Tag: Houthis

Oilpocalypse Incoming

On July 25, 2026

So, it seems that Ansar-Allah (the Houthis) struck an oil refinery in Jizan, Saudi Arabia. They also took a shot at a refinery in Yanbu, apparently intercepted by a battery the Greeks had there (what?)

Anyway, this is getting real. Between the Ukrainian strikes on Russian refineries, which have been very successful, Iranians hits, and now the Houthis, I don’t see how we avoid serious shortages. It’s the refineries that matter most: crude is worthless without refineries and they’re expensive, take a long time to build and aren’t always easy to repair, depending on what exactly got hit.

I also don’t see how we avoid massive famines and increased food prices in places that don’t have a formal famine. A lot of fertilizer runs from oil thru refineries.

The irony here (conspiracy theorists of elite intentions to depopulate the world, here you go) that Trump confirmed he OK’d the Saudi strike on the Houthi airport which set Ansar-Allah off. They’ve closed the strait and they’re going right for the jugular vein with these refinery strikes. If they keep shooting, the missiles will get thru. The defenders have to be lucky every time, they only have to be lucky on occasion.

Beans and rice. If you need distillates like diesel or motor oil, stock up now. It’s hard to stock up on medicine, but a lot also used petrochemicals, so do what you can: even simple things like aspirin are included.

Anyway, I don’t think Trump is together enough to have a diabolical super villain plan. To the extent he can plan at all, it’s about his next corrupt scam or bribe. But it amounts to the same thing in the end.

It’s hard to overstate how much this will destroy all goodwill for America in the globe. I mean all of it. Everyone knows the US started the war and refuses to stop it, whatever their reasons are. And when people can’t eat, the hatred will be immense. Iran will catch some backlash, but most people get that they’re defending themselves.

Empires end ugly and stupid. The rule of incompetence in late Imperial rulership maintains its record. I expected stupid, but it’s still flabbergasting to witness late Imperial Roman levels of moronitude.

Amazing.

Amazing is not a synonym for good.

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Every Administration Since Obama Has Been Bombing Yemen, Yet…

By Ian Welsh

On March 17, 2025

24 Comments

Something similar could be said about almost all Western policies except those which make the rich richer. “Is the policy working? No. Are we going to continue? Yes.”

Here’s the thing, AnsarAllah is the only nation in the world taking military action to try and stop the Israeli genocide of Palestinians. During the ceasefire, they stopped attacking ships trading with Israel. When Israel cut off all food and aid, they gave Israel four days warning: restore the aid or we start the attacks again.

Then they did, and then Trump figured that he’d start bombing Yemen again, which won’t do a damn thing except kill a few more people. The Yemenis genuinely don’t give a fuck, they’ve been bombed to hell and back again for the better part of two decades. Unless someone wants to invade and occupy the country, which would take troops in the six figures, I’d guess, there isn’t a damn thing military force will accomplish.

It is tiresome to keep saying this, but Israel, with the full support of many countries, including Britain, Germany and most importantly America (and my own nation, Canada, not that our help amounts to anything) is committing red letter genocide. There is no question about this, it is not “complicated” and there is no possibility of being a moral person, or even not a complete fucking waste of human skin, if you support genocide.

As for Yemen and AnsarAllah, they appear to be the only nation in the world which is fully moral in this respect, and the only nation in the world fully living up to the requirement for nations to actively try and stop genocide. There isn’t much that they can do, given their geography (though they’ve said that if other nations are willing to let their troops thru, they’ll send them, and I believe them) but what they can do, they are doing.

The Biden administration tried to bribe them. They offered full removal of sanctions, recognition of AnsarAllah and lots of money. Yemen refused.

I’m not even close to AnsarAllah ideologically, but I am reluctantly forced to say that I admire them and Yemen more than any other country in the world for the uncompromising refusal to look the other way and do nothing when there is something they can do.

As for the West, with a few exceptions like Ireland and Spain, we have proved ourselves irredeemably evil, not so much because we refuse to act against Israel, but because we actively help this genocide along. We have no moral figleafs left, we are revealed to the world for the monsters we are.

Perhaps China has done nothing, but at least they aren’t sending Israel weapons, and they have the bare decency to deplore the genocide. We can’t even manage that, but instead are arresting those who dare stand up and even say “genocide is bad.”

Pathetic.

Let us hope there is no just God. If there is, let us tremble for our nations.

Update:

The U.S. Navy has used more missiles for air defense since combat operations in the Red Sea began in October 2023 than the service used in all the years since Operation Desert Storm in the 1990s…

… the Navy will need years to replenish its supply of missiles…

…The Navy also revealed in January that it had fired 160 rounds from ships’ five-inch main guns as part of combat operations in the Red Sea. Those main gun rounds have been used to destroy Houthi drones, Clark said.

“They have been using guns to shoot down drones lately,” Clark said.

Not only are the 5-inch rounds less expensive than missiles, but the Houthi drones often fly too low or too close to the ship to be hit with missiles, Clark said.

“What often happens is these really small drones get close enough to where the missile can’t really engage in time, because the missile has a minimum range, also,” Clark said.

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