The Lift Line
“The Saudis have no good options for untangling this unprecedented Iran-Houthi pincer.” (Mahesh Sachdev, The Hindu, 22 October 2026)
Why This Editorial Matters for Your Exam
In the news: on 22 October 2026, The Hindu’s lead article by Mahesh Sachdev, a retired Indian Ambassador specialising in the Arab world and oil issues, argued that Saudi Arabia is squeezed at two chokepoints at once: the Strait of Hormuz in the east and the Bab al-Mandeb Strait in the west.
The column appeared a day after an attack on King Fahd International Airport in Dammam on 21 October killed two people, a Saudi national and an Indian resident, and wounded eight, according to Saudi Arabia’s General Authority of Civil Aviation (Reuters, via Al Jazeera). The Houthis claimed attacks on Saudi infrastructure that included the airport. On 22 October India’s Ministry of External Affairs condemned “the attack on King Fahd International Airport in Dammam and Saudi Aramco’s Shaybah oil field in the Eastern Province on October 21”, as reported by The Hindu. The attack is covered in today’s roundup.
For context, on 11 October this site explained the Riyadh airport attack and what it means for India-Saudi ties. Sachdev takes the wider view: why Saudi Arabia is caught between two straits, what its options are, and why India cannot look away.
GS Paper 2: India and its extended neighbourhood (West Asia); effect of policies and politics of other countries on India’s interests; Indian diaspora. GS Paper 3: energy security; infrastructure (pipelines and sea routes). GS Paper 1: important geophysical features (straits).
The Crux in 60 Words
Saudi Arabia, the world’s eighth-biggest military spender (SIPRI), is squeezed from both sides: oil flows through Hormuz have collapsed, the Houthis have moved onto the Bab al-Mandeb, and the Red Sea bypass pipeline has been attacked. Sachdev argues force will not undo this pincer and a negotiated truce might. India, with its oil, LPG and nearly ten million citizens in the Gulf, is exposed either way.
Mahesh Sachdev argues that Saudi Arabia faces an unprecedented Iran-Houthi pincer, with Hormuz constricted in the east and the Houthis pressing on the Bab al-Mandeb in the west, that its only viable option is a negotiated de-escalation, and that India must guard its energy supplies and its citizens in the Gulf.
- US Energy Information Administration (EIA) estimates show oil flows through Hormuz falling from 21.6 million barrels a day in the fourth quarter of 2025 to 4.9 million in the second quarter of 2026, which puts more weight on Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea outlet.
- In September 2026, according to FDD’s Long War Journal, the Houthis took Mocha, the Red Sea coast and Perim Island in the Bab al-Mandeb; Saudi Aramco’s East-West pipeline to Yanbu was shut down, as reported on 11 September, after drone attacks on 10 September that Saudi officials said were launched from Iraq.
- Houthi missiles and drones have hit Riyadh airport (10 October, at least 12 killed) and Dammam airport (21 October, two killed, one of them an Indian resident).
- Sachdev argues that Riyadh, despite about $83 billion in military spending in 2025 (SIPRI), lacks the military heft to dislodge the Houthis from their mountain positions by a ground offensive.
Some analysts treat the Houthis as acting in step with Iran and its allies: an analyst at FDD’s Long War Journal judged the September attacks on the Saudi pipeline ‘likely conducted in coordination with the Houthis’. On that reading a separate Saudi-Houthi deal would not lift the pressure.
Sachdev replies that the proxy label is an oversimplification that gives too little weight to the Houthis’ Arab identity.
For Riyadh, Sachdev’s answer is a negotiated package: de-escalate, lift the mutual air and maritime blockades and build a truce on the 2022 ceasefire. For India: keep crude and LPG sources diverse, keep evacuation plans for the Gulf ready, and use its Strategic Partnership Council with Saudi Arabia to back de-escalation without taking sides.
Background and Context
The two straits in 2026
| Strait | Lies between | What has happened in 2026 |
|---|---|---|
| Hormuz | Oman and Iran; joins the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Oman and the Arabian Sea | A US-Iran conflict began after US and Israeli attacks on Tehran in February 2026 (Anadolu). EIA estimates of oil flows through the strait, in million barrels a day (mb/d): 21.6 in the fourth quarter of 2025, 14.9 in the first quarter of 2026 and 4.9 in the second quarter |
| Bab al-Mandeb | The Horn of Africa and West Asia; joins the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden | The Houthis took Mocha on 10 September 2026, then the Red Sea coast and Perim Island, in the middle of the strait, the next day, and the Hanish Islands (FDD’s Long War Journal, 14 September); government forces claimed some recovery on 13 September |
Over the same quarters EIA’s estimate of oil flows through the Bab el-Mandeb rose, from 3.9 mb/d in the first quarter of 2025 to 8.1 mb/d in the second quarter of 2026. EIA cautions that its tanker-tracking (AIS) data “may be incomplete if the AIS signal has been manipulated or turned off”. For context, Euronews reported on 10 September that the Houthi seizure of Mokha was “meant to replicate Iran’s Hormuz blockade in the Bab el-Mandeb”.
The Red Sea bypass, and the attack on it
Saudi Aramco operates the East-West crude oil pipeline, which EIA describes as a 5 million b/d line from the Abqaiq processing centre near the Persian Gulf to the Yanbu port on the Red Sea; its capacity was temporarily raised to 7 million b/d in 2019. The background to the column’s pipeline claim: FDD’s Long War Journal dates the closure to 10 September, and The National reported on 11 September that the pipeline “has been shut down as a precautionary measure after ‘multiple’ attacks”, and that officials later said it was attacked by drones launched from Iraq. Sachdev calls the line the “Trans-Arabian Pipeline” and blames Iraqi Shia militias for the disruption.
A conflict nearly a century old, as the author tells it
Sachdev wants to correct what he calls “myopic and slanted” coverage, and starts with history (background, in his account):
- 1934: Saudi forces defeated the fighters of Yemen’s Imam Yahya; under the Treaty of Taif, he says, Yemen ceded three provinces in the Asir region.
- 2000: a border was demarcated, though many Yemeni nationalists, he writes, still question its finality.
- Until 1990, he says, Yemenis needed no visas to work in Saudi Arabia, and millions migrated.
- Sect: he describes Saudis as predominantly Wahhabi Sunnis and the Houthis as mostly Zaydis, a Shia sect, and calls the Yemeni civil war “12-year-old”.
- 2022: on 1 April 2022 the UN envoy announced a two-month truce, to start the next day (AP). Sachdev says this “tenuous ceasefire” held until fighting “exploded in July 2026”.
Strikes on Saudi cities
| Date (2026) | Target | Reported toll |
|---|---|---|
| 10 October | Riyadh airport | at least 12 killed (12 per AP; 13 per Reuters) |
| 11 October | Riyadh airport | struck again a day later (AP) |
| 21 October | King Fahd International Airport, Dammam | 2 killed (a Saudi national and an Indian resident), 8 wounded |
Sachdev writes that the Houthis have aimed missiles and drones at strategic targets, including Riyadh airport and Aramco facilities, and that this is “the first time in 35 years” that the Kingdom’s cities have come under sustained attack (his reckoning). India’s MEA named Saudi Aramco’s Shaybah oil field among the 21 October targets.
The Analysis
Sachdev builds his case in five steps.
1. The pincer. In the east, Hormuz is constricted; in the west, the Houthis sit on the Bab al-Mandeb; and the pipeline that was meant to route Saudi crude around Hormuz has itself been attacked. Together, he writes, these create “a worst-case scenario for Saudi Arabia, jeopardising its vital oil exports, particularly to Asia”. The logic is simple: a bypass only helps if its own exit is open, and Yanbu’s exit to Asia is the Red Sea.
2. The myths he wants to puncture. Sachdev argues that much of the coverage is wrong in five ways:
- Proxy. Calling the Houthis Iran’s proxies is, he says, “an oversimplification” that underrates their Arab identity. His evidence: they stayed out of “the two recent United States-Iran wars”, and Iran, he writes, has offered to mediate between Riyadh and Sana’a.
- Motive. He says the Houthi rationale for the attacks is retaliation for “the Kingdom’s decade-old air and sea blockade” against them.
- Hormuz is not normal. He cites “a 70% rise in global oil prices” (he gives no base period) against claims that Gulf flows are near normal. EIA’s own estimates point the same way: Hormuz oil flows of 4.9 mb/d in the second quarter of 2026, against 21.6 mb/d in the last quarter of 2025.
- Iran’s game. He suspects that Iran’s Revolutionary Guards first ran an “informal tolling arrangement” with some Gulf exporters, and that Tehran now restricts supplies to keep prices high until the US midterm elections. This is his reading.
- Pakistan. Iran and the US reached a memorandum of understanding on 17 June 2026 aimed at ending their conflict, and Pakistan urged both to uphold their commitments under the “Islamabad Memorandum of Understanding” (Anadolu, 9 July). Sachdev asks why Pakistan has since been sidelined as a peacemaker while Qatar, Iraq and Moscow are drawn in.
3. Saudi Arabia’s poor options. SIPRI puts Saudi military spending in 2025 at $83.2 billion, the eighth biggest in the world. Even so, Sachdev argues, Riyadh lacks the heft to dislodge the Houthis from their “mountainous perches” by a ground offensive; its local Yemeni allies are bogged down in “a war of attrition”; and backers such as the White House and what he calls the partners to the “Makkah Agreement” have offered only “tokenism”. The one viable path, he says, is to negotiate: de-escalate, lift mutual air and maritime blockades, and agree a truce based on the 2022 ceasefire.
4. The cost of a deal, for Riyadh. Sachdev lists the risks honestly: a loss of prestige at home and in the region, the possible collapse of Yemen’s “internationally recognised government”, and a firmer Tehran-Sana’a axis. He thinks a quick settlement is still in Saudi interest because, in his view, another round of US-Iran conflict could follow the US midterm elections, and, he writes, Iran has made no secret of its intention to hit the Gulf Arab states it sees as US accomplices. Without a Yemen settlement, he warns, Saudi Arabia may face attacks from both.
5. India’s stake. India is not a party at either strait, but it is exposed on three fronts:
| Front | The figure | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Crude | 33.14 million tonnes (MMT) from Saudi Arabia in FY2024-25, 13.58% of India’s crude imports | MEA bilateral brief |
| LPG | 3.34 MMT from Saudi Arabia, 14.99% | MEA bilateral brief |
| The Hormuz route | about 45% of India’s crude imports transited Hormuz; India imports about 60% of the LPG it consumes, and about 90% of those imports come through Hormuz | PIB, March 2026 |
| Trade | USD 41.88 billion with Saudi Arabia in FY2024-25 | MEA bilateral brief |
| People | about 27.5 lakh NRIs in Saudi Arabia; about 9.9 million NRIs across the six GCC states (sum of MEA’s figures for each) | MEA, January 2026 |
| Remittances | the GCC supplied 38% of India’s remittances in 2023-24; Saudi Arabia’s share was 6.7%, down from 11.6% in 2016-17 | RBI, sixth survey round (March 2025) |
Sachdev puts the Indians in the Gulf at “nine million”; MEA’s January 2026 country figures add up to nearly ten million NRIs. He recalls that in 1990-91 the cost of bringing home, by his count, about 1.6 lakh Indians from Kuwait helped precipitate the economic crisis that forced India to pledge its gold, and notes that the number of Indians in the Gulf now exceeds that figure “by more than 50 times”. The lesson he draws: an evacuation on today’s scale would be a very different undertaking.
Data and Institutions Vault
Prelims-grade facts:
The straits:
- Strait of Hormuz: between Oman and Iran; joins the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Oman and the Arabian Sea.
- Bab al-Mandeb Strait: joins the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden and the Arabian Sea; 18 miles wide at its narrowest (EIA).
- Perim Island lies in the middle of the Bab al-Mandeb; the Hanish Islands were also taken by the Houthis in September 2026.
- East-West pipeline (Saudi Aramco): Abqaiq to Yanbu on the Red Sea; 5 million b/d, raised to 7 million b/d for a time in 2019.
Saudi Arabia:
- SIPRI (27 April 2026): Saudi military spending of $83.2 billion in 2025, the world’s eighth biggest.
- Saudi-Yemen frontier, background: the author’s markers are the 1934 Treaty of Taif and the 2000 border demarcation.
India and Saudi Arabia:
- Strategic Partnership Council Agreement: signed during the Prime Minister’s Riyadh visit of 28-29 October 2019.
- Crude: 33.14 MMT from Saudi Arabia in FY2024-25, 13.58% of India’s crude imports (MEA).
- LPG: 3.34 MMT, 14.99%; bilateral trade USD 41.88 billion in FY2024-25 (MEA).
- Diaspora: about 27.5 lakh NRIs in Saudi Arabia (MEA, January 2026).
- Remittances: the six GCC states gave 38% of India’s remittances in 2023-24 (RBI).
The 2026 timeline, in context:
- 17 June: the Islamabad Memorandum, an Iran-US MoU aimed at ending their conflict.
- 10 September: Houthis take Mocha (FDD’s Long War Journal); drone attacks on the East-West pipeline, reported shut down on 11 September.
- 10 October: Riyadh airport strike, at least 12 killed (12 per AP, 13 per Reuters).
- 21 October: Dammam airport attack, 2 killed, one an Indian resident.
⚠️ Watch the trap: the pipeline shut down after the drone attacks of 10 September 2026 is Saudi Aramco’s East-West pipeline (Abqaiq to Yanbu). It bypasses Hormuz, not the Bab al-Mandeb, so Saudi oil loaded at Yanbu still needs the Red Sea route open. SIPRI’s $83.2 billion is 2025 military spending, not a budget. Hormuz opens to the Gulf of Oman; the Bab al-Mandeb opens to the Gulf of Aden.
The Debate
The case for Sachdev’s line (negotiate). Force has not worked: a ground offensive in Yemen’s mountains is, in his account, beyond Saudi reach, and its allies are stuck in attrition. Each month of fighting keeps the Bab al-Mandeb at risk while Hormuz is already constricted. A deal that lifts the mutual blockades on the lines of the 2022 truce would reopen the Red Sea route and lower the risk to Saudi cities, to shipping and to the about 27.5 lakh Indian NRIs who live in Saudi Arabia.
The other side. A deal under fire could reward the Houthis for force and for holding a chokepoint. If the Houthis act in step with Iran and its allies, as an analyst at FDD’s Long War Journal judged of the pipeline attacks, a separate Saudi-Houthi truce would not end the squeeze, and Riyadh would have paid in prestige for little. Sachdev himself names the risks: the possible collapse of Yemen’s internationally recognised government and a stronger Tehran-Sana’a axis.
The balanced verdict. Sachdev’s case rests on the claim that the Houthis are partners of Iran, not mere proxies, so a direct deal can stick. That is contestable, but the alternative he describes, a war Riyadh cannot win while both straits stay under pressure, is costlier. For India, the useful lesson is independent of who is right: a bypass is only as safe as its own chokepoint, and the diaspora is part of energy security.
How to Think About This
Use the “bypass has its own chokepoint” lens for any question on sea routes and energy:
- Route: which passage carries the flow? (Hormuz for the Gulf’s crude and LPG.)
- Bypass: what is the alternative? (The East-West pipeline to Yanbu.)
- The bypass’s own weak point: where does the alternative exit? (The Red Sea, and so the Bab al-Mandeb.)
- Who can close each: a state (Iran at Hormuz), a non-state force (the Houthis at the Bab al-Mandeb), or drones against a pipeline.
- India’s ledger: energy (crude, LPG), people (NRIs), money (remittances), and the cost of an evacuation.
Pair it with a second test when a writer calls a militia someone’s “proxy”: ask what the group does when its patron’s interests differ. Sachdev’s evidence that the Houthis stayed out of the US-Iran wars is exactly that kind of test.
Diagram-in-Words
Saudi Arabia between two chokepoints
Covers the squeeze at Hormuz and the Bab al-Mandeb, the attack on the Red Sea bypass, the strikes on Saudi cities, the author’s way out and India’s exposure.
Simultaneous disruption at the Strait of Hormuz and the Bab al-Mandeb Strait exposes the limits of route diversification. Examine the implications for India's energy security and its Gulf diaspora, and suggest a way forward. (250 words)
The Strait of Hormuz, between Oman and Iran, is the Persian Gulf’s exit to the Arabian Sea; the Bab al-Mandeb, between the Horn of Africa and West Asia, is the Red Sea’s door to the Gulf of Aden. In 2026 both came under pressure at once, testing Saudi Arabia and, through it, India’s energy security and its Gulf diaspora.
Energy. US EIA estimates put oil flows through Hormuz at 21.6 million barrels a day in the last quarter of 2025 and 4.9 million in the second quarter of 2026.
Saudi Arabia’s bypass, the East-West pipeline from Abqaiq to the Red Sea port of Yanbu, was shut down, as reported on 11 September 2026, after drone attacks on 10 September that Saudi officials said came from Iraq, and that month, according to FDD’s Long War Journal, the Houthis took Mocha, the Red Sea coast and Perim Island in the Bab al-Mandeb. A bypass is only as safe as its own chokepoint.
India imported 33.14 million tonnes of crude from Saudi Arabia in 2024-25, 13.58 per cent of its crude imports (MEA), and PIB noted in March 2026 that about 45 per cent of India’s crude imports transited Hormuz. People and money.
MEA’s January 2026 figures for the six GCC states add up to about 9.9 million NRIs, and the GCC supplied 38 per cent of India’s remittances in 2023-24 (RBI). Missile and drone attacks on the airports of Riyadh and Dammam in October 2026 killed people at both, including an Indian resident at Dammam.
Route diversification fails when the bypass has its own chokepoint. India needs more diverse crude and LPG suppliers, ready evacuation plans for the Gulf, and steady diplomacy, through its Strategic Partnership Council with Saudi Arabia, for a negotiated truce in Yemen.
Interview Angle
"Suppose the Bab al-Mandeb is blocked while Hormuz flows are still disrupted, and Indian workers in the Gulf begin asking to come home. What should India do first, and in what order?"
Takeaway Box
- Lift line: “The Saudis have no good options for untangling this unprecedented Iran-Houthi pincer.”
- Core idea: Hormuz is constricted, the Houthis press on the Bab al-Mandeb, and the Red Sea bypass was attacked; the author argues only a negotiated truce can ease the squeeze.
- Prelims hooks: Hormuz (Oman-Iran, Gulf of Oman); Bab al-Mandeb (Red Sea-Gulf of Aden, 18 miles); Perim and Hanish Islands; East-West pipeline (Abqaiq to Yanbu); SIPRI 2025: $83.2 billion, eighth; India-Saudi SPC (2019); GCC 38% of remittances (2023-24).
- Ethics and Interview angle: the duty of care to citizens abroad, and how a state weighs the safety of millions of workers against strategic choices in a war it is not part of.
- Probable question: “Examine the significance of the Bab al-Mandeb and the Strait of Hormuz for India’s energy security.” (GS3, 250 words)
Sources:
- Mahesh Sachdev, “The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in dire straits”, The Hindu, 22 October 2026
- SIPRI press release, 27 April 2026
- US EIA, Today in Energy (27 August 2019; 16 June 2025) and Short-Term Energy Outlook supplement, August 2026
- FDD’s Long War Journal, 14 September 2026; Euronews, 10 September 2026; The National, 11 September 2026
- Anadolu via New Straits Times, 9 July 2026
- Al Jazeera (Reuters), 22 October 2026; MEA spokesperson’s statement of 22 October 2026, as reported by The Hindu
- MEA, India-Saudi Arabia bilateral brief and Population of Overseas Indians (January 2026)
- PIB releases of 11 and 12 March 2026; RBI Bulletin, 19 March 2025
- AP and Reuters reports of 10 and 11 October 2026
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