Feb 18, 2016

Saudi Arabia is hosting large-scale military training maneuvers on its northeast border to signal strength to Iran and provide substance to its proposed Islamic military alliance against Iran and terror groups. The highly publicized maneuvers also deflect attention from the stalemate in Yemen, where the Saudi-led coalition backing the ousted government is still struggling to defeat the Houthi rebels and their allies.

Called "Northern Thunder," the exercise involves 150,000 troops from 20 countries, according to the Saudi press: Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, the UAE, Oman, Jordan, Pakistan, Djibouti, Mauritania, Senegal, Sudan, Chad, Tunisia, Morocco, Comoros, Mauritius, Malaysia, Egypt and the Maldives. The force allegedly includes 2,540 aircraft and 460 helicopters, according to Saudi media, and 20,000 armored vehicles.

The exercises are being held around the Saudi military facility at Hafr al Batin, which has long been the home of the Gulf Cooperation Council's Peninsula Shield task force, the GCC's rapid response unit. If the numbers reported by the Saudi press are accurate, this is the largest military operation in the region since the liberation of Kuwait in Operation Desert Storm, a quarter-century ago this month.

Saudi commentary says the purpose of Northern Thunder is to deter Iran from aggression against the Gulf states. Implicit in their analysis is the Saudi assumption that Iraq or at least the Baghdad government is all but a satellite of Tehran and a potential Iranian ally in a future conflict between Riyadh and Tehran. From the Saudi perspective, Iraq has gone from being the Eastern shield of the Arab world resisting Persian and Shiite Iran to a puppet controlled by Iran.

The exercises are also intended to show the Islamic military alliance announced last December by Saudi Defense Minister and Deputy Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman has a solid base. The alliance is intended to both deter Iran and combat terrorists including the Islamic State (IS) and al-Qaeda. The Royal Saudi Air Force has resumed combat operations against IS in Iraq after a hiatus due to the Yemen war and has deployed aircraft to Turkey to attack IS targets.