Saudi Arabia's Yemen Gambit

Saudi Arabia sees Iran as responsible for all its security threats, including the Houthis in Yemen. As it argues, by restricting Sunni groups’ strategic options in Yemen and elsewhere in the region, Iran makes the Islamic State and al-Qaeda more attractive to locals. This is partly a problem of perception. Saudi Arabia overstates Iran’s capacities and does not believe its own propaganda that it is able to counter it. It is also partly a problem of Saudi Arabia’s own making. The kingdom has no strategic approach to national security, preferring short-term tactical alliances and the comfort of familiar, ill-researched, and exaggerated assumptions about what Iran and its allies are up to—and what they ultimately want. These tactical motivations encourage shifting alliances that can alienate friends and create bigger problems for the kingdom, in Yemen and elsewhere.