really, it has been painted by so many people in the west who are too lazy to pick up a history book and read – or a geography, you know, a book and understand the complexities of the Arabian Peninsula and its politics. They painted this war as, you know, this big bully, Saudi Arabia, is throttling those ragtag militants, you know, who are fighting for freedom, you know, the Houthis, who were always oppressed and marginalised. You know, this is the problem, you know, when you look at a conflict from a very myopic, you know, point of view and you only see an underdog and the bully dog, and you don't see that, actually, it's far more complex than this.
Thomas Small Now, Aimen, in the Arab Spring era, of course, you had left MI6. You were no longer a double agent inside al-Qaeda and you had become an even worst terrorist in your own words, a banker, meaning that you were advising a global banks, particularly on how to combat terrorist financing. So, there you are, advising top bankers, proper masters of the universe, about this chaos that's raging across the region and especially Yemen. Why would captains of the universe and Western leaders in general be particularly interested in the stability of Yemen?
Aimen Dean Because as we have highlighted before, the five major points that both Yemen and Afghanistan share.
Thomas Small Yes. That's right. Mountains, tribes, weapons, drugs, and religious extremism. and sectarianism.
Aimen Dean Perfect. You are a good student, Thomas. You know, A star. Okay. So, the issue here is that Yemen sits just to the – on the south Western flank of Saudi Arabia and on a very important maritime corridor where, roughly, I think, eleven percent of the world global trade go through there. But—.
Thomas Small Well, let's – let's specify. This is the Bab-el-Mandeb leading into the Red Sea and the Suez Canal This is one of the most important maritime corridors in the world.
Aimen Dean Absolutely. So, that stretch of water passage between Yemen and Djibouti is only about maybe ten miles wide. And that is the bottleneck, you know, on the journey between Europe and Asia. So, you have the first one in Bab-el-Mandeb, between Yemen and Djibouti. And then, after that you go north to the Suez Canal. So, if you block that one, then the Suez Canal actually is useless. What's the point of going through the Suez Canal if Bab-el-Mandeb Strait is experiencing high levels of maritime terrorism and maritime insurgency.
Thomas Small Well, you could still go to Sudan
Aimen Dean You can still go to the Sudan. But, you know, what would you do in Sudan? I mean, there is nothing. So, the trouble here is that, if we want to understand why Saudi Arabia, which, by the way, represents the Achilles' heel of the global economy—and we will come to that later—why would Saudi Arabia go to war in Yemen and even still continue on this spot for – for three and a half years by now?
It took longer than – than they anticipated. And yet, they still, according to my own sources inside Saudi Arabia, which I have quite plenty, you know, budgeted for the war until March 2020. It's still—. There is seventeen more months in the military budget as far as Saudi Arabia is concerned to fight a war.
Thomas Small So, they were prepared for a long fight?
Aimen Dean They were up about for a long fight. Now, why is that? Now, imagine the Arabian Peninsula. I want the listener either to imagine the map or, for those who are, you know, about the geography, pull a map of the Arabian Peninsula, which includes Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Oman, and the rest of the Gulf countries. Look at that landmass. It's the size of India. Or to put it mildly, basically, it is the size of the UK, Ireland, Spain, France, Germany, Italy, Poland combined. And yet, there isn't a single lake or river.
Thomas Small Yes. This is what people don't quite understand. It is a massive, massive area. And you look at the map, and there is no blue.
Aimen Dean Not a single speck of blue at all. Not a single lake, not a single river. The water scarcity there, it represent the largest and the biggest challenge, at the same time also a vulnerability, a strategic vulnerability for Saudi Arabia and for the other.
Thomas Small Now, you've totally flummoxed me. I did not expect you to talk about water security when talking about the reasons Saudi Arabia intervened in Yemen. This is very confusing.
Aimen Dean It is the ultimate reason as to why Saudi Arabia went to war in Yemen.
Thomas Small I'm going to press you on this, 'cause, surely, the real reason is they didn't want Iran to spread its hegemony further. That's the real reason surely..
Aimen Dean Of course. But it's related to water.
Thomas Small Iran and water, they're related how?
Aimen Dean Yeah. Saudi Arabia has no water. So, where does the water come from them? There are, you know, thirty-eight million people living in Saudi Arabia. They must have water. They must get water from somewhere. And the answer is water desalination, the process of building huge plants on the coast, which sucks in water from the sea, desalinate it, take away the salt, and produce fresh drinking water. So, Saudi Arabia is so world-leading power in this field that they produce one-third of the entire global output of desalinated water.
Thomas Small So, Saudi Arabia, the country that brings you oil and desalinated water.
Aimen Dean Yeah. They produce water on huge quantities every day. And this operation is considered to be the strategic vulnerability of Saudi Arabia, their dependence on the sea to produce water.
Thomas Small That's funny, because I think a lot of people who even think about these things would think, "Okay. Well, if you wanted to take out Saudi Arabia, you need to direct a tremendous missile strike against the oil fields of the eastern province."
Aimen Dean Oh, no.
Thomas Small "Hit it in the juggler of the oil fields." But you're saying, no, the juggler or the desalination plants.
Aimen Dean Absolutely. During the Iran-Iraq War, of course, basically King Fahd at the—.
Thomas Small The Iran-Iraq War raged between 1981 and 1988 between Iran and Iraq, during the reign, in Saudi Arabia, of King Fahd.
Aimen Dean Yes. He realised that the Iranians could easily target the largest water desalination plants on the eastern province of Saudi Arabia.
Thomas Small So, this is on the Persian Gulf coast?
Aimen Dean Absolutely. Just facing Iran, which is not far away. Two hundred kilometres gap. That's it. So, he realised the vulnerability of Saudi Arabia. Imagine, you know, people in the desert, living in desert, millions of them, and suddenly water is cut. What do you think is going to happen? It's a collapse.
Thomas Small Yes. Paint a picture. Imagine if suddenly all of the desalination plants of Saudi Arabia were – were cut off, were destroyed. How long would it take before the whole country descended into total chaos?
Aimen Dean Well, in theoretical terms, you know, there is enough water basically to last, you know, a month in the storage. But that's just theory. But the psychological terms, if people hear that there would be no more water produced, that's it. Basically, there will be millions of people on the move. A collapse of law and order, a collapse of society as we know it. Everyone will be for himself. You know, when you are on the desert and there is water scarcity, a different mentality takes over. This is difficult for Europeans to understand who lived thousands of years with the nearest source of water is just basically metres away.
Thomas Small But is it important for the rest of us to understand? Because, actually, who cares of Saudi Arabia were to descend into chaos?
Aimen Dean Because Saudi Arabia is the Achilles' heel of the global economy.
Thomas Small The Achilles' heel of the global economy. You hit it, and you hit the whole global economy.
Aimen Dean I'll tell you why. Because whenever you go, you know—. Keep this thought in your mind. Whenever you go to any petrol pump and you fill your car with petrol, what's happening is that, no matter where you are around the world, one out of nine litres of that dinosaur juice you are actually filling your car with in, you know, came from Saudi Arabia. And if you include the neighbouring countries who would collapse if Saudi Arabia collapsed—Kuwait, UAE, Qatar, Bahrain, and possibly even Oman—then, basically, one out of seven of these litres that you're filling your car with came from that part of the world. Now, even if we don't import in the West—. Let's say, in the West, we stop important completely. Completely. We stop importing oil and gas. Remember, natural gas is important. Even if we stop importing natural gas and oil from Saudi Arabia or any of the Gulf countries, while you might be independent of their oil, you are not independent of the oil price index, which is global. And then, the price will go from $80 per barrel to $250 per barrel, which means, basically, that the price of a big Mac will jump, you know, from £4 per meal to £10 per meal. Because the price of everything—logistics, farming, power, electricity, transportation. Saudi Arabia stability is our stability. It's the global stability.
Thomas Small And as you said, Saudi Arabia's chief vulnerability are the desalination plants. You know, during the Iran-Iraq War, the desalination plants on the Persian Gulf Coast were threatened by the Iranians. So, what did King Fahd do?
Aimen Dean He built far more desalination plants on the western coast of Saudi Arabia, on the Red Sea.
Thomas Small So, up north and south of Jeddah, the city of Jeddah.
Aimen Dean Indeed.
Thomas Small Too far, from Iran, for its missiles to hit.
Aimen Dean Absolutely. And also, the Saudis invested heavily in the anti-ballistic missile system, patriot missile system, PAC-2 and PAC-3. Also, they are buying the THAAD missile system from America, which shows you, basically, that, for them, their greatest fear is ballistic missiles. But then, there is problem. Even—even—sometime, if the Saudis have the ability to intercept these ballistic missiles over the target, all the Iranians have to do is, basically, arm the warheads with radioactive isotopes. And then, even if they intercept them in the – above the target, the radioactive fallout over the water desalination plant would render the plant shut for weeks, months, possibly years, because of the radioactive contamination.
Thomas Small So – so, bring this back to the Houthis. And what does this have to do with the Houthis?
Aimen Dean You see, the Houthis are sitting where? In the southwestern flank of Saudi Arabia. So, basically the entire western seaboard of Saudi Arabia is vulnerable. So, what happened is, in October of 2014, when the Houthis took over the Yemeni capital with the help of former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, what they did is they took over immediately the entire arsenal of Yemen's army's ballistic missiles.
Thomas Small Which was not negligible. Ali Abdullah Saleh had—.
Aimen Dean Six hundred of them. Six hundred.
Thomas Small Ali – Ali Abdullah Saleh had built up an arsenal of six hundred Scud missiles.
Aimen Dean Yeah. All of them capable of reaching every single—. Sorry. All of them are capable of reaching every single water desalination plant on the west coast of Saudi Arabia. So, this is the first vulnerability that Saudi Arabia experiencing as far as the Yemen conflict was concerned. That now, Iran even not just only were content with the fact that the Houthis took over the ballistic missile arsenal of the Yemeni army, they even started importing, from Iran, ballistic missiles, you know, with even longer range and bigger capability.
Thomas Small So, Iran is telling the Saudis, "Ha ha ha. We've got you now on both coasts. We can destroy the desalination plants on the Persian Gulf. We can destroy them on the Red Sea."
Aimen Dean Absolutely. Or render them useless with possible attack by radioactive warheads. Now, this is something the Saudis cannot and will not tolerate. They will never admit it to the world that they are strategically vulnerable. No one does that. But at the same time, they couldn't just sit back and allow Iran to have a complete hegemony over Yemen uninterrupted.
Thomas Small Now, you say that they wouldn't admit that. That's hard for me to understand. Why wouldn't you just say to the world, "Look, guys. Our lifeblood water is under threat." Why couldn't they say that?
Aimen Dean Because they are Hobbs. And after all, basically, they never, never admit that they are vulnerable. They never admit what their vulnerabilities are. I – I got to remind the listeners of something. You remember that scene in Lawrence of Arabia
when Lawrence's guide, the Bedouin guide, he took him into a water well that wasn't his or wasn't his tribes.
Thomas Small Oh, yes. When Omar Sharif arrives out of the mirage. The greatest entrance into cinema history.
Aimen Dean Yes.
Thomas Small The slow long shot as Omar Sharif, the handsomest actor in the history of the world, appears out of the sunrise. Amazing.
Aimen Dean And then, he shoots that Bedouin for drinking his water without permission.
Thomas Small Then, he shoots the Bedouin for drinking his water without his permission. You're saying this typifies the Arab mentality.
Aimen Dean Yes. Water is sacred. Water is our DNA. It's something really sacred. Every living thing is made out of water, according to the Qur'an.
Thomas Small Not just sacred. More importantly, in that part of the world, scarce.
Aimen Dean Scarce. Actually, we have more oil, you know, than water. Water is more expensive than Saudi Arabia than oil, you know. And that's saying something. That's why I remember, when I was going around in Scotland and seeing all of these rivers and lakes, saying, "Wow, if this wasn't Saudi Arabia, these people will be called Sheikh MacDonald or, you know, or Sheikh McLeish."
Thomas Small That reminds me of the scene in – in – in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, when Morgan Freeman's Moor character—. Obviously, he's Moroccan. He's not Saudi Arabian. But when he first sees a river running through an English, you know, in the English countryside and he says something like, "A paradise of this magnitude I never thought existed on earth." Just the sense of water.
Aimen Dean Exactly.
Thomas Small Of water and the greenness that it produces. It's very—. It's lodged very deep in the – in the heart of the Arabian imagination.
Aimen Dean Absolutely. And you threatened a Bedouin with his water, you will have to bear the consequences. You know, you do not threaten Bedouins with their water. It's simple as that.
Thomas Small So, you say that – that they didn't say this openly. They would never admit openly to – to this vulnerability. How do you know about it then?
Aimen Dean Well, I—.
Thomas Small Do people inside the kingdom talk about it quite openly?
Aimen Dean Well, not just only quite openly, but also, I had access, you know, to certain, you know, report that was written in October of 2014 by the Saudi intelligence, submitted to the Royal Court, which basically talks about the—. Not just only the water security, vulnerability, but the four vulnerabilities. So, if the listener thought that it was only water that actually pushed the Saudis to go to war in Yemen, you know, we are in for a surprise, because there are three other strategic vulnerabilities that the Saudis took into consideration when they went to war in Yemen.
Thomas Small Briefly.
Aimen Dean Food.
Thomas Small Food.
Aimen Dean Energy security.
Thomas Small Energy security.
Aimen Dean Mercantile security.
Thomas Small I see. So, basically, keeping trade routes open, keeping their people fed, keeping them watered, and keeping the lights on.
Aimen Dean Absolutely.
Thomas Small Now, for all of these reasons, Saudi Arabia did intervene in the Yemeni civil war. It has prosecuted that war for much longer than anyone expected. As a result, the Yemeni people are suffering to a great degree. Often, the blame for this is placed on the Saudis and the coalition. We hear about the worst famine in the last hundred years, millions and millions of children, starving to death diseases breaking out, not enough medicines. What – what lies behind this tragedy? I mean, is it the – the Saudi coalition that bears the brunt of the blame for this terrible, terrible humanitarian disaster?
Aimen Dean I think this has got all the ingredients of the perfect storm where you have an ideologically committed militia believing in, you know, messianic fairy tales, you know, effected them by Iran, deciding to take Yemen as a whole hostage, you know, on behalf of the Iranian grand scheme for the entire Middle East and threatening the water security, food security, energy security, and mercantile security of Saudi Arabia. And the Saudis basically were looking at the scenario. I'm thinking, "We are doomed if we act. We are doomed if we don't." It's a perfect catch-22 situation.
Thomas Small For the Saudis. But what about the Yemenis?
Aimen Dean For the Yemenis, they are being held hostage, as I said, by this ideologically committed militia who have taken over Yemen, even killed, you know, their ally, Ali Abdullah Saleh, just about a year ago.
Thomas Small Yes. In the end, Ali Abdullah Saleh did get it. He got it in the end.
Aimen Dean He got it in the end. That he handed over his country to a group of militia that are so merciless that they have killed him in three days after he betrayed them. And despite the fact he betrayed Saudi Arabia for three years, they did not even touch him. Saudi Arabia did not start to go after the Houthi leaders until they killed Saleh, because they have broken the cardinal rule of the Bedouin, you know, honourable style of war, which is basically you do not go after the leaders. But they did. They killed Saleh just three days after he switched back to aligning himself with the Saudis. Three days. So, for three years, the Saudis gave him, you know, some room for manoeuvre, hoping one day he will go back to his senses. But the Houthis did not. Within three days now.
Of course, why the war went wrong, you know, in Yemen, there are lots of reasons. But the first reason is that the Saudis are, one, not a great military power. It's a medium-sized power. And it's taking on a militia that is four times the size of the Taliban in Afghanistan. And the US with all its might, the UK, France, Germany, and other NATO countries, as well as the Afghan army, they were fighting the Taliban now for seventeen years in Afghanistan. And no are—. We are nowhere near an end. In fact, they fought—.
Thomas Small And now, we're in negotiations with the Taliban [unintelligible] in a power sharing agreement for the country.
Aimen Dean Absolutely. So, in a sense, if the Americans and the entire NATO coalition couldn't do it in Afghanistan, how could the Saudis basically be able to finish the war decisively?
Thomas Small Well, this is why people say, "Well, let's stop the war. Let's bring every—. Let's bring the Houthis these to the table. They have power on the ground. We have to respect that. They must participate in a power sharing arrangement."
Aimen Dean The Saudis will never agree to this for a very simple reason. If the Houthis where only after power, the Saudis would have basically struck a deal with them very, very long time ago, before even a war would have stopped it. Because the first recommendation of that report I was telling you about from October of 2014 was to negotiate with the Houthis and buy them off. No matter what the price is, whatever billions of dollars they demand buy them off. And the demand was very simple.
There are two strategic demands that the Saudis have for this war to end. The first one is that the Houthis must abandon access to the sea. So, they give up all the territories they have on the coast of Yemen. So, Saudi Arabia's food imports and oil exports and mercantile activities are no longer under threat in Bab-el-Mandeb Strait. The second strategic demand is that the Houthis give up any ballistic muscle with a capability of more than a hundred and twenty kilometres to a third party. They must give up their ballistic missile capability, which, by the way, the ballistic missile capability of al-Houthis, which is – which they are actually a non-state player, have better ballistic missiles in terms of range and in terms of power than the armies of Egypt and Turkey. And that's saying something.
Thomas Small Yes. I mean, I think it's very important for people to understand that when the Houthis captured the arsenal of Yemen, when they captured Yemen's arsenal of ballistic missiles, it was the first time that non-state actors—you know, like Hezbollah, like Hamas, like the Tamil Tigers, you name them—the first time that non-state actors had, under their control, such weaponry.
Aimen Dean Absolutely. It was scary.
Thomas Small It's a turning point in history.
Aimen Dean Absolutely. It's scary. And, you know, this shouldn't be tolerated. So, when people say, "Oh, they are a ragtag army of freedom fighters," no. No.
Thomas Small So, the Houthis refused. They—. the Saudis demanded that they – that they withdraw from the sea and that they hand over their arsenal of ballistic missiles to a third party. What does this tell you about their ultimate strategic aims and the extent to which they are part of Iranians larger aims?
Aimen Dean Because as far as Iran is concerned, you know, having a strategic edge over Saudi Arabia is what matters above everything else. And that's—.
Thomas Small Why? Why? Put us into the heads of – of – of the Ayatollahs and the Revolutionary Guard in Iran? What do they want? Because they are also enamoured of these prophetic apocalyptic dreams. They believe that, with the Iranian revolution and everything that's followed, the end of times has begun. The Mahdi is going to come. They are destined to conquer Jerusalem, Mecca, Medina. They have the same sort of scenario in mind.
Aimen Dean You know, I sat down in 2017 with an Iranian businessman living in Dubai who himself, until eight years ago, was one of the mid-ranking, ideologically-driven officers of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, IRGC.
Thomas Small What a dinner party. My goodness.
Aimen Dean Indeed. And it was in a very nice Iranian restaurant. By the way, I love Iranian food and music.
Thomas Small Oh, yes. It's very good. Oh, yes.
Aimen Dean You know, it's just like—. I don't like the Iranian regime, but that doesn't make – make me anti-Iranian.
Thomas Small Oh, no. Iran, what a wonderful country.
Aimen Dean Indeed. So, I sat down with him and I had this lengthy discussion. And he really told me, you know, some astonishing things. He said that "in the IRGC, we believe that Yemen—."
Thomas Small The IRGC, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, which is the military wing of the revolution.
Aimen Dean Yeah.
Thomas Small Both committed to making sure it succeeds inside Iran and also exporting it to other countries.
Aimen Dean Absolutely. He said that the prophecies of the Mahdi, the Shia Mahdi, indicate that we must be, in order for him to emerge, we must be primarily positioned in ideal strategic situations in Iraq, in Syria, and in Yemen. These are the prophecies. And by the way, I checked them. Actually, they are there in the, within the Shia, you know, religious narrative.
Thomas Small So, what did the Shia prophecies say? Why do they need to be in Yemen?
Aimen Dean Because the Mahdi could only emerge if his armies, his armies that he's going to lead to Mecca and Medina—.
Thomas Small Shia armies.
Aimen Dean Exactly. Are in Iraq, which is already happening; in Syria, already happening; and in Yemen, which is already happening.
Thomas Small So, they're making sure that the prophecies are coming true.
Aimen Dean Absolutely. The prophetic edge, you know, of the Iranian regime is always understated by Westerners, because Western analysts just—. They are always cynical themselves. So—. And they don't believe in prophecies or anything. So, they think the rest of the world don't. But this is the problem. You know, basically trying to understand the mentality of others through your own mentality is a trap. It will lead you nowhere. And that is why you need to understand the Iranian regime as an ideologically-driven, not a pragmatically driven regime.
Thomas Small So, as much as members of the Politburo in the Soviet Union believed in their heart of hearts that, imminently, the proletariat worldwide would rise up and destroy the bourgeoisie and usher in a period of millenarian peace and prosperity for everyone, the Iranian mullahs believe in their heart of hearts that, at any moment, because they've amassed these armies in these three countries, the Mahdi will return, and glorious future awaits for Shias.
Aimen Dean Absolutely. And so, if you look at the Houthis' brigades and their chanting, they always say, "[foreign language]," which is, like, you know, "We are there for you, Mahdi." This is their daily cries. And after this, when the Houthis took over Sanaa in September and October of 2014, what they were chanting on the street—. 'm going to repeat what they were saying, basically, in Yemeni accent. You know, they were saying, "[foreign language]." "I want my rights. I'm not afraid." From Sanaa to Taif. Taif is deep in Saudi Arabia. It is just next to Mecca, you know. And so, they are saying that they will reclaim the ancestral home of Yemen, which is going all the way basically to Mecca, which has even an exaggeration. So, in a sense, from the beginning, you know, they were a part of this pan-regional Iranian vision, imperial vision, and they are part of the extension of that vision. So, when they say, "We are not going to give up the ballistic missiles," what they mean is that "Iran is not letting us give up the ballistic missiles." When they say to the international community, "We are not giving up access to the sea even though it's not necessary," what they mean is that Iran is not letting them do so.
So, who's ultimately responsible for the suffering of the Yemeni people? The Houthis, because of these two simple demands. Simple for them, but strategically important for Saudi Arabia. Imagine—.
Thomas Small And for the world [crosstalk].
Aimen Dean And for the world. It's for wealth security. You know, people—. You know, for example, I'll give you an example, how, you know, the left and the human rights organisations in the West are so, you know, I would say, naive in the way they think about the war in Yemen, is that they always see it from the prism of, "Oh, people are suffering." I mean, of course, people suffer in war. But in war, there isn't just only one side that is wrong and one side that is right. There is—. It's a complex situation here. But if Saudi Arabia were to concede to al-Houthi and basically stopped the war on humanitarian ground without taking any important concessions, strategic concession from the Houthis, which means Iran, then they will put the entire global economic security at the mercy of Iran. And that is not something that need to happen. To give you an example why, you know, this is important: Boris Johnson, before he became—.
Thomas Small I did not expect Boris Johnson to come up.
Aimen Dean But I bring him up as an example of buffoonery, you know. Whether before on the right or on the left. He was vociferous in his opposition to the war in Yemen and to selling arms to the Saudis. Completely. Saying, "No way. We can't condone that." So, that's, before he became foreign secretary. The day he became foreign secretary, he was given a file containing all the facts I'm telling you about today, in this podcast, which tells him in clear terms that we are doomed if the Houthis were to prevail in Yemen. No matter what. Their win in Yemen is a loss to the entire international community. So, that is when he changed his tune completely and started defending weapon shipments to Saudi Arabia. Just—. Regardless of how he despised how the Saudis conducting the war, you know, we come back to the issue: Saudi is a medium-sized power without military experience, and they are not nation builders. But yet, upon their shoulders, rest this responsibility of ridding Yemen of this cancer called the Houthis.
Thomas Small Well, there you have it: the Yemen war through the eyes of Aimen Dean.
Aimen Dean And Thomas Small.
Thomas Small And Thomas Small. Though I – I just basically sit here slack-jawed, with – with my mouth gaping open, thinking, "Oh, my God." So, Iran's regional ambitions, empowered by their prophetic beliefs in the coming Mahdi, I think this is a nice place to stop today and to throw forward to our next episode, which will explain the very complicated tale of the sad killing fields of Syria.
This episode of Conflicted was produced by Jake Warren and Sandra Ferrari. Original music by Matt Huxley. If you want to hear more of Conflicted, make sure you search for us on Apple Podcasts or wherever you download yours.