The roar of fighter jet engines filled the night sky as six British aircraft set off from RAF Akrotiri, a British military base on the southern coast of Cyprus, on the evening of 11 January 2024. Navigation lights glowing into the distance, they made their way through Egyptian air space towards northern Yemen.1
Hours later the planes dropped laser-guided Paveway IV bombs on the already battle-scarred country below. It was one of many times British-made bombs have hit Yemen since 2015, but this time the pilots were not Saudi or Emirati but from the British and US air forces. The two allies had shifted from supplying the bombs to deploying them.
