r/news • u/ThePensiveE • 1d ago
Soft paywall Iran-backed Houthis reach Yemen's Dhubab on Bab el-Mandeb Strait, sources say
https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/iran-backed-houthis-reach-yemens-dhubab-bab-el-mandeb-strait-sources-say-2026-09-11/195
u/Responsible-Bunch316 1d ago
Starting to seem like attacking Iran should've required a higher threshold than "Bibi said so".
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u/somewhat_brave 22h ago
And yet they didn't do anything until after we attacked them.
Is the plan to attack every single country that could have any sort of leverage over the US in the future?
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u/MobileArtist1371 19h ago
Phew! Good thing no critical thoughts were put in your comment so it will be allowed to stay up!
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u/Responsible-Bunch316 22h ago
They literally agreed not to make nukes and submitted to regular inspections of their nuclear program. Bibi said they were building nukes decades ago and the nukes never appeared. The same way Bush's "weapons of mass destruction" never appeared. To take these claims at face value is immensely naive, especially when the consequences of believing them includes just shrugging your shoulders at an entire school of children being bombed to smithereens.
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u/barbieq68 23h ago
Please don't talk about critical thought when they were on the precipice of revolting against their government on their own before this shit. We could've potentially had improved relations with Iran for free and no oil problems had we not bombed school children.
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u/Old_Gimlet_Eye 14h ago
By that same logic every country on earth should be attacking the United States. Actually, now that I've said it...
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u/ArcanumAntares 23h ago edited 19h ago
Pincer move on the vulnerable coast complete: the entire strait is now under threat/control by a localized, unified entity that is hostile to western interests.
This was a foreseeable outcome.
The Saudis may continue to refuse taking military action, while expecting the US to perform that work to re-establish partial control of the strait. The Saudis will bleed money with the straight locked down, as their exports to western nations will not be allowed transit. Western nations reliant on oil and other materials transiting through the straight will suffer shortages unless/until transit fee agreements can be made with the new governing body who controls the strait. Any such agreements will increase the cost of transit through the strait, which will increase the cost of those commodities being transported through the straight.
Let's switch to renewable energy. Fuck oil.
EDIT: Strikes on the Saudi east-west oil pipeline are tied to this action, and will serve to strengthen the negotiating position of those who control the strait while simultaneously hitting Saudi oil revenues hard and significantly increasing the cost of transited commodities.
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u/Responsible-Corgi-61 15h ago
Saudi Arabia is basically a US oil company. The troops they employ are a mercenary army that have as much dedication to their job as the average person in your town working at a grocery store. They are not putting their lives on the line to fight revolutionaries.
The fact the Houthis took so much land and a fucking island in 24 hours is insane and really shows how weak the Saudi military is. The US has no options here. Bombing them does nothing historically.
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u/ArcanumAntares 14h ago
Yep. The deal was: oil, lots of oil, at a great price, in exchange for military hardware and protection.
Current US administration is disrupting that agreement, though it's possible that a certain $2bln USD payout was an exchange for nuclear technology, and the agreement has been verbally adjusted.
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u/Dark_Mak__r 1d ago
Well, this is too much complicated. Though houthis usually do offence and go back as holding is much more difficult due to saudi, but if they hold on. Its a big win for iran and a big L for trump. Though trump won’t mind.
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u/Ven18 1d ago
Wouldn’t this mean there is no over sea route to ship oil out of the Middle East? That would be catastrophic and strangle the global oil supply.
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u/withinallreason 1d ago
Not "none", as the routes around Africa still exist. However, commercial traffic and oil traffic gain about 1-2 weeks of travel time going around Africa instead of through the Suez depending on destination, so its a major business expense that will raise prices tremendously.
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u/RedTulkas 1d ago
you cant ship around africa if you cant get to the open ocean
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u/murakumotsurugi 1d ago
Can just go through suez
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u/rodsteel2005 1d ago
The largest tankers can’t get through Suez full. The Suez Canal is shallow, and they could only get through if they are half empty. Better than nothing, but…
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u/MoesOtherBar 21h ago
They have an offloading system in place for that so ships offload, it's pipes to the other side and ships then reload.
Extra time and cost tho.
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u/Responsible-Corgi-61 15h ago
The alternative route still has ships routing to ports that Iran and the Houthis can still strike. There are also limits to the size of what can move around Africa so you can't even move the same volume anymore through the Suez.
This is just a death blow to global shipping. There is no way this does not end in an economic crash at this point.
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u/DerekB52 13h ago
Yeah, the world is set to have some major problems at this rate. Personally, as an american, I think one of the best things we could do is see Europe and other powers sanction the fuck out of the US until we pull out of Iran. We(people who like the current world order) need the Strait of Hormuz opened ASAP.
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u/new_account_wh0_dis 1d ago
I imagine they just go through the suez? They probably already do if the destination is Europe no?
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u/goldstar971 1d ago
How do you get to the suez? All the terminals for unloading oil are in range of the places the houhis have seized.
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u/Mythosaurus 1d ago
You just… go if you aren’t an Israeli, Saudi, or US ship?
Accept that the US/ Trump shit their brains out and are no longer a safe empire to work with. Maybe there will now be tolls on both straits until the US admits defeat, and price that into your budget.
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u/Serious_Swan_2371 1d ago
The houthis were already attacking western ships and at war with the saudis for years before the Iran war started
I hardly think this is directly caused by Trump, it’s been a goal of the Houthis to use their proximity to shipping lanes to hurt the western economies for many years
You can blame him for Hormuz maybe, but it’s pretty much as bad from an American perspective for oil to be traded in yuan as it is for us to not get oil. Both mean a swift end to the inflated standard of living Americans have enjoyed and total Chinese military dominance over the eastern hemisphere (excluding Russia and India who are big enough to make threatening them a real headache).
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u/naijaboiler 1d ago
well except now they have stronger Iran backing to that, and are able to see Iran as a working prototype of what they can do
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u/Serious_Swan_2371 1d ago
Iran was funding them well before the war, also funding Hamas.
That’s a part of the reason Israel and the USA attacked Iran, they had been funding proxies to attack Israel and Saudi Arabia.
If anything I’d say the west’s inability to crush Hamas and the Houthis is what gave Iran the confidence to really fight them. They were testing the waters by funding these groups for years to see how the U.S. would react.
Exactly the same as how Russia tested the waters by taking Crimea. When they weren’t met with force by the west, they realized they could try and take all of Ukraine if they wanted.
The thing they weren’t expecting was for Ukrainians to really stand up and fight, and for the US to give so many weapons to Ukraine.
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u/tb30k 1d ago
But Iran has been giving them drone and missle tech and haven't before. They are not a Iranian puppet but Iran has made them super strong
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u/Serious_Swan_2371 1d ago
They are most definitely an Iranian puppet. They would not exist without Iran funding them.
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u/CryOld2986 1d ago
It won’t last. Saudi has been holding back this whole time, they seem to be done playing nice.
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u/Drekkful 1d ago
The Saudi’s are idiot manchildren who hire foreign armies and mercenaries because their own population hates them with a seething passion, so they cannot dare to arm them.
Unfortunately for them all of their oil production and transit capacity has been destroyed so they have such little cash flow that they can’t purchase military strength and are just getting decimated by super hardened houthis who are the arab peninsula equivalent of afghan mountain fighters.
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u/ProductIntegortion 1d ago
What are they going to do? They're not going in with ground troops. Their weapons all come from the US and we've catastrophically depleted our own stocks because of the dumbfuck's Iran war, so we can't resupply them with long range munitions.
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u/Dark_Mak__r 1d ago
Yup saudi has only airstrike options. They have to keep lot of missiles stored as usa can still attack iran and war can resume. So saudi will just ve doing airstrikes, and as houthis have no plans to invade saudi, it is unlikely pakistan or turkey will help them in this.
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u/CryOld2986 1d ago
Ground troops are absolutely an option. It’s been on the table the whole time, they likely just brought it upon themselves. Saudi is not a democracy where combat losses are a problem for leadership and the Houthis are nowhere near as well armed or strategically prepared, nor do they have a huge population supporting them.
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u/THR 1d ago
They’ve already proven themselves ineffective at ground operations. So it’s a poor option.
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u/RimjobEnjoyerX 1d ago
That's rather unfair to use the expendable, underequipped, African mercenaries and yemeni proxies that the Saudis employ for this conflict as a marker on the fitness of the Saudi ground forces.
As far as I am aware they have not deployed any meaningful size of troops.
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u/goldstar971 1d ago
The saudi military is hilariously clown shoes. The Saudi armed forces are not going to attempt an amphibious operation to dislodge the Houhis
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u/613codyrex 1d ago edited 1d ago
Whatever the saudis are metaphorically holding back, they would have used it since 2014 when they first got involved with the Yemeni civil war.
And unlike with Iran, the GCC hasn’t had to be gentle with Yemen considering how many civilians the GCC has killed in their 10 year operation in the country.
There is no secret weapon or new capability that’s hidden in anyone’s back pocket. The US has depleted its own armaments and have been shipping whatever extra replenishment to Israel for their defense. Whatever weapons and resources that the GCC use on Yemen will not be replaced.
The euros also attempted to dislodge and protect shipping along with the US and it did nothing.
So it’s not only just countries with trophy wives style militaries like the GCC but ones that should have on paper be more effective failing at dealing with Yemen even with the disregard for casualties that they (US, Israel and Europe) usually do.
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u/TheBigCore 19h ago
Trump is the "gift" that keeps on giving.
Everything he touches becomes a catastrophe.
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u/DistanceToEmpty 21h ago
Up next: Iran closes the strait of Malacca while INDOPACCOM's resources are tied up in the ArabianAmerican Gulf
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u/TransitoryFeel 1d ago
Bill Murray will reprise his role in a new screwball comedy "What About Bab el-Mandeb?"
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u/Responsible-Corgi-61 15h ago
You think you are still going to the theater months after this? You are going be busy with hours long fuel lines fist fighting two-tooth, meth-head Tony for the last gallon of gas at the station. Oh buddy, you have a rosy outlook of your future!
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u/TransitoryFeel 15h ago
Baby steps to the gas station....baby steps to the grocery store...baby steps....
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u/Hidalgo321 1d ago
I understand like 5 words in this headline
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u/NinjaOdd1098 1d ago edited 1d ago
I was gonna be snarky and say “well good thing there’s an article linked” but the article doesn’t really say a whole lot either lol
Editing to link an article with more detail: https://www.nbcnews.com/world/middle-east/houthis-control-bab-el-mandeb-yemen-red-sea-saudi-iran-war-oil-rcna597186
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u/hutsunuwu 1d ago
Iran now controls both the bab el mendab and the hormuz straits with physical control. Its an absolute disaster for the trump regime and for Saudi Arabia
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u/F00dBasics 1d ago
Exactly correct. What makes this a headache to shipping companies is that do you take the risk and go through the straight and possibly get attacked by Iranian backed houthis or do you take the much more expensive and longer trip going around the tip of S. Africa.
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u/reflect-the-sun 1h ago
It's almost like you're not ashamed of your ignorance.
This is how trump came to power.
Read a book so the rest of us don't have to live with your stupid decisions.
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u/marcopaulodirect 17h ago
Why have I never seen a picture of a Houthi?
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u/TotalBismuth 15h ago
World likes to pretend they’re just a rebel group but they control all the significant territory of Yemen and are pretty much the new government.
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u/NRCS_DRONE 1d ago
The only nation this war IS NOT destabilizing is Iran. All others are ripe for revolution. i.e. our dictator 'allies'
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u/Brent_the_Ent 17h ago
It would take you about 5mins with google to realize the situation on the ground in Iran is desperate. The country’s civilian sector is in crisis, and its economy and civil stability will continue to decline
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u/Previous-Height4237 3h ago
We are trying to embargo and sanction them just like NK and Cuba. Both of which after 60 years are still going.
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u/Brent_the_Ent 2h ago
Thats not the problem, the problem is they have zero oil revenue, their leadership has been decimated, the civilian government has no legitimacy or power, and the bombings themselves did 100s of billions of dollars in damage. Had we hit their power grid and utilities with the same aggression that russia hits ukraines they would be facing total societal collapse. But sure, keep glazing Iran
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1d ago
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u/ThePensiveE 1d ago
If nuclear obliteration is the counter for everything then what would be concerning since we could destroy the world 10x over?
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u/GloryofSatan1994 1d ago
One submarine using conventional weapons is not going to solve anything...
You're also not military lmao.
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u/COINTELPROfessionals 1d ago
" You are not military I can see that now."
Levels of cringe I thought impossible mere seconds ago.
Love how the US always gets their asses kicked then says 'bro but I have something else that would have really worked, bro!'
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u/ThePensiveE 1d ago
The Virginia and Los Angeles class submarines have Tomahawks and Harpoons. The converted Ohio class can carry I believe ~154 Tomahawks.
With conventional warheads that does not destroy the nation of Yemen, and the Tomahawks aren't even a unique platform to submarines so I really don't think you know what you're talking about.
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u/goldstar971 1d ago
Cruise missiles launched from subs are literally no different from cruise missiles launched from land and what did years if hitting the houhis with cruise missiles accomplish? Oh, nothing?
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u/wjfox2009 1d ago
If both straits are closed (Hormuz and this), expect oil to reach $120-130 or more.