African Ports Overwhelmed by Red Sea Reroutings
gcaptain.com
gcaptain.com
> Maersk said vessels routed around the Cape will as far as possible try to fuel at origin or destination.
> “In case there is a need for bunkering en route, it would be decided on a case by case basis with Walvis Bay (Namibia) or Port Louis (Mauritius) being the top options,” a spokesperson said.
I grew up in Walvis Bay and back then I could cycle from one end to the other in well under 30min. Last census says 62k pop.
The government isn't really in a good place to capitalise on this, they recently signed a deal with DP World to operate part of the Dar es Salaam port. Sentiment on the deal has been pretty negative (massive understatement of the year, no official polls but anecdotally, everyone was pretty pissed with it). https://www.ft.com/content/f5776df5-9375-438f-bbeb-bc7e8c296...
Considering this existing agreement, the murky dealings surrounding it, the circumstances we found out about it (it was leaked). I don't see them seeking anyone's attention, or even making a show of the increased burden to show that DP World or other "investors" are needed.
Pointing this out because some of the comments read as bafflement over their organization and equipment. They are not a rag tag collection of villagers who decided pirating is the best path forward. They are often trained military.
They “exert de facto authority over the bulk of North Yemen” [1]. The problem is there is no single person who controls their armed groups. So striking a deal with one person provides zero assurance around what the others will do.
[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Houthi_movement#Houthi-contr...
How do they get money for arms? Where do the arms come from? Why is the government unable to exert any realistic control within their own borders?
I know its a complex political problem, but I still don't get how in 2023 we still have warlords and quasi-states like this.
Is the government of Yemen so incompetent they can't exert any control over these areas? I would believe that, to be honest. I'm simply baffled is all.
In the Houthi's case, they're a clan.
The entire clan pitched in because they were persecuted under Saleh - businessmen, service men, low level govenenent officials, etc.
Familial and Clan traditons are still a thing.
That said, at some point, you expect things to normalize, because fundamentally people should be conflict adverse, however, it seems this region has an unusually high rate of conflicts that aren't strictly due to massive government failing in succession, since it appears Middle Eastern governments have been in power a long time (thus, can establish a relative order) but seem unable to control their own country within their own borders still. Which i suppose is indeed government failure, just of a different nature than one would typically imagine (IE, losing total control)
They happen in every culture or society where family ties matter.
For example, Guangdong's rise in electronics assembly thanks to Cantonese business families in Malaysia, Thailand, and Singapore investing in Taiwan and then co-investing in Guangdong.
> it appears Middle Eastern governments have been in power a long time
Most are stable. Aside from Libya, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, and Yemen they are humming along.
> people should be conflict adverse
People are conflict adverse.
The issue is a states like Yemen, Syria, and Iraq just straight up imploded and collapsed, so people reverted to family relations.
If you ever wondered what the world would look like after the apocalypse, it doesn't look like Fallout or The Last of Us - it looks like Yemen, Syria, Nepal, Myanmar, Afghanistan, Lebanon, etc
Cantonese business families (eg. Shiniwatra/Qiu) in Thailand/HK/SG/MY investing in factories in Guangdong
Hokkien business families (eg. Tan Kah Kee, like the chem building at UC Berkeley by Evan's Hall) in SG/MY investing in Taiwan and then coinvesting with Taiwanese in Guangdong
Teochew business families (eg. Chearavanont/Xie, Li Ka Shing, etc) in TH/SG/MY investing in Guangdong
I think that most W.E.I.R.D. (Western) people don't realize how much the rest of the world (for better or worse) still runs on kin-based rules. Good book going over the strangeness of the 'Western' world in many respects:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_WEIRDest_People_in_the_Wor...
* https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/10/joseph-...
Clans as a societal unit was a thing in the West as well. For example, it was a major reason for the Jacobite Rebellion in Scotland in 1745, the Irish independence movement was organized thanks to the clan system in the 19th and early 20th century, etc.
Clans as a societal unit disappeared in Western Europe when the Nuclear Family became the primary unit around the 19th-20th century
There used to be two Yemens caught between the Ottomans and the British. The North became an independent kingdom and then a republic, while the South was first a British protectorate and then a communist state. Both had civil wars, and there were at least two wars between the two. When communism fell in Europe, the two Yemens unified and had a civil war. Then there were a couple of decades of uneasy peace before the current war.
Aden Colony was it's own thing until the emergency. Basically an middle eastern Hong Kong or Singapore
The southern Emirates were their own thing until the late 60s
Hadhramut was it's own protectorate until 1967.
North Yemen (where the Houthis are from) was in the midst of a civil war between Commies and Zaidis. The Commies won, but the Zaidis got the last laugh by overthrowing Saleh and starting the Houthi movement.
Every "country" was once like this, it was the norm not the exception. Look at Feudal Japan for example. The nation-state is a modern invention (it's a social construct with associated institutions to enforce it) that requires a bunch of preconditions that obviously aren't going to hold up if you apply enough stress. It doesn't help that the national boundaries of many countries in the Middle East were drawn up arbitrarily after the fall of the Ottoman Empire. These aren't naturally emerging countries. They're arbitrary borders that contain warring tribes within those borders. Such as the Kurds who are split up among 3 countries.
The global reality is no government on earth can control a majority of the population without their consent.
Every aspect of government control relies humans, and if they refuse to participate, you need other humans to make them.
They're primarily a clan/tribe - al-Houthi.
It's fairly organized like other clan systems. The issue is they don't want to negotiate. They have bad blood stretching from the Saleh government and even earlier - the same way how Daesh is able to hold Deir ez-Zur because of Al-Bakr support.
Embedded with foreign fighters. (EDIT: Nvm.)
The Houthi movement isn't a pan-International Shia movement like Liwa Fateymoun, Liwa Zainebiyoun, Hezbollah, etc.
Zaidis are technically Shia, but also base it on ethnic and familial ties.
As ships can't be anonymous (both on ownership and journey), this reduce the intelligence work to 0 by "hostile" entities. This would not have been possible if privacy was the default as their options will be reduced to a full blockade.
Houthis have a request - food/water for Gaza - but Israel says no so the rest of the world has to suffer.
Or can they lead to another global wave of supply-chain disruptions, like the those we experienced during the pandemic?
There's lots of evidence that the pandemic's supply-chain disruptions triggered inflation, and we're still fighting it.
I'm not looking for predictions. I'm more interested in an informed assessment of the risks.
They have a webinar about it. Ryan (@typesfast) has also been tweeting about it a bunch.
Reading between the lines, my take-away is:
Both shipping times and costs are rising.
It’s usually positively correlated. Longer shipping time means more demands for ships and there aren’t unlimited amount of ships.
Source: used to work in the policy space
No evidence of this discrimination. That’s a big part of the problem.
The only reason to not consider it an act of war is to avoid recognizing their legitimacy as a governing force.
Sure. Then they hit a Norwegian tanker carrying biofuel to Italy [1]. Then another Norwegian ship [2].
[1] https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/cruise-missile-yem...
[2] https://www.cnn.com/2023/12/18/politics/uss-carney-red-sea/i...
https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/cruise-missile-yem....
What you’ve got is independent militant groups firing off while a rear PR group tries to project control.
https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/ukmto-ambrey-repor...
Houthi spokesperson Yahya Sarea identified the vessels as the MSC Clara and Norwegian-owned Swan Atlantic, and said the attacks were carried out after their crews failed to respond to calls from the group.
If they suspect a ship is headed to Israel, they attack it, with military equipment they (most likely) got from Iran.
Right, which is a touch broader than “targeting Israeli ships.”
(It’s also convenient retcon. Where would I go next…paperwork wasn’t promptly provided? Paperwork appeared forged? We thought they were lying?)
What's the greater leap, them assuming that silence was unacceptable and therefore likely headed to Israel, or that they're taking random, unpredictable pot shots and their actual agenda isn't related to Israel at all?
The point is their behaviour isn’t predictable. Which means you can’t make a deal. (To say nothing of there being nobody to negotiate with, nor enforce the terms of a deal ex post facto.)
Put another way, nobody has a monopoly on violence on the Yemeni coast. Before we start discussing legalistic concepts like a treaty, someone needs to seize that monopoly.
Why do you think we moved a carrier strike group to the Strait of Hormuz before sailing it to Yemen [1]?
[1] https://www.navytimes.com/news/your-navy/2023/11/27/ike-carr...
We are threatening to shut the Strait. We sailed a CVN to Hormuz to telegraph two can tango.
> US is currently 5-10 years behind in weapons technology
Compared to Iran?!
We’re literally liquidating their newest air-defence systems with 90s-era kit in Ukraine.
> War with iran will be as historically significant as the sacking of rome on our own economy and global reputation
This is stupid. We could topple Tehran with de minimis force reduction from offshore. We might lose some ships, which would be a high cost, but nothing catastrophic.
The catastrophe would be the power vacuum that follows. Which is why nobody is threatening total war with Iran.
Great, we’ve devolved into generic ad hominem.
> the f35 launched late and still has kinks
Like every new platform, including our adversaries’. They are more than enough to SEAD Iran from BVR, even OTH. I would be shocked if more than a handful were lost in such a strike.
> we have no hypersonic weapons or defense against them
Usually war is hypothetical. In this case, we have modern Russian cruise missiles being shot down by decades-old Patriot batteries.
Hypersonics are largely a farce, but to the extent they’re being pursued, we have more programmes in development than Russia and China combined. And neither has demonstrated missile-defence piercing capability. (Even if they did, there aren’t enough to be a strategic issue.)
> wargames the US has held shows us losing
Yeah, if we try a ground invasion. Nobody suggested that. Nobody even suggested the decapitation I mooted. You’re multiple straw men deep.
American military supremacy is undisputed even by our adversaries. In a 1:1 conflict, we win. Not always, but certainly right now. We’re so overwhelmingly powerful it makes us arrogant, which leads to the very real risk of spreading ourselves thin. We probably can’t support a proxy war in Ukraine, Israel and Yemen while also fighting China around Taiwan. But engaging with any two of those alone? Mindblowingly easily.
> the rise of brics
Another vein of idiocy.
> regional war where we are being shot at from every direction
Welcome to the Middle East.
> the collapse of the currency
Let me guess, to be replaced by Bitcoin or a currency jointly managed by countries currently at war with one another.
They’ve also stated they’re targeting Israeli ships. There is no evidence any single person has control over their various armed groups.
The United States will enforce a ceasefire? Because that’s what this practically requires.
In reality, SC is voting on a “stripped-down draft resolution [that] calls for an increase in humanitarian aid but does not include a call for a cessation of hostilities, which had been unacceptable to the US” [1].
[1] https://www.ft.com/content/488f70b7-d6cc-458d-b90e-f89cdfd65...
Here’s a link to another index that tracks prices. Not sure if it’s a good one for this purpose — there are many others.
https://www.drewry.co.uk/supply-chain-advisors/world-contain...
Oh well, good old America has to save capitalism, yet again :)
Chinese/US trade mostly just goes directly across the Pacific.
Multipolar world my ass.
I feel like you're maybe trying to make a different point but avoiding saying it?
No, they frequently support violence when it’s internal suppression. They also support violence for e.g. taking Taiwan.
The simple answer is China can have its cake and eat it too, so why not.
I'm not sure what you're saying in your last paragraph. China have worked consistently with SA and Yemen to try to facilitate peace talks. They were opposed to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. They are opposed to Israeli aggression.
China invaded and annexed Nepal (EDIT: Tibet). They’re also prominently involved in Central Asian and African politics.
> not sure what you're saying in your last paragraph
China depends on Middle Eastern oil. The Strait of Hormuz and Bab-el-Mandab closing pose an existential crisis to it. Letting America deal with the problem lets Beijing focus on messaging.
I'm not sure I agree with your last point. It feels like you're assuming that the American solution is necessary or the only way. As I said above, other actors may see it differently.
> feels like you're assuming that the American solution is necessary or the only way
No. I think a regional solution would be better. But Riyadh and Abu Dhabi are constrained by domestic politics, and everyone else with militaries in the region is an ally who would expect America to take lead or a competing oil exporter.
If the US and others weren't actively arming the Saudis then a regional solution might be easier to find.
It’s a system problem that America didn’t start. Pulling the plug on Riyadh and Jerusalem would likely lead to their collapse, plunging the region into decades of anarchy.
Amusing since most of the arms are from US manufacturers.
Iran and Russia are pumping massive quantities of armament into the region.
If by a 'stone throw', you mean 'across the entire African continent' then yes.
Pull up a map.
No, we’d much rather the Saudis and Emiratis get their shit together.
CN-EU gets hurt by this. And also ME oil going to Eastern US.
Their demands were simply to restore full humanitarian aid (no bombing aid trucks!) or a ceasefire. Much easier than spending hundreds of millions in escorting every tanker headed to Suez.
People lived in ghettos and were executed before. I guess it depends how you define Holocaust tho
True. I think it’s most broadly held as the industrial liquidation of the Jewish people (alongside other undesirables). Everything else was sadly precedented.
Ffs, can we have someone defending Arab interests who doesn’t pivot to de facto defending the literal Nazis?
Nobody claimed we did!
I don't know why the Western media insists on giving them this name. Hussein al-Houthi was a Houthi, but most of his supporters are not. Would you call all Barak Obama supporters "Obamas"?
If they engaged in a rebellion under his leadership/memory separately from the rest of the Democrats, we probably would.
Not really, but if they were referred to as “Obamites” it wouldn’t be that jarring.
Are they referred to by something different in Arabic-language media?
I could give examples for and against every single one of those entities. This is very much a matter of perspective - and everyone thinks he was reasonable from his own perspective.
The US has created significant ill will trying to control the middle east, and there are consequences for continuing this path. You think we can solve this problem with more fighting, you dont think that will cause more problems?
Norway also failed to hold the various parties that came to agreements in Oslo. Not that they had to, but it would’ve been nice to get the mediator on the record of what the agreement was and how it actually played out.
In Middle East, any given actor hates most other Middle Eastern actors. Hate is not in short supply there.
I'm not certain that the people living there agree. From their perspective they bled, got betrayed, and had their entire region royally fucked over for decades.
To them we are no different from an authoritarian regime. They don't get to vote in our elections.
Maybe if the west simply kept their promises a lot of this could have been avoided. "Diplomacy" is pretty hard now, given that our word isn't worth the paper it's written on.
Russia never getting a friendly welcome from the rest of europe after the collapse of the soviet union has to try to work with the only other neighbors they have, and havent had nearly as many problems and incurring far less wrath from the arab world as we have.
Chinas MO is not to start wars, and to date has not started one, they try to capture countries with debt financing. Depending on whether these debts become exogenous and tools to control the political leadership, as is the case with the US, China too may face these problems, but does not currently.
We created what iran is today, and we feed it with every sanction, intentionally.
This is not to say that there are not valid criticisms of US actions. But the Arab world deserves more criticism than it typically gets.
I'm open to the "glass houses" take where people should be careful leveling criticism. I have a hard time seeing how this puts any of the terrorist organizations in a position that they are putting on a good display.
The US, EU, etc don't have a "moral" leg to stand on when it's always a colonialist attitude they have over this region.
One of the ways we improved was an honest assessment of our faults. Not perfectly honest, but we have been improving. Much of the rest of the world powers blatantly lie on their morality. Shamefully so.
Just remember that gunpowder is part of life too
Their demands and intentions are quite clear and solely focused on Israeli-bound ships, although it does seem like this is giving them more leverage with respect to Yemen's agenda which has seen years of war from US-Saudi aggression.
https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2023/12/22/beyond-gaza-ho...
Their actions haven't been, though.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Houthi_involvement_in_the_2023...
> On 12 December 2023, the Houthis launched an anti-ship cruise missile attack against the Norwegian commercial ship Strinda, an oil and chemical tanker operated by the J. Ludwig Mowinckels Rederi company, while it was close to the Bab-el-Mandeb. The Strinda was on its way from Malaysia to Italy (via the Suez Canal). The attack caused a fire aboard the ship; no crew members were injured. The ship was carrying cargo of palm oil. The French Armed Forces Ministry and U.S. Department of Defense reported that the Languedoc shot down a drone targeted at the Strinda, and the USS Mason also rendered aid. The Houthi attack on the Strinda was an expansion of its series of attacks against maritime shipping in the strait; the Houthis began to attack commercial vessels without any discernible tie to Israel.
Several more attacks since then, on ships with nothing to do with Israel.
It’s effectively a shut down of trade to make _basically everyone_ hurt until the world forces the US to stop vetoing UNSC resolutions.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._Ludwig_Mowinckels_Rederi doesn't say anything along those lines.
Nah it’s a different story
https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/news/2023/12/12/tanker-attacke...
1. God is the Greatest
2. Death to America
3. Death to Israel
4. A Curse Upon the Jews
5. Victory to Islam
I'm curious what makes you want to ignore it?
Commenter you’re responding to was arguing we should have left the Nazis alone in another thread [1]. Some combination of kneejerk anti-American sentiment, a belief that every problem can be solved over a dining table and/or trolling.
But even dropping dead collectively, how can I make sure all my people get a curse and America is dead too?
We don’t need to kill them. But it’s naive to think appeasement will work with folks calling for the destruction of an entire people.
I suppose if I’m going to complain about us having to learn this lesson time and again, I should learn that well-meaning but tragically-naïve people will keep trying it, time and again. (Appeasement isn’t always irrational [1]. But only if done for force conservation, not out of misguided humanitarianism.)
The former calls the latter naïve, the latter calls the former bellicose, they could well be both wrong. Maybe bin laden did just hate us, and maybe that doesnt matter, because his little empire was built on a different message that he could convince people it was worth dying for.
In Dying to Win: The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism, Robert Pape shows that all suicide bombings from 1980 to 2005 were the result of a people being occupied. I am not convinced that anyone actually wants conflict, not once theyve seen it and are subject to it at least, unless there is a direct incentive. You might think these people wont stop until they are dead or accomplish their most hardline public talking points, but I find it far more likely that theyd rather be home with their kids than out in the field guarding an unguardable missile launcher.
These aren’t suicide bombings. They’re helicopter-assisted seizures and anti-ship missile attacks.
> I find it far more likely that theyd rather be home with their kids than out in the field guarding an unguardable missile launcher
So would have many Nazis.
For what it’s worth, I don’t think the Houthis are evil. Their domestic war is entirely justified. Escalating to a regional conflict probably wasn’t their idea; the instructions came from Tehran.
We don’t fight to kill evil people, we fight to achieve objectives. Within the narrow scope of reopening the Bab-el-Mandab, negotiating isn’t an option because there is no single group who control all the Houthis’ armed forces except Tehran, and Tehran isn’t offering terms.
Look, just, for a second consider that you are treating iran as a bogeyman, they gave us intelligence on al queda after 9/11, they held a candlelight vigil in tehran for the victims. How much do you really know about iran? Are you really so confident that you understand everything thats happened there? How well, are you confident enough to get people killed over it?
I’m not. I’m treating them as a decision maker who won’t negotiate. Which they are. That leaves few options for a quick resolution outside military ones.
> Are you really so confident that you understand everything thats happened there?
Compared to the guy defending the Nazis, yes.
More, this completely ignores all other suicidal activities. Cults that lead people to suicide. Bullied people that are driven to suicide. Etc.
Seems far more explanatory power can be found if you use indoctrination as the primary driver in such activities. If you manage to indoctrinate people that their life would be best spent by sacrificing it for others, and a valid sacrifice is to strap a bomb to their body, then you will see a rise in that activity.
Just like the war on Nazis, some wars have to be fought, especially if your goal is to save lives.
The commenter you’re responding to would have preferred we’d let the Nazis do their thing [1].
Straw man. Also, in the 1940s. We condemn them for it. Very different from saying we should have let them be today, with the benefit of hindsight.
> believe it far more likely that you would come to their defense than I
Says the person who already has.