Since the start of the decade, Yemen — the country, its entities and individuals — has seen one split after another. There have been horizontal and vertical splits within Yemen’s entities, institutions, parties and communities. 

Those divisions didn’t start at any one particular point, as the driving differences sometimes lay dormant for years. But signs of one of the most significant splits first appeared inside the alliance of the traditional forces. These forces, mostly military political decision-makers, were in power for three decades. The tension between former President Ali Abdullah Saleh and his family started after he made several appointments that favored his son, Ahmed, at the expense of other relatives. Ahmed Saleh was named commander of Yemen’s Republican Guard in the early 2000s. The appointments escalated existing tensions and the alliance began to crumble, affecting the Yemeni army, state and society. The split became official when Maj. Gen. Ali Mohsen al-Ahmar, the commander of the First Armored Division, turned against Ali Abdullah Saleh and became his biggest military threat.

Ahmar declared his support for the revolution that was launched against Saleh after the al-Karama massacre on March 18, 2011. That split was a major sign that the Saleh regime was teetering from the inside. After decades of covering up the the division inside the Yemeni army, the truth eventually came out. The leaders that Ahmar helped bring to power suddenly became revolutionaries who attacked Saleh and his regime. Those closest to Saleh described the dissidents and Ahmar as outsiders whose corruption was suddenly unveiled. The announcement by some officials and deputies from Saleh’s party that they were siding with the revolutionaries was merely the civil facade for intra-military conflicts.

The leadership of the General People’s Congress (GPC) — Saleh’s party, and the most influential political party in Yemen until 2011 — denied allegations that political forces and officials were using the party as a cover to achieve their common interests as quickly as possible. The GPC's leaders were intellectually loyal to other Yemeni parties and organizations, from right to left. After March 2011, that fact became clear. The dissidents and the loyalists used the same discourse used by army commanders. The two most important parties to emerge from the events of 2011 were established by those who left the GPC, such as the National Solidarity Party and the Justice and Building Bloc. Those who remained in the GPC had to choose between either remaining loyal to Saleh or to Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi (the party’s secretary-general and the new president of the republic), after their positions diverged and their disagreements outweighed their convergences, especially after Hadi decided to oust army commanders loyal to Saleh.