Regional and international competition in the Red Sea and its repercussions on Arab national security

The Red Sea is witnessing regional and international competition and a growing military and security presence of countries with conflicting interests. It is possible that the continuous growth in the size of the forces affiliated with those countries will lead to the outbreak of tensions that may develop into international and regional armed violence, resulting in conflict axes that attract the countries of the region, and it grows, during That is, the violence of national movements that reject the presence of external forces, violence related to identities and terrorism, and maritime crimes, such as piracy and armed robbery on ships, or patterns of transnational organized crime through the seas, which harm Arab national security, given the occurrence of a third of the countries of the Arab world, On the edges of the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, and one of the manifestations of that damage is the freezing of maritime traffic in Bab al-Mandab and the Suez Canal, which has serious repercussions on economic security, energy security, freedom of maritime navigation, and other issues under the concept of maritime security.
This paper monitors the current and expected threats to the security of the Red Sea, and examines their causes and ways to deal with them.

The Red Sea and Gulf of Aden regions are witnessing a new chapter of military and security competition between a group of major international powers and emerging regional powers, within the framework of international and regional transformations that would disrupt the military and security power equations, and the stability of political systems. Accordingly, this paper sheds light on the new contexts of military and security competition in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, to highlight the new features of this competition, its areas of concentration, its motives, and to identify the repercussions arising from it. So that the study begins with an explanation of the geographical and demographic characteristics, their importance and their military and security applications, to accommodate the trends and dimensions of the competitive interactions under study.

First: The geographical characteristics of the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden regions and their military and security importance

This axis reviews the most prominent features of the geographical and demographic characteristics of the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden regions, their military and security importance, and the relevant international and regional interests.

1. Geographical and demographic characteristics of the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden regions

Astronomically, the Red Sea is located between longitudes (°32-44) east of the Greenwich line, and between two latitudes (12°-30) north of the equator. The head of the Gulf of Aqaba, and its northwest end continues, bypassing the Suez Canal, to the Mediterranean Sea, and its southern end meets the Gulf of Aden, through the Bab al-Mandab Strait. As for the Gulf of Aden, it is located, astronomically, between longitude (°44-58) east of the Greenwich line, and between two latitudes (°47-°12) north of the equator. The Gulf represents an extension of the Red Sea, on the water range extending from Bab al-Mandab to the drawn line, figuratively speaking, between Ras Asir in the northern coastal part of Somalia, and between Ras Baghashwa, in the Al-Dis district, in the Yemeni governorate of Hadramout (1) . There are those who expand its scope to become its eastern borders at Ras Fartak, in the Yemeni Governorate of Al-Mahra (2) .

On the banks of the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, the continents of Africa and Asia meet through nine countries, five of which are on the African bank: Egypt, Sudan (in the north), Eritrea, Djibouti, and Somalia. Four countries are located on the Asian bank: Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Israel (occupied Palestine), the total population of these countries is about 232 million. The Red Sea extends for about 1,200 miles, or about 1,900 km, while its maximum width is about 190 miles, between the Massawa coast in Eritrea and Jizan coast in Saudi Arabia, and the least width is about 40 miles, between Assab in Eritrea and Mocha in Yemen (3) . The greatest depth in it is about (2200 m), at the latitude (22°) north (4) , and it decreases in the south, to about (140 m), near Bab al-Mandab (5). Arab countries account for most of the coasts of the Red Sea; It is about (4,938 km), not counting the coasts of Israel (occupied Palestine) on the Gulf of Aqaba, and the coasts of Eritrea. As for the coasts of the Gulf of Aden, they are shared by Yemen by about (1,690 km), including the coasts of the Socotra archipelago, which are about 490 km long, according to those who count them within the Gulf of Aden, followed by Somalia (1,300 km), and then about 340 km for Djibouti (6) .

Three waterways are located in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden: the Bab al-Mandab Strait, the Suez Canal, and the Strait of Tiran, south of the Gulf of Aqaba. And there are hundreds of islands and archipelagos, namely: the islands of Tiran and Sanafir, south of the Gulf of Aqaba, the island of Mayun (Brim) in Bab al-Mandab, and the Socotra archipelago, south of the Gulf of Aden. As for the ports, the most prominent of them are the port of Djibouti, the port of Aden (Yemen), the Islamic port of Jeddah (Saudi Arabia), the port of Ain Sukhna (Egypt), the port of Port Sudan (Sudan), the port of Assab (Eritrea), the port of Aqaba (Jordan), and the port of Eilat (Israel). . The following table includes a number of demographic variables for the countries of the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, until the end of 2022 (7) .

2. The military and security importance of the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden

According to the theory of the Heart of the Earth, by the British scientist Halford Mackinder, the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden are located within the Arab region that connects, by land, the northern heart with the southern heart of the island of the world (8) . The importance of maritime connectivity is reflected in the role of the Bab al-Mandab Strait and the Suez Canal, as two maritime communication gates, for the easy transition between the south and north of the globe. Each of them played crucial roles, during many internal and international tensions and wars, whether by restricting and stopping the movement of warships and commercial ships, or facilitating their access to the areas of these tensions and wars, which was evident in the closure of the Suez Canal during the Arab-Israeli wars between 1967-1973, It was not opened until 1975; In 1973, the Egyptian Navy imposed control of Bab al-Mandeb, in cooperation with the naval forces in the northern and southern parts of Yemen, at the time, preventing Israeli ships from crossing (9). In contrast, the United States of America, and European countries, took advantage of their influence to enable their war fleets to pass safely through the Suez Canal and Bab al-Mandab, during its war on Iraq, in 1991, after its invasion of Kuwait, on August 2, 1990, and in the American invasion of Somalia, in 1993, Afghanistan in 2001, then Iraq, again, in 2003.

Also, the military and security importance of the role of islands and archipelagos, as one of the main pillars of maritime security and maritime safety, by hosting a number of them lighthouses for guiding ships, such as the Yemeni islands in the Red Sea, including: Mayun (Brim), Zuqar, and Hunaish al-Soghra , Uqban, Abu Ali, Zubair, and Kamran (10) . The role played by military garrisons on the islands in addressing the activities of transnational organized crime groups through the seas, such as: smuggling and illegal trafficking in weapons, drugs and people, in addition to combating piracy on ships and terrorist groups, and the role played by garrisons traditional security.

The proximity of a number of islands and archipelagos of the Red Sea, and the Gulf of Aden, to maritime jams, or to the mainland, achieves current and future military and security opportunities, the first of which is the control of navigation, in any circumstance, and the industrial linkage between them, and through them, with the mainland, on the Asian sides This issue was raised, but from an economic point of view, in what was called the City of Light, during the first decade of this century, regarding the connection between the island of Mayon (Brim) and the mainland of Djibouti, at a distance of about 20 miles, and the link between the islands of Tiran and the mainland of Egypt, In Sharm El-Sheikh, about 8-10 miles away, and with the mainland of Saudi Arabia in Tabuk (11) .

Second: Military and security competition in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden

In this axis, the new angles of military and security rivalry are highlighted, in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden.

1. The emerging manifestations of competition and its areas of concentration

These manifestations appear in the following contexts:

• Naval Security Alliances

In a military and security precedent, in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, the United States of America revealed, in April 2022, the formation of the Combined Maritime Forces 153 (CTF 153), as the fourth division of the so-called Combined Maritime Forces (CMF), Which includes, besides, “Combined Task Force 150” 150 CTF, “Combined Task Force 151” 151 CTF, and “Combined Task Force 152” 152 CTF.

According to what was announced, the division is responsible for maintaining maritime security and building the capabilities of countries, in direct cooperation with the “Combined Task Force 151” CTF 151, whose naval units are deployed in the Gulf of Aden and off the coast of Somalia. USS Mount Whitney (LCC 20). Among the participating countries is Britain, as well as Egypt, which is participating in the F 911 (Alexandria) frigate; This comes after it joined the CMF in April 2021, occupying the 34th rank among the member states (12) .

It is worth noting that the CMF coalition is multinational, consisting of 34 countries, whose participating ships are tasked with enhancing security, stability and prosperity in about 3.2 million square miles, of the waters of the high seas, including the most important shipping lanes, in the western Indian Ocean region (13 ) . The following figure includes the parties to this alliance, and the theater of its operations:

Figure: The States Parties to the Combined Maritime Forces Alliance and its theater of operations

It is noticeable in this alliance the absence of superpowers, such as: Russia, China, and other countries that shore its theater of operations, such as: India, Iran, Oman, Somalia, Djibouti, Eritrea, Sudan, and the African countries located in the western Indian Ocean, which indicates a conflict of interests with them. Or the feeling of a military threat, even though the declared activity of the coalition is to combat non-traditional threats, and the absence of other countries may be due to the weakness of their naval military capabilities and the internal crises they face.

In the same direction, the Council of Arab and African States bordering the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, whose establishment was announced in Riyadh in January 2020, is a new regional security attempt to create a non-traditional, competing security alliance that plays a part of the security of the Red Sea and Gulf Aden (14) . However, this council, two years after its establishment, did not go beyond its theoretical formulation to effective practice. Therefore, countries from it continued to reinforce pre-existing cooperative frameworks, such as the “Red Wave” exercise, the fifth of which was carried out at the end of May 2022, with the participation of six countries: Jordan, Djibouti, Saudi Arabia, Sudan and Egypt , and Yemen (15) .

As part of a joint military and security action, the Israeli navy carried out, during the years 2021-2022, joint exercises with the Fifth Fleet of the United States of America, deep in the Red Sea, and this expanded to include the UAE and Bahrain, as parties to the Abrahamic Agreement that they signed, along with Israel, In September 2021 (16) . It seems that these exercises constitute a collective activity that compensates Israel for the state of isolation it faces in the Red Sea, and presents it within alternative and equivalent alliances, from the same fabric that includes the maritime alliances in the region.

• local agents

Armed conflicts on the banks of the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden have produced numerous violent groups, states contesting their functions on the ground and monopolizing force, while at the same time mortgaging themselves with external forces that share interests and hostility to opponents, as represented by the current situation in Somalia and Yemen, but the situation in Yemen seems more clearly. The war in which the Arab coalition has been involved and funded since March 2015 has produced a three-variable equation for the internal local agents who control the country, especially the coastal areas, and behind them are the external supporters: the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and Iran (17) . These areas have become relatively stable, to ensure the interests of the supporters, and to provide security and safety for the corresponding maritime center through which energy shipments and supply chains flow between East and West; The conflict has been pushed into the interior since the signing of the Stockholm Agreement between the Yemeni government and the Houthis, in December 2018.

The influence of the UAE agents is concentrated on the western coast of the country (the Tihama coast), between the Bab al-Mandab strait and the city of al-Khokha, north of the port of Mocha, through a group of powerful armed formations that include the National Resistance Forces (the Republic’s Guards and the Tihama Resistance), and the rest of the giant brigades that restored Its position at the end of 2021. These forces have been strengthened with many elements to advance their roles, by sea and land, by building the capabilities of the Coast Guard, establishing a new airstrip in the city (port) of Mokha, and developing its port (18) . A number of islands near Bab al-Mandab have taken centers for military logistical support for the Emirates, such as Mayon Island (Brim), which has developed its infrastructure to receive and house aircraft and warships (19).. As for the coastal region extending between the Bab al-Mandab Strait and the neighboring Mahra Governorate of the Sultanate of Oman, including the Socotra Archipelago, it is shared by the UAE and Saudi agents, with limited government influence. These agents are at the forefront of the (separatist) Southern Transitional Council, through its armed formations.

With regard to Iran, the coastal sector subject to its proxies, the Houthis, extends, in the north, from the Khokha area to the southern outskirts of the Midi region, southwest of Hajjah Governorate, including three ports: Al-Hudaydah, Al-Salif, and Ras Issa, which was the subject of the Stockholm Agreement, In 2018, a major role in creating this situation, and then the repositioning process carried out by the Giants Brigades, in 2021 reinforced that (20) .

As for the third variable in the influence equation in the western coastal region, it is represented by the Saudi agents whose forces are stationed north of Hodeidah, between Midi, which includes a small port, up to the land-sea border with Saudi Arabia itself, at the season area, including the islands in front of it, which is an area of ​​influence A small navy, compared to the areas of influence of Iranian and UAE proxies, but it represents a defensive land barrier against Houthi threats to Saudi lands and maritime interests.

• The evolution of military and security competition

Aspects of this development appear in the joint training performance, in the Red Sea, between Israel and an Arab duo, namely: the UAE and Bahrain, and this is not without sending strong messages to Iran, which is penetrating the region, through its self-existence or through the Houthis, and its quest for a critical approach to Israel And Saudi Arabia, and direct friction with the US Navy. The incident reveals an attempt by the Revolutionary Guards Navy to seize, in September 2022, two unmanned Saildrone Explorer boats belonging to the US Fifth Fleet; That Iran has become a strong and capable peer, and that the United States of America has introduced these boats, in an unprecedented manner, as part of a new strategy to publish a large group of them, entrusted with collecting information (21) .

In this context, Iran revealed a new role for the naval forces of its armed forces, played by the 83rd Naval Group, which includes a number of destroyers, and that it has a tendency to support it with unmanned aircraft (22) . According to this trend, it is not excluded that it will be provided with unmanned surface and submersible boats, especially since the Houthis, supported by Iran, used unmanned surface boats, during the last years of the war, which supports the role and activity of the Behshad ship, anchored off the Eritrean coast, succeeding The ship “Saviz”, which played an intelligence role during the period (2016-2021), and left its position after being subjected to a bomb attack in April 2021 (23) .

2. Emerging drivers of military and security competition

The motives of military and security competition between the great powers represent an extension of the behavior of the colonial countries, and this is currently reinforced by new motives, unique to these powers, and other motives that they share with rising regional allies, which we highlight as follows:

• The escalation of the military presence against the United States of America and its allies

The US and its allies’ responses to Iran’s military presence beyond the Arabian Sea embody concern about Iran’s expansionist behavior. The mutual attacks on ships, their harassment, or piracy on them, expressed the common language between Iran and its opponents regarding this presence, and even pushed each of them to throw its weight in this confrontation. The cause of this concern was the statements of military commanders in the Iranian navy, regarding their country’s aspiration to achieve a permanent military presence in the Red Sea, by including it within the Iranian navy’s patrol areas on the high seas (24) . This was reinforced by Iran’s request to the International Maritime Organization, in March 2021, to classify the Red Sea as a high-risk marine area, to justify its military presence that it aspires to (25) .

It appears that the formation of the CTF 153 by the United States of America represented a hostile response to this endeavor, not to mention Iran’s association with the Houthis, who, in January 2022, seized the Emirati ship “Rawabi” while transporting medical equipment. Saudi Arabia, from the Yemeni island of Socotra to the Saudi port of Jizan (26) . US officials have stated that the formation of this force aims to thwart Iran’s smuggling of its weapons to the Houthis and other regional actors of violence (27) . Naturally, this includes monitoring all threats, including the naval mines that the Houthis emit off the Yemeni coast, threatening civilian and military maritime navigation.

On the part of Russia, its signing with Sudan of an agreement to establish a naval military logistical support center, at the Flamingo base, Port Sudan, raised great concern for the United States of America and its Western allies, against the background of the role of the Soviet Union before 1991, and Sudan denied it, in October 2022 Any Russian military presence on its territory (28) .

For the United States of America, the growing Chinese military presence represents a danger hidden behind China’s economic activity in the region, threatening its interests and alliances there, even though China justifies its military presence to curb unconventional threats. There is no doubt that China’s military presence is linked to its economic agenda, especially its Belt and Road initiative (One Belt – One Road), of which the region’s ports are one of its pillars (29) . It seems that what reinforces the American belief in the Chinese military danger is the continued flow of Chinese warships to the Gulf of Aden, since 2008, and their increase during the period (2020-2022), in light of its possession of a large military base in Djibouti (30) .

• Growing security concerns and regional political crises

After years of decline in piracy activity on ships, which was a pretext for the presence of foreign fleets in the Gulf of Aden, incidents that posed a direct threat to commercial ships and maritime traffic increased between 2019-2020, accompanied by smuggling and trafficking in drugs, weapons, and people, And commercial goods, keeping pace with regional crises and transformations, topped by the Yemen war that broke out in 2015, then the fall of the regime of President Omar al-Bashir in Sudan in 2019, and the subsequent internal turmoil, the complexity of the Renaissance Dam crisis between Egypt and Ethiopia, and the outbreak of conflict between the latter and the Tigray rebels. , in November 2020, which necessitated the need for weapons, precise military techniques, mercenaries, terrorists, and money, as well as drugs, which represent an abundant source of funding, and evidence of this is the many naval objections carried out by the international naval forces against smuggling ships, in Arabian Sea and Gulf of Aden (31). And less than that in the Red Sea, where the Sudanese navy, off the coast of the country, thwarted the smuggling of a shipment of light weapons and various ammunitions, at the end of September 2022 (32) .

In the context of two dimensions, traditional and unconventional security, the Renaissance Dam crisis prompted both Egypt and Ethiopia to approach Bab al-Mandab, especially Ethiopia, which is a landlocked country, and it is persevering to bridge this gap, by establishing a naval military base, or logistical support centers in Eritrea, or Sudan, or Djibouti, and it was achieved only in the latter, at the end of 2019 (33) On the other hand, Egypt established, in its southern strategic direction, the Berenice Military Base, southeast of the Red Sea Governorate, and opened it in January 2020, and at the time At the same time, Egypt is still making unremitting efforts to establish a military base in Djibouti (34) .

The Iranian-backed Houthis’ seizure of power in Yemen in 2014, was of great concern to Saudi Arabia. As Iran has become indirectly close to it, Saudi Arabia has positioned itself as the leadership of the so-called Arab coalition to support the legitimate government in Yemen, and during the past eight years of the war, Iran has gradually approached Saudi Arabia, and the depth of the conflict between the two countries has been revealed. From the same entrance, the UAE worked to confront Iran, according to calculations related to their dispute over the islands of Greater and Lesser Tunbs, and Abu Musa Island; Its membership in this coalition has gained it a military foothold in the Eritrean port of Assab, which was used to support the operations of the Arab coalition (35) . Then it expanded in the Somali cities of Bosaso and Berbera, and the Yemeni island of Mayun (Brim), after withdrawing parts of its military base in Massawa, in early 2021 (36) .

Third: The repercussions of military and security competition in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden

The most prominent of these repercussions are as follows:

• political repercussions

On the grounds that the competition in the military and security presence, with its various actors, south of the Red Sea, whether in a stable country like Djibouti, or a turbulent country like Yemen, is related to the agendas of these actors that could affect the unity and safety of these countries and others, including their political systems Reviving ethnic and separatist identities and tendencies, and supporting them, militarily and politically, as the case in Yemen, which may not go back to its predecessor before the outbreak of the current war in 2015 (37) . The division threatens it, by separating its south from its north, and dividing the south into states, with which it loses control over the most important islands, such as Socotra and Mayon (Brim), which are currently facing this situation. The success of this agenda in Yemen may have an echo among the advocates of partition in the neighboring Arab and African countries, given the availability of auxiliary factors.

• Military and security repercussions

The continuous growth in the size of the forces of the competing countries could lead to the outbreak of tensions that may develop into international and regional armed violence, resulting in axes of conflict that attract the countries of the region to which the countries of the region are drawn. And maritime crimes, such as piracy and armed robbery on ships, or patterns of transnational organized crime through the seas, and the danger of this violence increases with the expected weakness in the military and security capabilities of the countries of the region, which are basically weak, and the failure of development programs that support security and stability (38) .

Arab national security is the first affected by this competition, given that a third of the Arab countries are located on the edges of the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, and the large-scale international violence that may result from the competition, freezing maritime traffic in Bab al-Mandab and the Suez Canal, and the dangerous repercussions On economic security, energy security, freedom of navigation, and other issues under the concept of maritime security (39) .

Conclusion

The military and security competition of the great powers in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden is seen as an extension of their old colonial ambitions, but in new forms created by security concerns and political crises whose repercussions affected the interests of these powers, and emerging regional powers allied with them, or brought together by frameworks of common interests , and other forces that conflict with it, and these concerns and crises were topped by the activities of transnational organized crime through the seas, piracy on ships, the activities of terrorist groups, the Renaissance Dam crisis between Egypt and Ethiopia, and the Yemeni war, in which conflicting international and regional actors stormed, such as: the United States The United States of America, China, Israel, Saudi Arabia, the Emirates, and Iran, and thus the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden became a medium for soft and violent interactions between these parties, in various fields and tools.

The repercussions of this competition were manifested in the political, military and security fields, which would undermine states, their ruling regimes, their political independence, and weaken their armies and internal security forces in the face of threats arising from violent groups, and their reflection on global security issues, such as: the security of energy flows and energy chains supply, and maritime security.

About the author

Ali gold

Researcher specializing in military and strategic affairs. He holds a PhD in Maritime Transport Technology, Maritime Security and Safety, and Security Strategy in the Western Indian Ocean and Gulf of Aden.REFERENCE

1. Tim R. McClanahan, Charles RC Cheppard, David Obura, “The Coral Reefs of the Indian Ocean; Their Ecology and Conservation”, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000), p.263.
2. Simon C. Wilson, Rebecca Klaus, “The Gulf of Aden”, (2000), chapter 56, p.49.
3. Salah al-Din Hafez, “The Great Powers’ Struggle over the Horn of Africa” ​​(Kuwait: The National Council for Arts, Culture and Letters, 1982), p. 58.
4. Rifaat Al-Gohary, “The Coral Coast and the Red Sea Desert” (Cairo: National Publishing House, 1964), p. 35.
5. Hussein Ali Al-Hubaishi, “Yemen and the Red Sea, Location and Location” (Beirut: Dar Al-Fikr Contemporary, 1992), p. 33.
6. Wilson and Klaus, p49
7. The data received are estimated and variable, and some of them differ from what was stated in the text, to express the border problems existing between countries. See: World Bank, 2022, access 23/10/2022, at: https://bit.ly/3N25hV6 ; Global Firepower, 2022, access 23/10/2022, at: https://bit.ly/2MVStAA.   ;
8. See: Ali Ahmed Haroun, “The Foundations of Political Geography” (Cairo: Dar al-Fikr al-Arabi, 1998), pp. 325-326.
9. Ali El-Din Hilal, “Arab Security and the Strategic Conflict in the Red Sea Region,” Al-Dara, No. 2 (January, 1981), p. 55; Qusay Saleh Shabib, “The Importance of the Bab al-Mandab Strait in Modern and Contemporary History” (Sana’a: Yemeni Studies and Research Center, 1994), p. 132.
10. Ali Hamid Sharaf, “Yemeni Islands and Lighthouses in the Red Sea, Gulf of Aden, Arabian Sea”, 3rd Edition (Sana’a: Moral Guidance Department Press, 2002), pp. 83-97.
11. The Red Sea (Bab Al-Mandeb to Suez Canal), Dryad Global, 2/6/2022, access 11/9/2022, at: https://bit.ly/3tLu7js.
12. Combined Task Force 153 Operations, “U.S. Central Command”, 20/4/2022, access 11/10/2022, at: https://bit.ly/3egA6rZ.
13. Combined Maritime Forces (CMF), “A 34- Nation Naval Partnership”, 2022, access 28/9/2022, at: https://bit.ly/3xXytpY.
14. Ashraf Al-Esawy, Council of Arab and African States bordering the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden: Opportunities and Challenges, Trends for Research and Consulting, (no date), (entry date: September 25, 2022), at: https://bit.ly/3aJsgFq
15. The first exercise of it (Red Wave 1) was launched at the end of December 2018. It was noted that Eritrea was absent, as usual, from most security initiatives, while Somalia attributed its absence to the repercussions of its political conflicts and their repercussions on its naval military capabilities.
16. US-Israeli-Emirati-Bahraini exercises in the Red Sea, Al-Arabiya, November 11, 2021, (entry date: October 22, 2022), at: https://bit.ly/3N84n9w
17. On spheres of influence and their armed formations, see: Ali al-Dhahab, “The map of the armed formations affiliated with the Emirates in Yemen and their military and political influence,” Al Jazeera Center for Studies, January 24, 2019, (access date: September 28, 2022), at: https: //bit.ly/3TrAp2j
18. Mayor of Taiz, Yemen, announces the establishment of a new airport in the city of Mocha, Arabi 21, September 21, 2022, (entry date: October 16, 2022), at:   https://bit.ly/3D6UiF3
19. Secret sea air base built on strategic island off Yemen coast, TRTWORLD, 15/3/2021, access 22/10/2022, at: https://bit.ly/3swVQU4.
20. Ali al-Dhahab, “Withdrawal of the Joint Forces from the West Coast of Yemen: Military Dimensions and Political Repercussions,” Al Jazeera Center for Studies, December 6, 2021, (access date: October 15, 2022), at: https://bit.ly /3rUoz4Q
21. Iran forced to return US sail drones seized at sea for second time, The Guardian, 2/9/2022, access 26/9/2022, at: https://bit.ly/3MkVgC3.
22. Iranian destroyer group present in the Red Sea, RT (Arabic), August 21, 2022, (access date: October 12, 2022), at: https://bit.ly/3CI3eSr
23. Iran Quietly Replaced ‘Saviz’ Spy Ship in Red Sea, Dryad Global, 20/8/2021, access 27/9/2022, at: https://bit.ly/3b4l9ri.
24. This Presence Will Continue Forever’: An Assessment of Iranian Naval Capabilities in the Red Sea, CIMSEC, 5/4/2017, access 24/10/2022, at: https://bit.ly/3UqI7Kz  
25. IMO Council Members (2022-2023), International Maritime Organization (IMO), 15/12/2021, access 16/10/2022, at: https://bit.ly/3T9vnHV  
26. Security Council condemns Houthis’ holding of UAE flagged ship, Saudi Gazette, 15/1/2022, access 24/9/2022, at: https://bit.ly/3MATpsF.
27. Washington forms a new force to stop arms smuggling to the Houthis, DW (Deutsche Welle), April 13, 2022, (date of entry: October 26, 2022), at: https://bit.ly/3SMUM9d
28. Exclusively, “Al-Arabiya” tours the controversial Flamingo military base in Port Sudan, Al-Arabiya, September 16, 2022, (date of entry: October 17, 2022), at: https://bit.ly/3T8T6rt  ;
29. Zach Ferten, “Great Power Rivalries in the Red Sea: China’s Experience in Djibouti and Implications for the United States,” Brookings, June 2020, (accessed October 16, 2022), at: https://brook.gs /3CMvLFg
30. China sends a new naval fleet to the Gulf of Aden and the waters off Somalia on an escort mission, China Through Arab Eyes, March 28, 2020, (entry date: October 15, 2022), at: https://bit.ly/3MFcXfN
31. Group of Experts on Yemen, “Final Report of the Group of Experts on Yemen for 2020, Security Council, Ref. 79/2021S, (25 January 2021), pp. 29-37.
32. The Sudanese army thwarts an attempt to smuggle weapons and explosives at the hands of Yemenis, Al Jazeera Mubasher, September 25, 2022, (entry date: October 16, 2022), at: https://bit.ly/3MHdfCI
33. Ahmed Gomaa, Ethiopia’s plan to build Red Sea military bases fuels tension with Egypt, Al-Monitor, 9/6/2021, access (27/9/2022), at: athttps://bit.ly/3IOhESA
34. Hatem Sadek, Opinion| Egyptian President Al-Sisi’s visit to Djibouti and Ethiopia’s isolation, daily news, 9/6/2021, access 23/9/2022, at: https://bit.ly/3uR58f6
35. Group of Experts on Yemen, “Final Report of the Group of Experts on Yemen for 2017,” Security Council, Ref. 68/2018/S, (January 26, 2018), pp. 20-22.
36. Goma, Ethiopia’s plan to build Red Sea military bases fuels tension
37. Group of Experts on Yemen, “Final Report of the Group of Experts on Yemen for 2017, Security Council, Ref. 68/2018S, (January 26, 2018), p. 9.
38. This was evident in Somalia, and the withdrawal of US forces in 1993.
39. Safwat Sadiq El-Deeb, Gamal Salama Ali, and Nibal Ezz El-Din Jamil, “International and Regional Variables, and Their Impact on the Security of the Red Sea,” Journal of Political and Economic Studies, Faculty of Politics and Economics, Suez University, No. 3, Year 3, (May, 2022), pp. 132-165.