Yemenite War of 1979

Second Yemenite War
Part of the Cold War and the Arab Cold War
North & South Yemen
Date 24 February – 19 March 1979 (3 weeks and 2 days) Location North Yemen-South Yemen border Result Decisive Southern Yemeni victory Kuwait Agreement of 1979 No territorial changes Two Yemens re-pledge ambition to unify
Belligerents
North Yemen Supported by:  United States  United Kingdom  France  Jordan  Egypt  Taiwan  Saudi Arabia  Iraq	South Yemen Supported by:  Soviet Union  Cuba  East Germany  Libya  North Korea
Commanders and leaders
Ali Abdullah Saleh	Abdul Fattah Ismail
Units involved
1 North Yemeni Army Division 1 Air Defence Brigade 2 Air Force squadrons – 18 aircraft 1 Mechanised Brigade (late entry)	3 South Yemeni Army Divisions 1 Air Force Tactical Regiment (4 MiG-21 and Su-22 Squadrons – 32 aircraft)
Strength
300,000 total 1900 Tanks total 350 Tanks in theater	120,000 total 45,000 in theater 600 Tanks total 300 Tanks in theater
Casualties and losses
672 ground troops KIA, 1,624 POW 6 MiG-17 aircraft and 3 MiG-21 destroyed on ground, 4 MiG-17 and 2 MiG-21 shot down in combat, 4 pilots POW; 5 Mi-17s destroyed on ground 46 T-34 and T-55 Tanks destroyed 16 SA-3 launchers destroyed; 34 P-15 radars and 6 P-12 radars destroyed	412 ground troops KIA, 125 POW 12 T-55 Tanks destroyed 2 Su-22s downed in combat.

The Second Yemenite War was a short military conflict between the Yemen Arab Republic (YAR; North Yemen) and the People's Democratic Republic of Yemen (PDRY; South Yemen).^[1] The war developed out of a breakdown in relations between the two countries after the president of North Yemen, Ahmad al-Ghashmi, was killed on 24 June 1978, and Salim Rubai Ali, a moderate Marxist who had been working on a proposed merger between the two Yemens, was murdered two days later.^[2] The hostility of the rhetoric from the new leadership of both countries escalated, leading to small scale border fighting, which then in turn escalated into a full blown war in February 1979.

North Yemen appeared on the edge of a decisive defeat after a three-front invasion by South Yemeni combined arms formation,^[3] however this was prevented by a successful mediation in the form of the Kuwait Agreement of 1979, which resulted in Arab League forces being deployed to patrol the North–South border. An agreement to unite both countries was also signed, although it was not implemented.^[4]