Yemen war hinges on Saudi Arabia's 'pain tolerance', analyst says

Egypt's parliament is meeting to decide whether the country will formally support Saudi Arabia in its fight against Yemen's Ansar al-Houthis. On Saturday, Egypt's president, Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, asked parliament to approve his call to provide defensive aid. It comes after weeks of Houthi strikes targeting Saudi infrastructure, including multiple attacks on Riyadh's King Khalid Airport that killed at least 17 people. Talha Abdul-Razak is a Middle East security expert. He joins us now live from London. Good to have you with us, sir. If Egypt's parliament passes President Sisi's request, and of course if Saudi Arabia asks for assistance, what could Cairo realistically provide? Would it be air defence crews, fighter patrols, warships, boots on the ground? I really don't think that Saudi Arabia is necessarily going to request Egyptian assistance at this stage in any case um you know they haven't entered dire straits just yet um and uh what egypt could contribute and you know just kind of looking at it from an egyptian perspective as well the fact that President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said that he's going to refer this to parliament and you know see if they can approve his request um you know the political system in egypt is effectively Abdel Fattah al-Sisi if he decides that you know uh egyptian forces will be deployed in one way shape or form to Saudi Arabia or to the Red Sea then they will pass that measure however he can also use it to kind of pivot away and say well look parliament didn't approve it so therefore unfortunately I can't help you out should they deploy I imagine it would be with some assistance on the Red Sea because primarily if we look at the map of Houthi held territories on the northern border you've got a fairly hard border which is the Saudi Arabian border and then surrounding that is obviously uh presidential forces the yemeni presidential forces that is and then their only real supply lines are on the red sea so they've got the port of hodeidah and a few others um there's a huge amount of smuggling operations that goes on between uh the horn of africa and east african coast that basically passes through supplies and light arms and weapons and so forth and dual use equipment um to the houthis in yemen And this is largely coordinated with the Iranian IRGC, Quds Force. So on that basis, they're probably going to be more effective to assist the Royal Saudi Navy in a Red Sea blockade to ensure that those supplies can't get through. All right. Sisi says this would be a defensive mission if Egypt gets involved. Let's suppose for a moment that Saudi Arabia does ask for assistance. How clearly could that boundary be maintained if protecting Saudi Arabia requires striking launch sites inside Yemen? And what does this mean for the coalition, the defence partnership with with Turkia and Pakistan? I think primarily for the Saudi Arabians, if we're looking at homeland defence, then they are going to be looking at the Mecca Joint Defence Pact long before they look at Egypt. um you know this is something which is not uh you know people kind of are overblowing i think the egyptian role here um they may well get involved but like i said to you will be kind of like as an auxiliary uh involvement they'll be there kind of uh tacked on but if it came to homeland defense of saudi arabia and then pakistan and turkey will be the first port of call for the of uh purely because they have those mechanisms in place um but where the egyptians can help like i said is through patrolling the Red Sea, and also it impacts the Egyptians. Let's not forget, if the Houthis are blockading the Red Sea or they start threatening Bab al-Mandab, it means that shipping is going to struggle to get to and from the Suez Canal, which Egypt controls. That will have a knock-on effect on the Egyptian economy, and it will also reduce its prestige in standing. So that's why Sisi may want to get involved, rather than needing to intervene to save Saudi. You talk about maritime assistance. Saudi Arabia is intercepting missiles and drones, but attacks are still getting through and killing people. Where are the main weaknesses in its defences? Saudi Arabia is a massive territory. So when you're looking at something like that, and especially when you're looking at the kind of the history of the Saudi Arabian defence industry, unfortunately, it's only very recently that they've been really investing, you know, trying to look at Vision 2030 and having 50% of domestic defense products produced inside Saudi Arabia itself that wasn't the case previously and it's a slow grind you know these things take a lot of time to uh fire up essentially so Saudi Arabia has to basically cover a lot of space and um that requires a lot of interceptor missiles it requires kind of um you know various ranges of missiles as well so you've got the long range intermediate and uh and short range and these have to overlap and interlink and interlock with various radar systems to ensure decent coverage. But again, you could have the best system in the world. You're not going to stop every missile from getting through. So ultimately, how this is going to hinge this entire war, I think, is on Saudi Arabian pain tolerance. If they are able to absorb the blows that the Houthis are going to be sending their way by striking Saudi oil facilities and airports and so on, as we've seen them do, Saudi Arabia basically has to attrite them, they have to spend time ensuring that they are sufficiently pushing the presidential forces especially on the eastern axis coming from Ma'rib into Sana'a and then to ensure that they continue to bomb their fuel facilities their petroleum stores and this will attrite them, slow down the Houthis and perhaps open the door for further negotiations or even an end to the war on Saudi and Yemeni terms. Good to talk to you sir Many thanks indeed for being with us. Talha Abdulrazak there.