Houthi attacks and submarine cable infrastructure
Recent attacks by the Houthis of Yemen on ships transiting the Gulf of Aden and the Red Sea have garnered much attention globally. The attacks began as an attempt to stop Israeli ships from passing through the area as punishment for the war in Gaza and have disrupted normal shipping operations of global logistics companies.
Responses to the attacks include U.S. and British airstrikes against Houthi areas in Yemen and the re-designation of the group as “global terrorists” by the Biden administration. There are now troubling reports that the Houthis may damage or cut submarine communications cables to Europe as an extension of their operations.
It is unfortunate that the targeting of critical infrastructure seems to be normalizing as a tool of international affairs. Damage to a pipeline and submarine cable between Finland and Estonia, the cutting of submarine cables connecting Taiwan to the Matsu Islands, a ransomware attack on the Colonial Pipeline of the southern United States and the bombing of the Nord Stream natural gas pipelines between Europe and Russia have all occurred in the past three years.
Houthi targeting of submarine cable infrastructure would certainly be a concern for those affected. However, there is a rather disturbing gap between the potentiality and plausibility of Houthi attacks on this critical infrastructure. Put more forthrightly, it simply does not seem a realistic course of action for the Houthis to follow.
The truth is that once a communications cable experiences a degraded or lost signal, a network operations center gets a warning message so operators can locate the fault. Signal traffic is automatically rerouted by the system. The global telecommunications system is so redundant that when the 2006 Hengchun earthquake off the southwest coast of Taiwan cut eight cables in the area, traffic became slow and congested but remained remarkably functional. Inconvenient? Yes. Economically catastrophic? No.
According to TeleGeography’s online Submarine Cable Map, there are 17 cables that pass through the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait, the narrowest choke point between the coast of Yemen and the coast of Djibouti. North of Bab-el-Mandeb is the Red Sea, which borders Houthi territory and has an estimated average depth of 490 meters, though it is 100 meters or shallower in many areas. Could a potential Houthi attack cause an inconvenience? Yes. Can the Houthis cut 17 cables simultaneously so nobody notices and the system cannot reroute? Extremely improbable and made more so by reports that the Houthis do not have the technology necessary to easily locate or damage cables at these depths. Nonetheless, we are led to believe the group may employ some bold, new tactic to potentially disrupt communications upon which the West relies.
Furthermore, although Western analysts often call the Houthis “militants” and “rebels” to seemingly imply they are run-of-the-mill, pro-Iranian terrorists, the group is a sophisticated political entity. Even if not recognized as the legitimate Yemeni government by Western states, the Houthis run a functioning government, control the most populous parts of Yemen, levy taxes, have a currency and formulate domestic and foreign policy. Why is this important?
Well, submarine communications cables carry more than 95 percent of all global digital communications and more than 99 percent of all internet traffic. In the Houthi-controlled territory of Yemen, there is one submarine cable landing station housing two cables, one of which connects Africa, the Middle East and South Asia, while the other connects Europe, Africa, the Middle East and Southeast Asia.
The Houthis, their government and their citizens need these communications cables just like the rest of us. There is little reason to believe they would cut their own communications to spite Western powers, which lessens considerably any attractiveness to attacking the other 15 cables in the open sea.
Still, this past January, the Houthi Ministry of Foreign Affairs had to refute claims made in Israel-affiliated media that the Houthis were planning to target submarine cables in the Babel-Mandeb Strait. The ministry said, “The approach of the Yemeni government is to focus on building and development [of] telecom and internet services,” and “ships executing submarine cable works should obtain the necessary permits and approval,” which is the normal operating procedure for working in a country’s territorial waters.
Despite Houthi denials, the initial claims of potential Houthi attacks continue to be voiced by the internationally recognized Yemeni government, which has been at war with the Houthis for years. It is also possible that this narrative of potential Houthi attacks is being constructed by interested parties in hopes of dragging the United States and like-minded allies deeper into a widening conflict in the region.
In 1964, unverified attacks in the Gulf of Tonkin led to a major U.S. escalation in its war in Vietnam. Doctored reports by U.S. intelligence agencies and the White House regarding weapons of mass destruction in Iraq led to a U.S. invasion in 2003. Like these cases from the past, recent analyses of Houthi designs on submarine cables seem to lack veracity but may act as an effective pretext for expanding U.S. military operations in the Middle East, an outcome that would simply add to the tragedies of this troubled region.
Although I strongly believe the protection of submarine communications cables is in the global interest, an objective reading of the facts, in this case, leads me to conclude the potentiality of Houthi attacks on these cables is highly improbable, and should an attack occur, it would not be catastrophic. The real danger appears to be the propagation of questionable analyses by those with an agenda, which, if left unquestioned, could have tragic consequences.
Houthi targeting of submarine cable infrastructure would certainly be a concern for those affected.
Sean O’Malley (seanmo@dongseo.ac.kr) is a tenured professor of international studies at Dongseo University and a former submarine cable network technician. His latest paper on submarine communications cable infrastructure is in the current issue of the Journal of Territorial and Maritime Studies.