Note to self: Do Not Bet On The Houthis

From Agence France-Presse: 

Yemen's Houthis say Saudi Arabia launched more than 50 strikes against their positions in 24 hours. Fighting between the Iran-backed group and Saudi-backed government forces renewed in July when the Houthis declared a maritime blockade on Saudi Arabia and began targeting its ships in the Red Sea https://t.co/cMLZEmBk6E

— AFP News Agency (@AFP) September 14, 2026

The Saudi's fell down on the job when they allowed the Houthis to break the cordon and get to the Red Sea. However....

The Saudis have money. A lot of money and if they want to drop a million-dollar bomb on the head of each of 10,000 Houthis they can afford the $10 billion out of cash on hand.

Additionally the U.S. has shipped 200 advisors to Saudi to coordinate the intelligence and satellite recon. to assist in picking off individual Houthis should the Saudis so desire.

Granted the 200 advisors are not the Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders but then there probably won't be the need for a bayonet charge. 

As noted (intro and outro) from March 2024's "Palantir Cuts Deal To Clear Landmines In Ukraine": 

So no HALO Trust?

*****

I was thinking of the HALO Trust because of Lt Col Colin Campbell Mitchell and I was thinking of the Lieutenant Colonel because of the failure of the Western militaries to convince the Houthis to stop firing missiles at passing ships.

In Aden Yemen he led what has been referred to as the "Last Battle of the British Empire" in July 1967.

He and his 700 -strong 1st Battalion, Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders did a bayonet charge at 500-700 of the local militia and police who had perfidiously killed a bunch of Brits a couple weeks earlier.

As they charged the bagpipes began making their Godawful noise, in this case the regimental charge Mony Musk. Here's a recording from the year after the charge:

Commanding Officer Lt Col C.C. Mitchell
Drum Major WO ll J Malloch
Pipe Major Sgt. K. Robson
1968

 

As the crazy Scotsmen are running straight at the Yemenis, 30 seconds into the charge the pipes go double-time. In December's "Maersk Ship Hit by Missile in the Red Sea"  I mentioned:

It might be time for a reprise of "Mad Mitch" in Yemen with cold steel and pipes skirling

with a short explanation after the jump:

...Back to Mad Mitch, after he was basically chased out of the British Army for exceeding his orders, he went on to found, along with his wife and another Scotsman, the HALO Trust, clearing landmines from the world's conflict areas and keeping kids bipedal. 

His regiment's march, Mony Musk, sounds like it would be quite terrifying to those being approached by a bunch of loony Scots, never mind the bayonets.

And then it goes up-tempo, Yikes! I'd be thinking, time to run.

It was in all the papers and contemporaneous reports on the "mad hillmen" were referring to the Scots, not the Houthis or other Yemenis. But as a result hardly a shot was fired, the Yemenis laid down their weapons and Britain pulled out of Aden, their only Arab colony, on the schedule they had announced in 1963 and the rest is history.

HALO Trust has cleared tens of thousand of acres of a million or two landmines in conflict zones all around the world, and kept a few thousand - or more - kids walking on two legs. 

Or walking at all.

And that's why I thought of the HALO Trust.

Brent $107.81, WTI 103.52. Don't bet on the Houthis.

(stop at $105 WTI)