Russia and China sided with the Houthis

The hijacked Greek tanker was transported to Bandar Abbas, Iran. The results of the US and UK attack against the Houthis are impressive – Saudi Arabia and China call for “restraint” Russia demanded the convening of the UN General Assembly.

Russia took a clear position in support of the militias Houthiwho control Yemen and condemned the US and UK air and sea raids, accusing Washington and London of violating international law as defined by the UN Charter!

Russia is on the side of the Houthis for the first time, and this is disadvantageous for the attackers, since it means that Russia will “revenge” the West’s help to Ukraine and the “bloodletting” they inflicted on the Russians by supporting the Zelensky regime.

And Russia can easily maintain a balance by excluding its strategic allies in the region, Saudi Arabia and the UAE, from attacks Houthis, but by supporting them against the USA and Great Britain!

🚨🇷🇺🇺🇸 RUSSIA has called for an EMERGENCY SESSION of the United Nations Security Council.

Russia believes the US & UK BOMBINGS in YEMEN is a violation of the United Nations Charter. pic.twitter.com/x6chVfs4Xe

— Jackson Hinkle 🇺🇸 (@jacksonhinklle) January 12, 2024

The Chinese authorities are calling to prevent an escalation of the situation in the Red Sea after US and British strikes on Houthi positions in Yemen, the Global Times reports, citing Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Mao Ning. “China is concerned about the rising tensions in the Red Sea. (…) We urge those involved to remain calm and exercise restraint to prevent the conflict from expanding,” Mao Ning said at a press conference on Friday.

Greek tanker “St NIKOLAS”, owned by shipowner Stamatis Molaris (Empire Navigation), which flies the flag of the Marshall Islands, captured 11 January by Iranian security forces with 19 sailors (18 Filipinos and one Greek), transferred to the Bandar Abbas anchorage in Iran.

USA “give up” and said they could do nothing to free the crew, who are accused of illegally transporting oil to the United States. This is the same ship that was previously seized… by the United States, on charges of transporting Iranian oil, and delivered to the United States, where the oil was transshipped to American refineries. Now it was transporting oil to the US, and the Iranians say they just got back the oil that belongs to them!

Those in the know are not optimistic about the quick repatriation of the crew (19 people), based on experience capture of two other tankers about two years ago, also by the Iranians, when the crews of the ships spent more than 6 months in Iranian captivity. It should be noted that in previous days the tanker was loaded with oil in Basra (Iraq) with the intended destination of Alia (Turkey) via the Suez Canal. The charterer of the vessel is Tupras.

Shiite Houthi rebels in Yemen who have vowed to respond airstrikes, struck at their positions by the US and UK overnight, have developed their military capabilities to include ballistic and cruise missiles, as well as attack drones and reconnaissance UAVs.

And neutralizing them, of course, will not be easy. Yemen is a big country, the Houthis have been fighting in their own environment for a long time, Iranian help is a given, and they have accumulated a large number of weapons systems. And of course, as we noted in the previous report, “absorbency” Houthi strikes are high, as was seen in the war against Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Bahrain.

In addition, Ukraine has set new standards in terms of the force’s ability to cope with such attacks, especially since it does not have ground forces that could take advantage of air strikes.

Ballistic missiles

The Houthis have Iranian Typhoon missiles in their arsenal, a modified version of the Iranian Qadr ballistic missile with a range of 1,600 to 1,900 kilometers, explains Fabian Hinz, a weapons expert at the International Institute for Strategic Studies. In tests conducted by Iran in 2016, these missiles hit targets at a distance of 1,400 kilometers.

Mohamed Albasha, an expert at Navanti Group, located near Washington, explains that the rebels introduced Typhonn just weeks before the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7.

Cruise missiles

Rebels in Yemen, who control much of the northern part of the country, also have modified versions of Iran’s Qods cruise missiles, Hintz said. Their range is about 1,650 kilometers.

In 2022, the Houthis announced that their Qods had hit oil facilities in Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates, located 1,126 kilometers north of Yemen. These missiles have already been used by the Houthis to attack targets in Saudi Arabia. The Emirates and Saudi Arabia are part of a military coalition that has supported the Yemeni government against the Houthis since 2015.

The rebels say they make their own drones, but experts say they use Iranian components that they illegally import.

In addition, the Houthis have attack drones Shahid-136, with a flight range of 2000 kilometers, illogical to those that Russia uses in the war against Ukraine, emphasizes Fabian Hinz. They also have a Samad-3 UAV in their arsenal, which can carry explosives weighing 18 kilograms and have a flight range of about 1,600 kilometers. These drones have already been used to strike the Emirates and Saudi Arabia during a three-year war in which Saudi troops and the Emiratis were never victorious.

In addition, it is no coincidence that Saudi Arabia announced today that “concern” is monitoring developments in neighboring Yemen and has called for “restraint” following early morning US and UK missile strikes against Houthi rebels. “The Kingdom is following with concern military operations in the Red Sea and attacks on a number of targets in Yemen,” – says a press release from the Saudi Foreign Ministry, which calls for “restraint” and believes that “escalation should be avoided”.

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