Yesterday, Mikhail Gorbachev was quoted as saying:
“We live in a global world, and US attempts to become a ‘lone wolf’ and conduct unilateral operations…they all fail, collapse, but [the US] tries again.”Let's look at Yemen, and see where Gorbachev's statement fits in.
During the so-called "Arab Spring" of 2010, which was supposedly intended to remove external manipulation in the affairs of Arab nations, the U.S. manipulated (Ha!) a single-candidate election in Yemen. Who was the single candidate? The pro-U.S. ruler Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi.
Oh, and by the way, "no" votes were not allowed in this single-candidate "election".
President Hadi, once in power, would let the U.S. wage a drone war in Yemen. The drones would target Al Qaeda on the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). This counterterrorism strategy would be hailed as a "model" by the White House. That scores of Yemeni civilians were also killed by U.S. drones didn't seem to factor into the "success story".
As any sane individual would conclude, the Yemeni people were not cool with U.S. drones wiping out people in their country. And they were not cool with the fact that President Hadi was turning a blind eye to the whole thing.
Rebels (led by the Houthi) got to work on getting rid of President Hadi. In January of this year, the Hadi government fell, and in February the U.S. closed its embassy in Yemen's capital.
So much for the "success story" of U.S. counterterrorism in Yemen.
President Hadi's ouster, ladies and gentlemen, is called "blowback". Who remembers when Ron Paul schooled the ignorant Rudy Giuliani on the concept of blowback?
Ok...so the pro-U.S. President Hadi leaves Yemen and flees to Saudi Arabia.
What to do?
Well, the U.S. has sold Saudi Arabia (which borders Yemen) a gazillion dollars worth of weapons over the years. How about putting those weapons to some use?
That's exactly what the U.S. and Saudi Arabia have decided to do. At the end of last month, Saudi Arabia began airstrikes against the Houthi rebels. The U.S. is helping the Saudis by providing surveillance, as well as assisting with aerial refueling operations of Saudi planes.
What's the goal? Re-install President Hadi!
Once again, the Yemenis are not cool with
Here's a very good question to contemplate...How do you think the Yemenis view the U.S. after all of this? First the U.S. uses drones that wipe out innocent Yemenis, and now Saudi Arabia (with U.S. assistance) is pummeling the place and doing the same.
Once again, we must bring up when Ron Paul told the world "We need to look at what we do from the perspective of what would happen if somebody else did it to us?" What would we, as Americans, think if another country was taking these actions here. I'm telling you, we would not be happy at all!
So that's where we are with the Yemeni debacle, as of this writing.
However, in the famous words of the late Steve Jobs, there is "one more thing."
Remember how Yemen was a "model" on how the U.S. runs its counterterrorism strategy against Al Qaeda?
Well, Daniel McAdams (of The Ron Paul Institute) has this update for us: "What is less reported in a US mainstream media is that one group in Yemen seems to be making out quite well in the US-backed and Saudi-created chaos: al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. Yes, al-Qaeda."
Al Qaeda has been cleaning up since the Saudi invasion. They've gained ground and have captured a major army base in Mukalla, and its large stockpile of weapons. They also gained control of a prison and released 300 prisoners, many of which are key Al Qaeda figures.
Remember Gorbachev on U.S. interventions: "they all fail, collapse, but [the US] tries again."
It's time to stop this complete insanity.
The Jeffersonian policy of "peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations — entangling alliances with none" must be reborn.
Chris Rossini is author of Set Money Free: What Every American Needs To Know About The Federal Reserve. Follow @chrisrossini on Twitter.
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