The French campaign against Egypt in 1798 demonstrated anew the connection between the two sides of the Red Sea. Britain read Napoleon's advance from the point of view of danger on the way to India, so the British East India Company sent a force to temporarily occupy the Yemeni island of Mayon Bab al-Mandab in 1799, away from the French battlefield. But the lack of water, difficulty in supplying and the inability of the defenders to control the entire corridor limited the feasibility of the occupation. Pamiyon divides the strait into two passages of different width and depth. The island was given a strategic opportunity, and the water, supplies and weapon ranges determined the height of its investment. In the 1830s, Muhammad Ali Pasha's forces expanded to Tihama, while Britain consolidated its position in Aden, which was captured by the East India Company in January 1839. So the Egyptian forces withdrew from Tihama in 1840 as part of European settlement that reduced Muhammad Ali's influence outside of Egypt. The Ottomans returned to Tihama in 1849, and Britain obtained Mayon in 1857. Then the powers of the government East India Company were transferred to the British Crown in 1858, and Aden remained linked to the administration of British India. After the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869, the importance of linking the British bases in Yemen with the northern end of the Red Sea increased. In 1872, the Ottomans entered Sana'a and reorganized the province of Yemen. Thus, the beginning of the British occupation of Yemen, with the occupation of Aden in 1839 and the subsequent expansion of the protectorates, preceded the British occupation of Egypt in 1882 by forty-three years. The sequence alone does not prove a causal connection between the two events, but it does show that both sides entered into one imperial reckoning. Ottoman rule in Yemen lasted until 1918, and in 1937 Aden became a colony administered directly by London. With steamships, coal stations and telegraph stations, the sites acquired integral functions in protecting the road and supplying vehicle fleets. Fernand Braudel's long view of time helps explain this accumulation: routes continue to attract commerce and power, and the means of investing them change; The coast, which required large bases and ships to affect navigation, parts of it can today be used to launch missiles and UAVs at a much lower cost. In the twentieth century, the intersection of interests took a contractual form.

The French campaign against Egypt in 1798 demonstrated anew the connection between the two sides of the Red Sea. Britain read Napoleon's advance from the point of view of danger on the way to India, so the British East India Company sent a force to temporarily occupy the Yemeni island of Mayon Bab al-Mandab in 1799, away from the French battlefield. But the lack of water, difficulty in supplying and the inability of the defenders to control the entire corridor limited the feasibility of the occupation. Pamiyon divides the strait into two passages of different width and depth. The island was given a strategic opportunity, and the water, supplies and weapon ranges determined the height of its investment. In the 1830s, Muhammad Ali Pasha's forces expanded to Tihama, while Britain consolidated its position in Aden, which was captured by the East India Company in January 1839. So the Egyptian forces withdrew from Tihama in 1840 as part of European settlement that reduced Muhammad Ali's influence outside of Egypt. The Ottomans returned to Tihama in 1849, and Britain obtained Mayon in 1857. Then the powers of the government East India Company were transferred to the British Crown in 1858, and Aden remained linked to the administration of British India. After the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869, the importance of linking the British bases in Yemen with the northern end of the Red Sea increased. In 1872, the Ottomans entered Sana'a and reorganized the province of Yemen. Thus, the beginning of the British occupation of Yemen, with the occupation of Aden in 1839 and the subsequent expansion of the protectorates, preceded the British occupation of Egypt in 1882 by forty-three years. The sequence alone does not prove a causal connection between the two events, but it does show that both sides entered into one imperial reckoning. Ottoman rule in Yemen lasted until 1918, and in 1937 Aden became a colony administered directly by London. With steamships, coal stations and telegraph stations, the sites acquired integral functions in protecting the road and supplying vehicle fleets. Fernand Braudel's long view of time helps explain this accumulation: routes continue to attract commerce and power, and the means of investing them change; The coast, which required large bases and ships to affect navigation, parts of it can today be used to launch missiles and UAVs at a much lower cost. In the twentieth century, the intersection of interests took a contractual form.