Above photo: Pool Moncloa/Fernando Calvo.
The new government in Madrid has thrown a wrench at the Pentagon’s plans for a new ‘coalition of the willing’ to protect Israeli-linked ships in the Red Sea.
US President Joe Biden spoke with his Spanish counterpart Pedro Sanchez on 22 December to discuss bilateral relations and the “dramatic situation” in Gaza.
The NATO partners “stressed the importance of ensuring the conflict does not expand in the region, to include condemning ongoing [Yemeni] attacks against commercial vessels in the Red Sea,” the White House readout of the call highlights.
However, the official readouts do not mention Spain’s role in the recently announced Operation Prosperity Guardian, as reports in Spanish media have revealed that Sanchez’s office ordered Madrid’s mission in Brussels to veto the participation of EU naval forces in the anti-Yemen coalition.
During an urgent meeting by the EU Working Group of Foreign Relations Advisors on Thursday – held at the request of EU High Commissioner Josep Borrell to discuss supporting “maritime security in the Indian Ocean and the Red Sea” – Madrid voted against the proposal in what was described by sources in the know as a “harsh and political” no to Borrell.
According to Madrid-based news outlet El Confidencial, the Spanish president “found out” about Spain’s involvement in the US-led Red Sea coalition on Wednesday via social media posts from Borrell and Spanish Vice Admiral Ignacio Villanueva Serrano, who is the current commander of “Operation Atalanta” – the new name for the EU Naval Force (EU NAVFOR) Somalia, a counter-piracy military operation off the Horn of Africa and in the Western Indian Ocean.
Upon discovering that Brussels and Washington included Madrid as part of this new “coalition of the willing,” Sanchez ordered that Spain’s envoys to the EU veto the bloc’s participation “as soon as possible.”
“The reversal given in Brussels is equivalent to a disavowal by [Madrid] of the decisions taken by the Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Defense,” El Confidencial said, as Spanish Defense Minister Margarita Robles had earlier “insisted that Spain would not participate unilaterally in the US plan, but could do so through NATO or the EU.”
“The Atalanta umbrella was the solution to the Spanish demand,” the neoconservative daily highlights.
Madrid’s sudden turnaround was reportedly also linked to discontent within the Congress of Deputies – led by Sanchez’s Socialist Workers’ Party (PSOE) – about the announcement of Prosperity Guardian by US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin.
“Operation Prosperity Guardian is bringing together multiple countries to include the United Kingdom, Bahrain, Canada, France, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Seychelles, and Spain, to jointly address security challenges in the southern Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden,” reads a statement by the US war chief released on 18 December.
According to informed sources who spoke with El Mundo, the Spanish veto on Thursday “surprised” EU officials, as the official position of Spain seemingly seesawed multiple times this week. “The argument for the veto is that ‘Spain has changed its mind’ because [the PSOE-led congress] does not feel comfortable with an operation led by the United States,” El Mundo reported on Friday.
“Atalanta would not be part of the [Prosperity Guardian], but, naturally, both missions will pursue a similar objective, which would benefit everyone,” EU sources told Europa Press on Thursday, in seeming confirmation that Brussels will go ahead in its pursuit to join the US-led coalition in support of Israel.
On Thursday, the Pentagon claimed “over 20 nations” had agreed to join Operation Prosperity Guardian, which seeks to counter attacks by the Yemeni armed forces on Israeli-linked ships in the Red Sea in support of Gaza.