While everybody is focusing on southern Yemen, eastern Yemen, and the latest tensions involving Saudi Arabia, the Houthis are quietly and steadily continuing to build what they openly describe as a one-million-man liberation force.

Today, the so-called General Mobilization Program conducted a live military exercise involving students from Al-Nahda Modern School, one of Sana’a’s oldest private schools, founded in 1992. While the entire school was not forcibly conscripted, there is no ambiguity about what took place.

Children were paraded, documented, photographed, and filmed while participating in military drills and combat-style exercises.

This was not incidental. It was deliberate messaging.

It is deeply troubling to see this level of militarization being normalized and promoted in Sana’a, a historic and cosmopolitan capital that once symbolized education, diversity, and civic life rather than indoctrination and armed mobilization. These were not harmless activities or cultural displays. They were part of a systematic effort to condition younger generations for conflict.

And make no mistake. These recruits, these formations, and these forces are not being assembled for defensive pageantry. Sooner or later, they will be deployed, either against Saudi Arabia or against southern Yemen. The trajectory is clear. The documentation is intentional. The signal is unmistakable.