
War in Yemen
View All Conflicts
Middle East and North Africa
Limited
Worsening
Civil War
Recent Developments
The Saudi-led coalition has continued to wage its campaign against Iranian-backed Houthi rebels, resulting in heavy civilian casualties. In June 2018, the coalition launched a major offensive to retake the coastal region of Hodeida, further worsening the humanitarian crisis. The United Nations, which appointed a new special envoy for Yemen in 2018, has attempted to broker a cease-fire.
The Houthis have responded to Saudi airstrikes with missile attacks on Saudi Arabian infrastructure and territory, including oil tankers and facilities and international airports. Further complicating the civil war, secessionist groups in Yemen’s south, supported by the United Arab Emirates, have clashed with the UN-recognized government forces based in Aden.
Background
Yemen’s civil war began in 2014 when Houthi insurgents—Shiite rebels with links to Iran and a history of rising up against the Sunni government—took control of Yemen’s capital and largest city, Sana’a, demanding lower fuel prices and a new government. Following failed negotiations, the rebels seized the presidential palace in January 2015, leading President Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi and his government to resign. Beginning in March 2015, a coalition of Gulf states led by Saudi Arabia launched a campaign of economic isolation and air strikes against the Houthi insurgents, with U.S. logistical and intelligence support.
Hadi rescinded his resignation and returned to Aden in September 2015, and fighting has continued since. A UN effort to broker peace talks between allied Houthi rebels and the internationally recognized Yemeni government stalled in the summer of 2016. As of December 2017, Hadi has reportedly been residing in exile in Saudi Arabia.
In July 2016, the Houthis and the government of former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, ousted in 2011 after nearly thirty years in power, announced the formation of a “political council” to govern Sana’a and much of northern Yemen. However, in December 2017, Saleh broke with the Houthis and called for his followers to take up arms against them. Saleh was killed and his forces defeated within two days.
The intervention of regional powers in Yemen’s conflict, including Iran and Gulf states led by Saudi Arabia, threatens to draw the country into the broader Sunni-Shia divide. Numerous Iranian weapons shipments to Houthi rebels have been intercepted in the Gulf of Aden by a Saudi naval blockade in place since April 2015. In response, Iran has dispatched its own naval convoy, which further risks military escalation between the two countries.
Meanwhile, the conflict continues to take a heavy toll on Yemeni civilians, making Yemen the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. The UN estimates that the civilian casualty toll has exceeded 15,000 killed or injured. Twenty-two million Yemenis remain in need of assistance, eight million are at risk of famine, and a cholera outbreak has affected over one million people. All sides of the conflict are reported to have violated human rights and international humanitarian law.
Separate from the ongoing civil war, the United States continues counterterrorism operations in Yemen, relying mainly on airstrikes to target al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) and militants associated with the self-proclaimed Islamic State. In 2016, the United States conducted an estimated 35 strikes in Yemen; in 2017, it conducted about 130. In April 2016, the United States deployed a small team of forces to advise and assist Saudi-led troops to retake territory from AQAP. In January 2017, a U.S. Special Operations Forces raid in central Yemen killed one U.S. service member, several suspected AQAP-affiliated fighters, and an unknown number of Yemeni civilians.
Concerns
The United States is deeply invested in combating terrorism and violent extremism in Yemen, having collaborated with the Yemeni government on counterterrorism since the bombing of the USS Cole in 2000. Since 2002, the United States has carried out over two hundred strikes in Yemen. While Houthi rebels do not pose a direct threat to the United States, their attacks on Saudi Arabian infrastructure and territory threaten an important U.S. partner.
Alerts
A Visual Exploration of the Conflict
War in Yemen

War in Yemen






Background Articles
Brian M. Perkins Jamestown Foundation October 23, 2019
April Longley Alley Foreign Policy October 15, 2019
Brian M. Perkins Jamestown Foundation September 10, 2019
International Crisis Group August 30, 2019
Bobby Ghosh Bloomberg August 22, 2019
Stephen W. Day Middle East Institute August 14, 2019
International Crisis Group August 9, 2019
Ahmed Nagi Carnegie Middle East Center July 31, 2019
International Crisis Group July 18, 2019
Matthias Sulz ACLED June 2019
Dion Nissenbaum and Warren P. Strobel Wall Street Journal May 2, 2019
Michael Knights, Kenneth M. Pollack, and Barbara F. Walter Foreign Affairs May 2, 2019
International Crisis Group April 15, 2019
Robert Malley and Stephen Pomper Atlantic April 5, 2019
Michael Horton Jamestown Foundation March 29, 2019
Reuters March 21, 2019
Baraa Shiban Al Arabiya March 7, 2019
Annie Slemrod New Humanitarian February 6, 2019
Peter Salisbury International Crisis Group January 15, 2019
Barbara A. Leaf and Elana Delozier War on the Rockcs January 9, 2019
BBC December 18, 2018
Jeffrey Feltman Foreign Affairs November 26, 2018
Tore Refslund Hamming War on the Rocks November 7, 2018
Mohammed Ali Kalfood and Declan Walsh New York Times November 6, 2018
Robert F. Worth New York Times October 31, 2018
Michael Knights CTC Sentinel September 2018
Peter Sallisbury International Crisis Group September 20, 2018
Jeremy M. Sharp Congressional Research Service August 24, 2018
Jon B. Alterman Center for Strategic and International Studies August 2018
Elisabeth Kendall Middle East Institute July 2018
Peter Salisbury Foreign Affairs June 27, 2018
International Crisis Group June 11, 2018
Alan Sipress, Laris Karklis and Tim Meko Washington Post June 8, 2018
Cameron Glenn Wilson Center May 29, 2018
Missile Defense Project Center for Strategic & International Studies April 13, 2018
Daniel Nikbakht, Sheena McKenzie CNN April 3, 2018
Peter Salisbury Chatham House March 2018
New Yorker March 23, 2018
Al-Monitor March 14, 2018
Bennett Seftel Cipher Brief February 28, 2018
Peter Salisbury World Politics Review February 16, 2018
BBC January 30, 2018
Ben Watson Defense One January 29, 2018
Stacey Philbrick Yadav and Marc Lynch Washington Post January 26, 2018
Peter Salisbury Chatham House December 20, 2017
Iona Craig Guardian December 12, 2017
April Longley Alley International Crisis Group December 6, 2017
The Economist November 30, 2017
Asher Orkaby Foreign Affairs November/December 2017
Maz Kamali Institute for Global Change October 6, 2017
Bennett Seftel The Cipher Brief October 4, 2017
Dan De Luce, Paul McLeary, and Colum Lynch Foreign Policy September 11, 2017
Shuaib Almosawa, Ben Hubbard, and Troy Griggs New York Times August 23, 2017
Patrice Taddonio Frontline July 19, 2017
Shuaib Almosawa and Nour Youssef The New York Times July 7, 2017
Cori Crider The Atlantic June 25, 2017
Laura Kasinof World Politics Review June 13, 2017
Joshua Koontz War on the Rocks June 1, 2017
Populations at Risk Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect
Eric Robinson, et al. RAND Corporation May 2017
Joost Hiltermann and April Longley Alley World Politics Review April 27, 2017
Richard Sokolsky and Perry Cammack Carnegie Endowment for International Peace April 10, 2017
World Affairs
BBC January 17, 2017
Simon Tisdall Guardian October 10, 2016
Latest CFR Analysis
CFR Blog, "Strength Through Peace" January 8, 2019
Jamille Bigio and Rachel B. Vogelstein Reuters December 18, 2018
Alexandra Stark CFR Blog, "Strength Through Peace" November 20, 2018
Philip H. Gordon Washington Post November 12, 2018
Zachary Laub CFR Backgrounder October 31, 2018
Steven A. Cook Foreign Policy September 27, 2018
Tawakkol Karman and Meighan Stone CFR Blog, "Women Around the World" April 25, 2018
Gerald M. Feierstein, Stephen Seche, and Ellen Laipson CFR Event December 12, 2017
Scott Paul and Zachary Laub CFR Interview December 1, 2017
Michael Dempsey Washington Post September 4, 2017
Steven A. Cook CFR Book June 2017
Zachary Laub CFR Backgrounder
Jonathan Masters CFR Backgrounder
CFR Interactive
April Longley Alley and Zachary Laub CFR Interview February 26, 2015
Micah Zenko CFR Council Special Report January 2013
Charles E. Berger CFR Policy Innovation Memorandum February 2014
Jonathan Masters CFR Backgrounder
Micah Zenko and Sarah E. Kreps CFR Council Special Report June 2014
Primary Sources
UN High Commissioner for Refugees April 30, 2018
Department of State July 2017
Terri Moon Cronk Department of Defense May 23, 2017
UNOHCHR August 25, 2016
UNHCR
UN News Centre August 15, 2016
UN News Centre August 12, 2016
U.S. Department of State May 19, 2016
U.S. National Counterterrorism Center
United Nations Development Programme
United Nations Security Council April 14, 2015
World Factbook CIA
U.S. Department of State
CFR Experts

Eni Enrico Mattei Senior Fellow for Middle East and Africa Studies and Director of the International Affairs Fellowship for Tenured International Relations Scholars