POLI 227 Lecture Notes - Small Arms Trade, Politics Of Yemen, Demining
11 Mar 2014
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Document Summary
Initially a popular protest movement against the regime. Part of that had to do with factions within the military. Yemeni politics was often divided along tribal lines. Opposition movement became less popular as student/youth protests became less important than factions within the military. Has a conscript military, but the key combat units/high officers come from minority sects. So the senior ranks and the officer core are from the same sect as the president. At the same time the regime can"t be fully confident that all its army is loyal. Large parts of the army haven"t been active in street combat; government has relied on special units (and even militia units) Syrian army was designed in such a way to reduce the risk of military coup. President assad"s father came into power within a military coup; they"ve spent a lot of time to design the military so as to guarantee its loyalty. Protests were originally broad-based, disproportionally supported by shi"ites.
