Yemen's Crackdown on Protesters Escalates to Air Strikes, Risking War

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2011/05/yemens-crackdown-on-protesters-escalates-to-air-strikes-risking-war/239054/

No one gives a shit about poor little Yemen. As I recall, this country was split down the middle North and South for much of its history as an actual country. The two Yemens were client states of the Soviets and the Americans, not that it matters which was which, and acted as a counter-balance to the two other client states across the Gulf of Aden, Ethipoa and Somalia. I'm sure some radar bases and minor airfields were put into place and someone somewhere was enriched. (Note: being a minor client state in the 70s and 80s for either the Americans or the Soviets clearly did not pay, at least for the populace.)
Clearly there is not a history of legitimate government in Yemen and I'd be surprised to learn that either the government or the opposition think of themselves as the same ethnic or even national makeup as the other. I don't see a way to tamp down this civil conflict, which will probably end with the Saudis funneling money, guns and expertise to the government over the course of the next decade. The opposition will become increasingly radicalized and will probably receive material support from across the sea from Somali Islamists and pirates, of all things. I don't think it will descend into Somali-style chaos, but a lawless region on the tip of the Arabian peninsula, directly across the Aden Sea from the gold standard of lawless regions, populated by disaffected civillians and radical Islamists, is probably a situation that the West can't tolerate. What they can do about it is a good question.