Preet Bharara:

From CAFE and the Vox Media Podcast Network, this is Stay Tuned in Brief, I’m Preet Bharara. Over the last few weeks, the US and UK conducted military strikes in Yemen after repeated attacks by a group called the Houthis on US allied ships in the Red Sea. The operations are part of a more widespread escalation in the Middle East since the onset of the Israel-Hamas War. Yemen has been embroiled in a decade-long civil war between the Houthis and Yemen’s internationally recognized government. The recent events led President Biden to redesignate the Houthis as a global terrorist group. So who are they? What’s the context of the recent attacks and what’s at stake for the US and Yemen right now?

I’m joined by former CIA Director John Brennan, who served in that position from 2013 to 2017. A long-time national security official, he also served as Chief Counterterrorism Advisor to President Obama, Deputy Executive Director of the CIA under President George W. Bush, and was Station Chief in Saudi Arabia for the CIA. Director Brennan, welcome to the show.

John Brennan:

Thank you, Preet.

Preet Bharara:

So let’s start at the beginning because it’s very complicated and things in the Middle East get increasingly complicated and fraught. Simplest question I can ask you, who are the Houthis?

John Brennan:

Well, the Houthis are a tribe in the northernmost part of Yemen, and they are located along the border with Saudi Arabia. And for many years they were very independent and they didn’t want to listen to the central government in Yemen. And they built up a military capability of their own, and they were the dominant tribe in that area. And Yemen’s history has been racked with conflict basically over the last 50 plus years, if not longer. And the Houthis over time generally expanded their range of influence and control of Yemen. But it’s a group that is based on the tribe called the Houthis, the name that they now have, the technical name is Ansar Allah, which means supporters of God, and they are of the Shia faith. It’s a sect of Shiism called Zaydism. And for many years now, they have received support from Iran as well as close cooperation with Hezbollah in Lebanon.

Preet Bharara:

You mentioned they developed their own independent military capability. How would you describe it? What’s the scope of their ability? And then we’ll get into what they’ve been doing recently.

John Brennan:

Well, for many years they were building up their own capabilities not just in terms of small arms and weapons, but also had artillery and tanks. But their power really significantly increased following the Arab Spring and then into the 2014/2015 time period when they basically took over large swaths of North Yemen, the northern part of Yemen, and also the capital of Sana’a. And they were able then to seize a lot of the weaponry of the Yemeni government. And they’ve developed a lot of capability as a result of Iranian support. They make their own munitions, but they also receive very critical support from Iran in terms of missile components. So they have all types of weapons in terms of ground weapons as well as drones, aerial drones, seaborne drones, anti-ship missiles, cruise missiles. So they basically operate as a nation state in terms of their capability, but they are not recognized at all as being the government of Yemen.

Preet Bharara:

Could you describe and explain what interest Iran has in supporting the Houthis?

John Brennan:

Well, there has been many, many centuries of tension between Shia Iran or Persia and Sunni Saudi Arabia, which is the heartland of Sunni Islam. And given that the Zaydis are co-religionists of the Iranian Shia, the Iranians have provided support to the Zaydis and to the Houthis as a means of putting pressure on Saudi Arabia. So for several years, the Houthis were in direct conflict with Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia went into parts of Northern Yemen, and it was a conflict that went on for quite some time and with exchange of fire across the border. But Iran, I think, sees that it’s their obligation to support various Shia groups such as Ansar Allah, the Houthis, Hezbollah, but also it’s a way to put pressure on some of their regional rivals such as Saudi Arabia. And that’s why they’ve provided support with money, with weapons, with expertise, with training, as well as with encouragement.

Preet Bharara:

So they have been attacking, by drone and otherwise using this capability that you’ve described, US allied ships in the Red Sea. Why are they doing that?

John Brennan:

Well, they’ve done it before years past. Ever since they were able to expand their presence in the north of Yemen and their control along the seacoast there of the Red Sea, they have the capability to launch attacks from that sea coast, which is right at the southern end of the Red Sea, where a lot of the international shipping goes.

Preet Bharara:

Right, so they have the wherewithal more recently?

John Brennan:

Yes. And so what has happened now as a result of the conflict in Gaza between Israel and Hamas, and Hamas is also one of the benefactors or the recipients of Iranian Aid, Iran will support these various groups in the region in an effort to assert itself against its rivals, whether it be Saudi Arabia, or Israel. And so just like we’ve seen Hezbollah launching attacks across Northern Israel in support and in solidarity with Hamas, the Houthis are doing the same thing against commercial shipping, against US shipping. They’ve also sent missiles toward Israel. So I’m sure they’re doing this partly as a result of their own interest in supporting Hamas against Israel because the Houthis, just like many other Islamist groups, are implacably opposed to the state of Israel. But also I think it’s the result of strong Iranian encouragement as a way to put additional pressure on the United States and the West.

Preet Bharara:

Yeah, I believe one of the principal tenets of the Houthis is both death to America and death to Israel, right?

John Brennan:

Yes. They basically have taken on the Iranian mantra of death to both of those countries.

Preet Bharara:

Right. Could you describe the level of concern the US should have or the global community should have about these attacks in the Red Sea and how much it’s disrupting the supply chain or other types of commerce?

John Brennan:

Well, first of all, it presents a significant security threat to these vessels in terms of the personnel on board and sinking these vessels. So that is something, given that the Red Sea, and it goes then through the Bab al-Mandab in the southern part of the Red Sea, that’s where a lot of the international shipping takes place, global supply chains. And as a result of these Houthi attacks, a lot of that into international shipping has rerouted itself around the southern coast of Africa, increasing the costs of the shipping as well as delays. So it presents a real threat to international navigation and waterways. And so I think the United States, along with other countries that feel as though they need to support that international navigation, have decided to take action as a way to degrade Houthi capabilities. But I think the Houthis are quite determined, and they will continue to carry out these attacks as long as they have those capabilities.

Preet Bharara:

Are these strikes effective? Can they be effective? Are they more symbolic, or are they tactically wise and smart?

John Brennan:

Thankfully, the US Navy has been able to defeat a number of these attacks by shooting down some of these-

Preet Bharara:

As they’re happening?

John Brennan:

As they’re happening, yeah, in real time. So they could be quite devastating if we didn’t have the sophisticated defensive mechanisms and capabilities that we have in place. But some ships have been hit and disabled, but the Houthis have an array of capabilities. They have the seaborne drones, which they take these small watercrafts, load them with explosives, and then remotely pilot them toward ships. So it’s a real threat. Again, it can disable ships, it can kill personnel aboard ships, and again, it can just disrupt the flow of goods and people through the Red Sea.

Preet Bharara:

Do you think the strikes will continue at the current pace? Do you think they will accelerate?

John Brennan:

Well, the Houthis have a number of missile systems that are mobile, and they’ve tried to move them away from the coastline and to hide them. The US and others have taken strikes against them. So some of these Houthi capabilities have been degraded. They still, I’m sure, retain quite a bit. They can do a lot just by putting together sort of ad hoc systems. So I don’t think these strikes are going to deter the Houthis from carrying out strikes, but what they will do is reduce the Houthis’ wherewithal to conduct these attacks against ships in the Red Sea.

Preet Bharara:

Are the Houthis doing this in part to increase their own popularity within Yemen by showing solidarity with Hamas?

John Brennan:

It’s a good point because Yemen is still racked with internal conflict, and most of Southern Yemen are individuals of the Sunni faith and Al-Qaeda is active in Yemen. So during the 2011 to 2017/2018 time period, there was a real battle going on, it was like three factions. It was the Houthis in the north, it was the central government, which is located in Sana’a, and then in the South it was Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. And the Houthis built up a lot of their capabilities in order to go against their rivals, domestic rivals. So one of the things that the Houthis are going to be concerned about is that there are still factions inside of Yemen. The government of Yemen right now is located in Aden in the southern part of Yemen. There is still a element of Al-Qaeda as well as ISIS. So I think the Houthis had to be mindful that the more the capabilities are degraded, the less able they are to withstand any type of potential counterattacks by their Yemeni adversaries. So this is one of the things that I think they have to be careful about.

Preet Bharara:

What’s the Saudi role in all of this at the moment?

John Brennan:

Well, the Saudis, as I mentioned, for several years we’re engaged in direct battles and conflict with the Houthis and with the Northern Yemeni elements. And we refer to them as the Houthis but the Houthis are not a very large tribe in the north of the North Yemen, but they were able to make alliances with a number of the other tribes in the northern part of Yemen and so they become much larger than the Houthi tribe itself. And there’s this northern element in Yemen that were engaged in pitched battles with the Saudis. The Saudis for many, many years have felt that Yemen has been a real problem, and they’ve devoted a lot of resources, military strikes, and others.

Their concern right now is not having the conflict that started on October 7th expand and engulf the region itself. And that’s why Saudi Arabia, they didn’t condemn the US attacks against the Houthis, but they did express serious concerns about the potential spread. So what they don’t want to do is to have an active conflict erupt on their southern border, because, again, they’re fearful that in light of the strong sympathy for Hamas as well as the Palestinian cause that exists in the Arabian Peninsula in Saudi Arabia, what they don’t want is for the United States to be involved in a conflict with those who are supportive of the Palestinian people.

Preet Bharara:

Yeah. You mentioned earlier that on prior occasions, the Houthis have been bold enough to engage in certain kinds of attacks on the US and maybe an ally or two, engaged in military strikes, and then as I understand it, those activities by the Houthis stopped. Is there anything from that experience that informs us or gives us a lesson for the current experience?

John Brennan:

Yeah, the Houthis have conducted attacks against Saudi Arabia. They conducted attacks not too long ago against industrial sites in the UAE, United Arab Emirates. So they have quite a range. And sometimes if they are counterattacked, they don’t follow through with follow-on attacks. Sometimes they do things to send signals to their adversaries that they have these capabilities. So I think Secretary Blinken and the Biden administration have been very careful to say that they don’t really expect these strikes to lead to Houthis just ceasing the attacks. They’re hoping it’s going to be a deterrent because the Houthis are going to suffer consequences, but I do think that the continuation of the tragedy in Gaza and the continued loss of life there and the fact that the Iranians continue to do whatever they can to put additional pressure on Israel and Israel supporters, and namely the United States, I can see the Houthis, Hezbollah and Hamas continuing to carry out these violent strikes.

Preet Bharara:

So there’s another sort of area of confusion regarding US policy towards the Houthis. So if memory serves, there are various designations that the US government can make with respect to terrorist organizations, right? One is the designation of global terrorist group, another is designated foreign terrorist organization. I think to the lay ear, those sound like the same thing. They’re not the same thing. Could you explain the seesawing back and forth over the course of the Obama, Trump and Biden administrations of this designation and why it’s important? Just sort of explain to us what that means and why it’s changed over time.

John Brennan:

Well, groups can be designated, according to US law, to be foreign terrorist organizations. That then triggers a number of actions by the United States. Sometimes individuals are listed on the foreign terrorist list as individuals who cannot engage in any type of activities that the US has some control over. But the Houthis or Ansar Allah were listed as a foreign terrorist organization in the waning days of the Trump administration. And then shortly after the Biden administration came into office, they de-listed them. And the reason why was that when a foreign terrorist organization controls certain territory, the United States is prohibited by law from providing any type of assistance or support to that area. We’ve had these challenges in places like Somalia and other areas. When there are terrorist groups that control certain areas, it prevents humanitarian assistance and aid from going in. And given the Yemeni civil war and conflict, a large portion of Yemen, particularly in the North, were suffering. It was a humanitarian disaster, famine, health issues, other types of things, disease.

And so the Biden administration de-listed the Houthis in order to enable by law the provision of assistance to the Yemeni people. There’s a port on the coast of Yemen on the Red Sea called Hudaydah, and that is the main port where goods and food, grain and other types of things are brought into Yemen. And as long as the Houthis were in control of that area, and the Hudaydah Port, the United States was prohibited from allowing any type of US-affiliated organizations from providing assistance there. And so that listing was lifted so that aid could go into Yemen. But in light of what has happened in the recent months, the Houthis now have been put back onto that list of foreign terrorist organizations as a way, again, to put some additional pressure on the Houthis in Yemen.

Preet Bharara:

All right, what may be a dumb question, if it’s the case that a foreign terrorist organization controls a port, isn’t it separate and apart from the legal constraints, why would it make sense to send humanitarian assistance to people who need it through a port controlled by the terrorist organization? Just as a practical matter.

John Brennan:

Well, again, it’s very similar to what has happened in Somalia for a number of years. These terrorist organizations or groups like Houthis, they do control the ports, they control some of the roads, but there are millions of people who live in these areas and who are starving and who are in desperate need of healthcare medical assistance.

Preet Bharara:

Right, no, no. I guess what I’m asking is if the bad guys control the port, how do you get the humanitarian aid to the people who need it given their control of the port? In other words, how do you as a pragmatic matter get that done, putting aside whatever the legal restraints are?

John Brennan:

Well, if there are ways to get assistance in and bypass these ports, these roads, these airfields, whatever else, you do that. But if there’s no other option, and a lot of members of the Houthi movement or the Ansar Allah are not engaged in the strikes, maybe they’re toll collectors, maybe they are port officials or whatever. But they do have a bureaucratic system, the Houthis. And so what you try to do is if there’s no other way around it, I think, again, the Biden administration felt as though there’s a way to bring in aid to the Yemeni people without providing support to Houthi military and terrorist capabilities. And that’s what they were trying to do, they were trying to balance the equities of trying to retain pressure against these groups.

But the Houthis for a number of years, once the conflict with Saudi Arabia had died down, they weren’t engaged in these types of activities on an ongoing basis. Once in a while, they would shoot off a missile against Saudi Arabia or against UAE, but they weren’t an active international terrorist organization. But clearly in the last several months, with the tempo of the strikes against the shipping in the Red Sea, they fully qualify for a foreign terrorist organization.

Preet Bharara:

Is it time to update that law so that American officials and military officials don’t have to engage in such an exquisite balance between fighting off and deterring terrorist organizations and providing humanitarian aid?

John Brennan:

Well, might be, there’d need to be a-

Preet Bharara:

I would support you in that effort, sir.

John Brennan:

Well, it is a tough balance because you don’t want to do anything that’s going to enhance the standing and the strength of a terrorist organization.

Preet Bharara:

Right. But you want to give some flexibility to leadership in the US, do you not?

John Brennan:

Yes. And during the Obama administration, we allowed aid to go into Somalia despite the fact that there were terrorist groups that were controlling ports of Somalia. And we had to make an exception because the Somali people were starving. And even though some of the roads were controlled by the terrorist organizations, many of them affiliated with Al-Qaeda, this is something that the Obama administration felt was imperative in terms of trying to prevent the starvation of millions of innocents who happened to live in these areas.

Preet Bharara:

So here’s the most important, I think, issue and question that ordinary Americans worry about, and that is the expansion of hostilities in the Middle East beyond what just began as a war between Hamas and Israel. We’re worried about Lebanon, Hezbollah, Iran in these proxy fights, the Houthis now. What’s your assessment about the likelihood of being able to contain this, at least to what the current conflict sort of regions are, minimizing those, reducing those versus worrying about a greater expansion? I think people are worried that the US is going to be drawn in some very significant way. How do you see that risk?

John Brennan:

Well, I think it’s a serious concern. But at the same time, Iran, which is really the instigator of a lot of these attacks, and they’re the ones that empowered Hamas to carry out these horrific attacks on October the 7th, and they’ve encouraged Hezbollah and the Houthis to conduct strikes, at the same time, Hezbollah has really held back. Hezbollah has tremendous military capability in terms of missiles and rockets, and they could really do quite a bit more than they’re doing now. And I think it suggests that Iran is turning up the heat, but at this point, they are not interested in having a broad conflict. Iran doesn’t want to have a war with the United States, doesn’t want to get into a conflict with Israel. If that happens, there would be certainly a tremendous exchange of weapons, strikes.

But we do see that Iran recently hit targets inside of Pakistan, the Pakistanis just retaliated overnight against some Iranian areas. So the more that we have these incidents of strikes going across sovereign borders, I think the prospects of a broader regional conflict go up because there could be an escalatory spiral that maybe was not intended on the part of the Iranians, but some of these strikes can lead to more deaths and just increase the interest in retaliatory attacks.

Preet Bharara:

So here’s my final dumb question. If Iran truly and sincerely and authentically doesn’t want to get into an expanded conflict or a war with the US, why don’t they tell the Houthis to knock it off?

John Brennan:

Well, they want to ratchet up the pressure on the United States.

Preet Bharara:

But not so much so as to cause a direct conflict? It seems a dangerous game, isn’t it?

John Brennan:

Well, it is a dangerous game, but the Iranians have been quite, I think, clever and cunning in many respects because they’re using these proxies to go against their adversaries. Iran is still very much a revolutionary state. They believe that it’s important to be able to support a lot of these groups in the Middle East. In some respects, it’s the counter to their Sunni adversaries. But Hamas is a Sunni organization, but they have supported Hamas with money, weapons, training and other types of things because they’re implacably opposed to the state of Israel. So they’re using these pressure points against their regional rivals, whether it be Saudi Arabia or Israel, as well as against their global rivals in the United States. So it is a dangerous game they’re playing.

And again, this can further escalate. We could see something just in the next couple of days that will erupt. I’m particularly concerned about the Lebanese theater where Hezbollah, again, retains significant capabilities that really could be overwhelming of some of the Israeli northern air defenses, but Israel has the capability to really just destroy a lot of Hezbollah’s capabilities. And Hezbollah doesn’t want to destroy everything because they have their Lebanese rivals that they have to remain strong against. So it’s a chess game in many respects. But I do think the events of October 7th and the months since then really have increased the prospects that we could see the Middle East once more engulfed in some type of larger regional conflict that would put the United States in direct confrontation with not just the Houthis, but other regional actors.

Preet Bharara:

You make a very good point that this is a very fluid situation. I should make sure to note for the audience that you and I are having this conversation on Thursday morning, January 18th, and anything can happen at any time. With that, sir, I know your time is valuable. John Brennan, thanks for being on the show, and thank you for all your service to the country.

John Brennan:

Thanks, Preet, and thank you for doing this podcast. I think your continued interest in these issues and trying to inform the American public is really quite important and so I thank you for that.

Preet Bharara:

For more analysis of legal and political issues, making the headlines become a member of the CAFE Insider. Members get access to exclusive content, including the weekly podcast I host with former US attorney Joyce Vance. Head to cafe.com/insider to sign up for a trial. That’s cafe.com/insider. If you like what we do, rate and review the show on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen. Every positive review helps new listeners find the show. Send me your questions about news, politics, and justice. Tweet them to me @PreetBharara with the hashtag #AskPreet. You can also now reach me on Threads, or you can call and leave me a message at (669) 247-7338. That’s (669) 24-PREET. Or you can send an email to letters@cafe.com. Stay Tuned is presented by CAFE and the Vox Media Podcast Network. The executive producer is Tamara Sepper. The technical director is David Tatasciore. The editorial producer is Noa Azulai. And the CAFE team is Matthew Billy, David Kurlander, Jake Kaplan, Nat Weiner and Claudia Hernández. Our music is by Andrew Dost. I’m your host, Preet Bharara, Stay Tuned.