Issue No. 932

The Middle Eastern Shockwaves Across the Red Sea

Where to begin? The Middle East aflame, the Iranian Ayatollah Ali Khamenei killed by an Israeli airstrike, a slew of Gulf capitals and infrastructure under Iranian bombardment, and a war instigated by two powers with no clear end or scope. Few could say they were surprised by the coordinated Israeli-American bombardment of Iran, but the immediacy of its metastasis has been shocking, and the spillover of this war is already stretching from Cyprus down to the Strait of Hormuz. And there are almost too many unknowns to count, from the endgame logic of Washington to the vulnerability of the wounded Iranian regime to the broader reaction of the besieged Gulf.

Where does this leave the Horn of Africa? Adjacent to the conflagration, the region's leaders have little agency over what comes next. Nevertheless, it is worth examining a handful of the dynamics at play, as well as the strategic interests of Tehran and its rivals in the Horn of Africa. Unlike Riyadh, Ankara, or Abu Dhabi, Iran's direct geostrategic stakes in the Horn are limited, principally opportunistic and linked to its clandestine arms and fuel industries. Sudan has often been at the centre of this, with some ideological and strategic cooperation established during the 1990s, when Tehran cultivated ties with the Islamist-flavoured military government of Omar al-Bashir and Hassan al-Turabi; a rare case of Shia-Sunni alignment. And during this latest destructive conflict in Sudan, Tehran furnished the Sudanese army with a number of drones, including Mohajer-6 and Ababil types, which were deployed in the retaking of Khartoum last year.

But over the weekend, the Sudanese army was quick to condemn the volley of missiles and drones into their Gulf allies by Tehran, though notably omitting the Emirates-- the Rapid Support Forces' (RSF) main patron. Several other African capitals have followed suit, with Kenyan President William Ruto and Ethiopian PM Abiy Ahmed both denouncing Tehran's strikes on Gulf states. Such speed and clarity point to the geopolitical heft of the vying Gulf powers-- not Tehran-- in the region. The only outlier has been Chadian President Mahamat Idriss Déby Itno, who publicly mourned the passing of the Ayatollah —an odd move, considering that he, too, relies on Emirati largesse to maintain his ruling coalition.

So far, it appears that Tehran's focus—led by whatever the badly mauled military apparatus looks like today —is set on targeting the American allies in the Gulf, grounding the petro-monarchies' economies and shattering any illusions of normalcy in Dubai, Riyadh, and Doha. To date, Bahrain, Qatar, UAE, Kuwait, Lebanon, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Jordan have all been struck, with Tehran's rationale seeming to inflict sufficient pain on enough US military bases and Washington's political allies to bring about a ceasefire that leaves the surviving Iranian regime intact. But if the Iranians were to look further afield, the sizeable US Camp Lemonnier in Djibouti may be a target, lying at the farthest reaches of Iran's missile range. But the numbers and quality of Iranian stockpiled projectiles after the waves of Israeli and US strikes, too, are unclear amidst the unfolding conflict. Even so, Camp Lemonnier or the Emirati interests in Berbera, in Somaliland, for instance, are secondary to the far-closer prize jewels of American military interests and Gulf infrastructure. 

The next knock-on from the spiralling Middle Eastern conflict relates to the Iranian proxy of the Yemen-based Houthis, which has rapidly expanded its interests and relationships along the Gulf of Aden. Over the weekend, the Houthis pledged to renew their military campaign, having liberally targeted transiting vessels on the Red Sea with their array of drones and missiles from late 2023 onwards in response to Israel's invasion of Gaza. Though Tehran has plied the Houthis with a host of sophisticated weaponry over the years, their production capacity and supply lines are now increasingly diversified. Even so, no missiles have yet been launched as of writing.

Further, though theologically incongruent, the relationship between Al-Shabaab and the Houthis has rapidly deepened over the past 18 months, encompassing a broad range of weapons and technological exchanges. Many hundreds of young Somalis have been trained by the Yemen-based movement in everything from IED assembly to maritime interdiction, while the Houthis have further been establishing a clandestine base near Milho in the contested Sanaag region under Al-Shabaab protection. If and how the Houthis seek to activate these latent capacities remains to be seen, but with Israel having unilaterally recognised Somaliland in late December, the Houthis may yet serve as a proxy for their Iranian partners in the Horn in targeting an Emirati installation. Even so, cooperation between Al-Shabaab and the Houthis thus far has been pragmatic and mutually beneficial; transforming it into an overt anti-Israeli or anti-Emirati campaign in the Horn would alter that calculus.

Naturally, any resumption of a longer-term conflict on the Red Sea inevitably spikes shipping prices and maritime insurance, forcing freighters down around the Cape of Good Hope, having previously surged these costs by 30-50%. With a humanitarian crisis consuming much of the region and with tens of millions of people food-insecure, a renewed crisis in the Red Sea will further push up food and oil prices, potentially making it harder to deliver much-needed aid. Already, oil costs have surged, with Brent crude jumping by 10% to over USD 82 a barrel on Monday after three ships were struck near the Strait of Hormuz-- through which roughly 20% of the world's oil and gas passes.

The scale and nature of this war are yet unknown, and as to whether the Iranian regime-- though vulnerable-- will consolidate or collapse. But in the immediate and perhaps most significant dynamic for the Horn, the targeting of Dubai airport and the Ras Tanura oil refinery in Saudi Arabia is pushing the squabbling Riyadh and Abu Dhabi to tackle this existential threat to their economies. Divergent interests on Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen have been- at least temporarily- laid aside within the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), with a rare phone call occurring between Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Emirati President Mohammed bin Zayed to coordinate their responses.

Perhaps the current conflict may herald a thaw in Riyadh-Abu Dhabi relations and an attempt to deconflict their interests in Yemen and Sudan, or, perhaps, it accentuates them in the longer run, with their ideological divergences over the nature of the 'state' becoming increasingly clear. Beyond the damage to Gulf infrastructure, with the future of an internally fragile, externally besieged Iranian regime unclear, there are major concerns within these capitals of possible sectarian and refugee spill-overs from their neighbour. And no doubt, the decapitation of the Iranian state is sure to embolden the Israelis across the wider region, already making more assertive forays into the Horn of Africa, beginning with the recognition of Somaliland. Behind Ankara's condemnation of the US-Israeli strikes on Iran is a clear concern that Tel Aviv's hand will be subsequently freed across the Red Sea and Levant to target Turkish interests in Syria and Somalia, for instance. Indeed, some emboldened nationalist voices within Israel are already warning ominously that Ankara will become the 'new Tehran.' If the Iranian regime is finally toppled, the burgeoning Israeli-Emirati axis will likely seek to further reshape the political-security architecture from the western Indian Ocean to the Mediterranean.

With such a live, fraught situation, speculation is rife, and all bets are off. The potential overthrow of the Iranian clerical establishment could potentially transform not only the region but even the alliance frameworks across the Persian Gulf, Red Sea, and the Gulf of Aden. But that is a tall ask indeed, and aerial bombardment alone has never induced regime change. Indeed, a Maduro-style 'decapitation' of the Iranian theocracy may well leave elements of the Revolutionary Guard in control in Tehran, the war unfinished, and the region even more unstable. But whether this latest bout of Israeli-Iran conflict lasts a few days or several months, the reverberations within the broader Red Sea conflict system are sure to be keenly felt. The cost of entanglement between the Horn and the Gulf is that, as long as the Middle East experiences upheaval, Africa will continue to be buffeted by geopolitical turbulence from across the water. The Horn may not shape this war, but it will almost certainly pay for it.

The Somali Wire Team