Huthi Defence Minister Major-General Mohamed Nasser Al-Atifi in a
captured US Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected vehicle in 2019 [photo
credit: Ansar Allah]
Interestingly, when the Huthis took over Saleh’s military they chose
not to make sweeping changes and kept much of the same geographic
command structure and nomenclature. Huthi senior military commanders
still wear formal Yemeni army uniforms and obey rank conventions, for
instance not wearing red staff ‘tabs’ (epaulettes) if they have not
attended staff college.
Senior Huthi military commanders who were once senior figures in Ali
Abdullah Saleh’s Western-backed military include, most notably, the
current Huthi Minister of Defence, Major General Mohammed al-Atifi. He was once President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s most trusted
commander, responsible for the elite Missile Batteries Group which
controls Yemen’s medium and short-range ballistic missiles. Today he is
aiming those same missiles at Israeli, US and UK ships in the Red Sea
and is ranked number 7 in the most wanted Huthi list with a $20 million
dollar bounty on his head.
Another prominent Huthi leader who was once in Saleh’s army is the Chief of the General Staff Mohammed Abdalkarim al-Ghammari
(AKA Hashim al-Ghammari). Born in 1981, al-Ghammari has been a
beneficiary of the Ministry of Defence for a long time because after his
father died accidentally in a fire while serving in the MoD al-Ghammari
was awarded an honorary rank. He is regarded as the power behind the
defence minister’s throne and also holds another key position in Huthi
high command as Military Regions Official
whose role is engaging directly with the regional commanders, tracking
their needs and allocating “enablers’’ in fields including drones,
missiles, intelligence capabilities, armour, and artillery.
In 2021 the U.S. Treasury assessed:
As the Head of the General Staff of the Huthi armed forces, the
most senior commander within the Huthi military leadership structure,
Al-Ghammari is directly responsible for overseeing Huthi military
operations that have destroyed civilian infrastructure and (attacked)
Yemen’s neighbours, specifically Saudi Arabia and the UAE. He directs
the procurement and deployment of various weapons, including improvised
explosive devices, ammunition, and UAVs [Unmanned Aerial Vehicles].
Al-Ghammari has also overseen Huthi UAV and missile attacks against
Saudi Arabian targets.
Other former high-ranking Saleh soldiers turned Huthi commanders
include Abdullah Yahya al Hakim AKA Abu Ali, who played a pivotal role
in the Huthi consolidation of power and has also been sanctioned
by the UN; Major General Mohammed al-Miqdad whose operations room at
the Defence Ministry tracks the frontlines and movements of enemy
forces; and Major General Zakaria Yahya al-Shami whose key role in the takeover of Sana’a led to him being appointed as deputy chief of staff of the Huthi armed forces. He later became the Huthi minister of transport.
Although Western analysts and media never mention it, the Huthi war effort has also been bolstered by unknown numbers of senior Saudi military defectors who have also been trained by the US and the UK, such as Sgt Major Dakheel Al Qahtani
who before he went to Yemen to fight the Saudis was a senior
non-commissioned officer in Saudi Air Defence and was decorated twice
for heroism in the Gulf War.
The painful truth is that when it comes to anti-colonial struggles
and liberation movements it is the norm that the West’s most trusted
military and political allies took the weapons and the training - with
powerful members of their armed forces secretly awaiting the opportunity
to use the weapons against the occupiers - to become the West’s most
potent foes. In Iraq, Somalia, Afghanistan, Algeria and beyond Western
forces have always found their most dangerous opponents were actually
trained and armed by the West itself. In Egypt, the most effective
jihadist leaders like Saif al-Adel and Hisham al-Ashmawy
were commanders in the special forces which work hand in glove with the
US military. And the last time the British were defeated by the Yemenis
in 1967 they were staggered to find when they came to hand over power
to FLOSY [Front for the Liberation of Occupied South Yemen] that the
incoming government included Yemenis who not only did they already know
personally, but that up until that very moment they had believed were
their most reliable and trustworthy allies.
So next time you hear Western media and politicians describe the
Huthis as Iran-backed, think again. “US-armed Huthis” may be a more
accurate moniker.