After taking
Yemen’s capital two years ago, the Islamic Republic is now shifting its focus
from land to sea.
The footage was
shaky, grainy and out of focus, but the moment it captured was unmistakable.
Across the water in the distance is a massive warship. The amateur videographer
does his best to keep the vessel in the frame as small waves lap the edge of
his skiff. For a minute, he chats in Arabic with another onlooker. Then, in
anticipation, they fall silent. Wrote Brent
Then it happens,
just as planned
A massive fireball
erupts from the stern of the warship, sending out an instantaneous shock wave
that rocks the camera. A second later the fiery explosion turns black as smoke
billows skyward. The Arabic voiceover returns, this time with much more fervor:
“God is great! Death to America! Death to Israel! Curse the Jews! Victory for
Islam!”
This was the scene
in the southern Red Sea in late January when Iranian-backed Houthi militiamen
successfully rammed an unmanned, explosive-laden boat into the side of a Saudi
frigate, killing two sailors and announcing to the world that the militia’s
arsenal now includes naval drones.
A few months earlier
on October 1, the weapon was different, but the chants were the same. However,
instead of a naval drone causing the carnage, it was a C-802 antiship missile,
made by the Chinese, reverse engineered by the Iranians, and fired by the
Houthis. This time, it was a United Arab Emirates-operated hsv-2 Swift advanced
transport vessel that was destroyed.
A week after that,
the most powerful navy in the world was the target. On October 9, the Houthis
picked a fight with the uss Mason—far out of its weight class, but they had no
fear. The militia launched two land-based cruise missiles at the Mason, an
American destroyer stationed just north of the sea’s critical southern choke
point, the Bab el-Mandeb Strait. The Mason was forced into defensive measures
including the firing of three of its own missiles to intercept the Houthis’
missiles. The attack was foiled, but the Houthis were undeterred, and within
the same week launched two more missile attacks against the Mason.
In March, the
United States Office of Naval Intelligence warned that the Houthi militia had
upped the ante by deploying naval mines in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait. The U.S.
Navy said it would remove the mines, but it didn’t happen fast enough. On March
10, a Yemen Coast Guard vessel hit a mine and exploded, killing two sailors and
injuring eight others.
Naval mines, drone
attack boats, cruise missiles: These are the latest weapons used in Iran’s
quest to control the southern Red Sea passageway.
Prepping for War
Ever since the
Houthis took over Yemen’s capital Sanaa in late 2014, the Trumpet has
emphasized that this was actually a victory for Iran. In the April 2015 issue,
editor in chief Gerald Flurry wrote, “The Houthis’ takeover of Yemen was not
just a grassroots revolution. It was a part of a deliberate and calculated
Iranian strategy to conquer the Red Sea.”
These latest
actions by the Houthi militia prove that Iran is making progress in controlling
this waterway. Along with the uptick in its actions against naval targets
through its Houthi proxy, Iran is directly exerting power over the southern Red
Sea.
In late February,
the Islamic Republic of Iran Navy conducted a large-scale exercise in the
northern Indian Ocean. Operation Velayat 95 included operations in an area of
nearly 800,000 square miles, from the Strait of Hormuz leading into the Persian
Gulf, around the Arabian Peninsula to the Bab el-Mandeb Strait leading into the
Red Sea. This is an annual war drill for the Iranian Navy. However, the drill
this year was different from the one last year in one notable way: This was the
first time the exercises extended to the Bab el-Mandeb.
Geopolitical
Futures wrote that the inclusion of the Bab el-Mandeb Strait “offers a window
into Iranian strategy,” explaining that “Iran’s recent naval exercises indicate
that Iran could be preparing to take advantage of a distracted United States
should conflict in the South China Sea or elsewhere take place. If the U.S.
does not have the resources necessary to prevent Iran from projecting power in
the region, Iran wants to be sufficiently prepared to take advantage of the
situation. Therefore, we can conclude that Iran considers the Bab el-Mandeb
important enough to increase its capabilities to project force in that region.
…
“Iran is adding the
Bab el-Mandeb to the theaters in which the country feels it must be capable of
operating. There are no precise details on what Iran has deployed, but in this
case, the specifics of the deployment are less important than observing that
Iran now considers the Bab el-Mandeb part of its immediate strategic
environment” (February 28; emphasis added).
Iranian ambition in
the Bab el-Mandeb is natural considering one of its leaders claimed dominance
over the waterways following the 2011 Houthi uprising. “We in the axis of
resistance are the new sultans of the Mediterranean and the Gulf,” said
Mohammed Sadeq al-Hosseini, adviser to former Iranian President Mohammed
Khatami. “We in Tehran, Damascus, [Hezbollah’s] southern suburb of Beirut,
Baghdad and Sanaa will shape the region. We are the new sultans of the Red Sea
as well.”
Moving forward into
2017, Iran is simply implementing the strategy it hinted at years earlier.
The types of
weaponry that Iran chose to test in early 2017 also reveal its naval strategy.
On the second day of the Velayat 95 exercises, Iran successfully test-fired its
Dehlaviyeh antiship missile for the first time. This land-based, laser-guided
missile system created by Iranian technicians jeopardizes shipping traffic
navigating the narrow sea passages of the Red Sea and Persian Gulf.
In early March,
Iran launched two Fateh-110 short-range ballistic missiles. The last time this
model was used, the Fateh (Persian for “Conqueror”) starred in a propaganda
film in which it blew up a simulated U.S. Navy aircraft carrier.
According to Fox
News sources, the new Fateh-110 has been updated with “active seeker”
technology that allows it to better detect ships at sea. The missiles are
road-mobile and can be used against land-based targets. But the improvements to
the weapon, as well as the way in which it was tested, show the Iranians’
primary purpose for the missile: to destroy ships.
But Iran is not
done yet. In a March 22 report, Reuters sources indicated that Iran’s
long-standing support for the Houthis has increased in recent months, and that
it has provided special assistance through its Quds Force. According to
Reuters, “A senior Iranian official said Maj. Gen. Qassem Suleimani, commander
of the Quds Force—the external arm of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps(irgc)—met top irgc officials in Tehran last month to look at ways to ‘empower’
the Houthi.
“‘At this meeting,
they agreed to increase the amount of help, through training, arms and
financial support,’ the official said.”
Iran’s Strategy in
Yemen
Gerald Flurry wrote
in 2015 that the “Houthi takeover in Yemen proves that Iran is implementing a
bold strategy to control the vital sea lane from the Indian Ocean to the
Mediterranean Sea” (op cit). This was at a time when most commentators were
focusing on the Houthi rebellion as an attempt to take over land and
destabilize Iran’s rival, Saudi Arabia, which is Yemen’s northern neighbor. But
Mr. Flurry foresaw that Iran’s interest in the Houthi uprising was aimed at a
vital strategic goal: domination of the southern Red Sea passage.
After the October 1
Houthi missile attack on the U.A.E. vessel, Stratfor wrote that the attack
“indicate[s] that the group has acquired new capabilities, raising questions
about the security of shipping in the waters off the Yemeni coast and the
effectiveness of an arms embargo against the Houthis. If not the sign of a new
weapon, the attack could suggest a shift in the group’s tactics that may
equally threaten ships in the Red Sea” (Oct. 5, 2016).
Iran is completely
aware of the strategic significance of this gate. On Jan. 17, 2015, the Iranian
state-sponsored Tasnim News Agency published an article that boldly proclaimed:
“Today, all the arteries of oil transport—from Bab el-Mandeb Strait to Suez
Canal and the Strait of Hormuz—are under Iranian control, by means of Syria,
Yemen and Bahrain, and within range of Iranian missiles” (Middle East Media
Research Institute translation).
Two months later,
on March 2, the irgc weekly, Sobh-e Sadeq, wrote, “… Yemen has a highly
sensitive geopolitical status, stemming in part from its location in the Gulf
of Aden and the Bab el-Mandeb. [Yemen’s] location links East with West. These
days, Europe imports 3.5 million barrels of oil through these straits, and if
the crisis in Yemen worsens and Bab el-Mandeb is closed, it would create a
dangerous situation.”
Iran is fully aware
that controlling this gate will give it virtual control of the trade through
these seas.
Over 300,000 tons
of shipping, including 3.8 million barrels of oil, pass between the
Mediterranean Sea and the Indian Ocean every day. Each ship must sail through
the southern passage of the Red Sea: the Bab el-Mandeb. Measuring just 18 miles
across, this channel is the closest point between the two landmasses of central
Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. The northeastern edge of the strait is inYemeni territory.
The strategic importance
of controlling this strait is equal to controlling the crucial Suez Canal,
since every ship that sails between Asia and Europe through the Red Sea must go
through both of these passages. If sailing from the Persian Gulf this route is
43 percent shorter than sailing around the continent of Africa, which makes it
the most affordable route and saves shipping companies millions of dollars.
For this reason,
roughly 20,000 ships pass through the Suez Canal and Bab el-Mandeb each year—an
average of 55 per day. About 15 percent of all global maritime trade and nearly
10 percent of global seaborne oil passes through the gates of the Red Sea.
More specifically,
almost all of the trade between Europe and Asia is seaborne and travels through
the Bab el-Mandeb sea gate. That amounts to almost $700 billion worth of trade
per year that Iran could conceivably delay, sabotage, or stop dead in the
water.
On Oct. 25, 2016,
Foreign Policy wrote of the Bab el-Mandeb, “If a coastal foe can menace
shipping transiting this narrow seaway, it would disrupt the shortest, most
convenient sea route connecting Europe with South and East Asia. Doing so would
carry significant economic and military repercussions.”
It certainly would,
and biblical prophecy indicates that it most definitely will. Geopolitical
analysts are watching Iran closely every day and trying to predict where its
efforts will lead. But incredibly, there is a source even older than Iran
itself that forecasts what it will do in the 21st century! The Bible actually contains
specific, detailed foresights of what modern nations will do. Included in these
forecasts is 21st-century Iran.
“And at the time of
the end shall the king of the south push at him: and the king of the north
shall come against him like a whirlwind, with chariots, and with horsemen, and
with many ships; and he shall enter into the countries, and shall overflow and
pass over” (Daniel 11:40).
According to this
verse, at the time of the end this “king of the south” is going to push at the
king of the north. Since 1994, Gerald Flurry has forecast that Iran would grow
to become the dominant power in the Middle East, heading up a powerful alliance
of radical Islamic nations known as the king of the south. The king of the
north in this prophecy is a united Europe led by Germany. While the world is
mostly blind to it, some in Europe are waking up to Iran’s plan to capture the
Mediterranean and the Red Sea. The Europeans see that this strategy and Iran’s
overall strategy of aggressiveness and terror is a definite push. And Europe
will eventually push back.
On February 3, in a
letter to supporters of the Trumpet and other Philadelphia Church of God
projects, Mr. Flurry wrote that the aggressive king of the south is about to
push the world into an all-out world war. The increasingly violent actions by
Iran and its proxies in the Red Sea are one part of that push; a push that will
ultimately succumb to a violent and forceful counterstrike by a superior force
from the north.
However, while that
will be a time of worldwide suffering, it also announces the beginning of the
very last world war that will engulf this planet. After Daniel 11:40 are verses
that announce that all the armies of this world will finally be put down by the
most superior force of all—that of Almighty God (Daniel 12:1-3; Matthew
24:29-31).
Continue to watch
for Iran to strengthen its presence inside Yemen, as well as in the waters
around the Bab el-Mandeb Strait. Here lies the very beginning of the prophesied
push that leads into a global conflict.
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