March 07, 2016 U.S. Central Command Promotes The War On Yemen Where Al-Qaeda Is The Only Winner Daniel Larison recaps the War on Yemen: The Saudi-led intervention has been going on for over eleven months, and in that time it has failed in all of its stated objectives. The Houthis have not been driven from the capital, the former president has not be restored to power (not that most Yemenis would want him there now anyway), and the intervention certainly hasn’t produced the stability that the Saudis laughably claimed to be bringing.

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Yemenis have been sorely deprived of basic necessities for almost an entire year thanks to the Saudi-led blockade, and the majority of the population is starving or at great risk of doing so. At least four-fifths of the population is in need of humanitarian assistance. The country’s health care system has all but collapsed, medical facilities are coming under repeated attack (including repeated bombings by coalition aircraft), medicine and fuel are in short supply, and the lack of access to clean water has made the spread of disease much worse. Every problem Yemen had before the intervention has grown far worse than it was, and the country’s infrastructure has been wrecked by the coalition bombing campaign that the U.S. supports.

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Since the Saudis and their allies started pummeling Yemen with indiscriminate bombing and the use of inherently indiscriminate cluster munitions last March, the U.S. has been reliably backing the Saudis in this unnecessary and indefensible war with weapons, refueling, and intelligence. The U.S. has helped the Saudis to whitewash and obscure their crimes, and the Obama administration has done this despite credible reports from multiple human rights organizations and the U.N. that the Saudi-led coalition is likely guilty of war crimes and possibly even crimes against humanity. The U.S. not only continues to whitewash the Saudi crimes but is still actively propagandizing and reinforcing the false Saudi claim that Iran is in cahoots with the Houthis. I have yet to see even one picture from the war in Yemen that shows any Iranian weapon or munition. There are lots of pictures though that show Houthis using weapons they pilfered from incompetent Saudi troops or their proxies. The Australian navy today captured a weapon smuggling ship in the Arab sea. They reported: The Australian Navy said that one of its ships patrolling the region, the HMAS Darwin, intercepted a small, stateless fishing vessel about 170 nautical miles off the coast of Oman when it made the discovery. On board they found more than 2,000 pieces of weaponry -- including 1,989 AK-47 assault rifles and 100 rocket-propelled grenades.

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An Australian Defense Ministry spokesman told CNN there were 18 people of various nationalities on board the ship, but officials could not initially confirm that their identification documents were valid. Authorities believe the weapons were headed for Somalia based on interviews with crew members, but that information is preliminary and may change as the investigation continues, the spokesman said. Someone bought 2,000 old AK47s and some RPGs, maybe in Iraq or elsewhere in the Gulf, to sell them in Somalia. That makes sense. There is an ongoing civil war in Somalia and selling weapons there has little risk. But here is the U.S. Central Command making up nonsense about the Australian find: According to a U.S. assessment, the weapons were believed to be initially sent from Iran and were likely intended for Houthi rebels in Yemen, Lt. Ian McConnaughey with the U.S. Navy told CNN. U.S. Central Command is still gathering more information to determine the arms' final destination, McConnaughey said. There is zero evidence for that claim that these are weapons from Iran on their way to Yemen. Indeed the circumstances as reported by the Australians seem to make that unlikely. But the CNN report, from which the above is taken, is headlined Weapons seized by Australia may have come from Iran, intended for Houthis thus supporting the false Saudi claims. Yemen is flooded with weapons. The Saudi have several times dropped thousands of new weapons to their proxy forces in south Yemen. Many of those weapons were seized by the Houthis and those that reached the Saudi proxies were immediately sold off to the highest bidder. Every modern assault rifle one might think of is available in Sanaa's weapon markets. Why would anyone ship old AK47 to Yemen where even the poorest households already have better weapons? Remarks a Yemeni analyst: Hisham Al-Omeisy @omeisy So Iran sent 1989 low grade AK47s & 100 RPGs to a #Yemen already flooded w/ better AK47s & RPGs! What am I missing? And another one: Haykal Bafana @BaFana3 2nd time the US is claiming that Somalia-bound arms are "Iran weapons to Houthis Yemen" delivery. Almost as if DC is prodding Saudi Arabia. The war in Yemen can not be won by the Saudis or their proxies on the ground. The mercenary company Blackwater/Xe had been hired to provide a battalion of foreign fighters. These tried to capture Taiz from the Houthis but were routed. They were pulled out after taking too many casualties. Now the Saudis spend another $3 billion and hired Dyncorp to provide more cannon fodder. There is no way the Saudis or their mercenaries can win the war and no sane reason to give them any further support. Banks have stopped to certify letters of credit for food imports to Yemen and those few ships which still come to Yemen have to pay huge bribes to be allowed to unload. The famine in Yemen will intensify over the next months. More people will die. Meanwhile Al-Qaeda is occupying more and more land in south Yemen and is winning the hearts and minds of the hungry locals: Saudi Arabia needs all the possible help to come out of Yemen with less damage possible. It is accusing Iran of intervening in its backyard, raising tension between the two countries. The nervousness reached its peak when a video leaked to the Saudi, showing pro-Iranian Lebanese Hezbollah Video [alternative source] training Houthis in Intelligence warfare inside Yemen, confirmed authentic to me by sources close to Hezbollah leadership. Therefore, it is not surprising to see reports on a collaboration between the Saudi-led coalition and Ansar al-Sharia (AQAP) for the battle against the Zaydi Houthis as the tension between Saudi Arabia and Iran increases. Ansar al-Sharia come out as the absolute winner, offering infrastructure support, “recruiting” through activities, public service and games to win the “hearts and the minds”. Al-Qaeda in the Arab Peninsula, aka Ansar al-Sharia, is the only party winning in Yemen. It several times attempted to target U.S. civilians and is listed by the U.S. as a terrorist organization. It is fighting on the side of the Saudis. But the U.S. military in the Gulf has nothing better to do than to promote the false Saudi narrative about the war on Yemen. For whom are these U.S. Central Command folks really working? Posted by b on March 7, 2016 at 18:46 UTC | Permalink Comments