What happens if you put a Yemeni tribal fighter, an Egyptian soldier, a European mercenary, a Saudi prince, a Jordanian king, and an Israeli politician together? A war teeming with geopolitics, controversy, war crimes, covert ops, and sheer adventure.

The North Yemen Civil War (1962-1970), fought between an Egyptian-backed puppet government and a royalist tribal coalition, occurred because Gamal Abdel Nasser, Egypt’s then-president, fancied an empire.

Nasser saw that barren, medieval country as the first beam to his grand Arab armada: North Yemen, then Aden, then Saudi Arabia, and finally Israel — or, at least, so went the dream.

Opposing him? An indolent Imam leading a few scattered royalist tribes and a handful of ex-SAS and European mercenaries funded and supplied by the most unlikely partners: Arabs and Jews.