Saleh era
From 1994 until 2013, the army was organized into five military districts or regions; the Northwest Military Region, Central Military Region (which included the capital of Sanaa), Middle Military Region, Southern Military Region and Eastern Military Region, each roughly equating to a specific geographical area of Yemen. Each military region was headed by a high-ranking general, who was in charge of military activities in their respective area and supervised the brigades and camps based there. [5] The de jure system had it that, if a military unit was operating in region it was not assigned to, its operational command would be shifted to the jurisdiction of the relevant regional commander. In reality, Saleh's personal Republican Guard and Ahmar's northwest-based 1st Armoured Division often functioned independently wherever it operated, and still "retained administrative and logistical authority" in cases where it didn't, creating a frequent source of frustration for the commanders. [5]
The concentration of units in each region strongly correlated to their importance in maintaining power, such as the regions containing Sanaa and Aden, where security forces were usually deployed to "break up protests, infiltrate opposition groups, and manipulate social movements". The weakness of the central state outside of the major population centres resulted in each of the five regions effectively functioning as autonomous states. A United States Department of State report noted that regional commanders functioned as "the final authority in nearly every aspect of regional governance. In practice, they behave like tribal sheikhs and super-governors, parceling out new schools, water projects, and money. Despite periodic efforts to integrate military units, the Commanders recruit largely from regional tribes." Commanders often enriched themselves by hiring ghost soldiers, so much so that most brigades were staffed by one-third to one-half with non-existent soldiers.
In 1999 and 2000, Saleh began to position for his son, Ahmed Ali Abdullah Saleh, to succeed him as President, angering much of the Sanhani elite within the military. An internal split in allegiances materialized between those loyal to Saleh and those who instead allied to Ahmar, who utilized his position as the longtime-Northwest region commander to create an extensive tribal patronage network, thus retaining the support of the Northwest and Eastern military regions. Among other measures to secure the dominance of his faction over the security forces, Saleh appointed his half-brother as head of the Office of the Commander-in-Chief, which functioned as an instrument to communicate directly with the military including regional commanders while bypassing the Ministry of Defense. The Northwest Military Region was the army's main theater of operations during the Houthi insurgency throughout the 2000s, which allowed Saleh to indirectly weaken his internal rival as he built up the strength of forces allied to him.
Yemeni revolution
The rivalry in the armed forces eventually came to a head during the Yemeni revolution. [15] On 21 March 2011, three days after pro-Saleh soldiers massacred over 50 peaceful protesters in Sanaa, Ahmar announced his defection to the opposition, declaring that troops under his command would protect protesters from the regime and supporting popular demands for Saleh to resign. He was soon followed by numerous other commanders within the military, including Eastern Military Region commander Muhammad Ali Ahmar and Central Military Region commander Saif al-Baqri. These defections resulted in Saleh losing control over most forces in the northwest and east. Major protest centers such as Sanaa and Taiz were the site of clashes between pro and anti-Saleh military forces. Regardless of these events, it was the Southern Military Region which experienced the most fighting during this period, as it battled militants from al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) and its local front, Ansar al-Sharia, which took advantage of the chaos to seize several cities in Abyan and Shabwah governorates.
Restructuring
In February 2012, Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi officially took power as President in accordance to the agreed upon internationally-backed deal to have Saleh relinquish power. During the first months of his tenure, Hadi's began restricting the military in order to curb the influence of Saleh and personnel still loyal to him. By April, he had appointed new commanders to four of the five military regions, with the exception of the Northwest region. [18]
On 19 December 2012, Hadi announced a major restructuring of the military. Among the changes included a redistricting of the military regions, which were increased from five to seven, and the disbandment of the Republican Guard and 1st Armoured Division, which were to have their units be integrated into the regional command structure. [5] The Northwest Military Region was split into two separate regions [5] along with the Eastern Military Region, which was divided into the 1st Military Region, constituting upper Hadhramaut Governorate, and the 2nd Military Region, which contains lower Hadhramaut and Al Mahrah Governorate. [20] The new regions and their headquarters were officially established on 10 April 2013 under Presidential Decree No. 104, as the government announced the commanders heading each of them. [21] [22] The 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th regions, where AQAP had the most concentrated presence, were allocated more resources in order to better fight the insurgency.
