Are we willing to play passive observer as thousands and then tens of thousands of innocent civilians—the old, sick, weak, and infants and toddlers first—die from a starvation blockade supported by the mighty United States of America?
Without U.S. targeting and refueling, Saudi planes could not attack the Houthis effectively and Riyadh could not win this war. But when did Congress authorize this war on a nation that never attacked us?
Yemen today is arguably the worst humanitarian crisis on earth, and America’s role in it is undeniable and indispensable.
If the United States were to tell Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman that we were no longer going to support his war in Yemen, the Saudis would have to accept the reality that they have lost.
Indeed, given Riyadh’s failure in the Syrian Civil War, its failure to discipline rebellious Qatar, and its stalemated war and human rights disaster in Yemen, Trump might take a hard second look at the Sunni monarchy that is the pillar of U.S. policy in the Persian Gulf.
The American Conservative
7 comments:
Probably just the canary in the coal mine for the whole region...
They can’t eat without $75/bbl of rent in a barrel of oil....
US no longer paying monopoly rent is now redefined as “a blockade!”...
Nothing stopping Iran from sending in food and water.... why don’t they?
US no longer paying monopoly rent is now redefined as “a blockade!”...
Ah, I see! Whatever inhuman and barbaric war crime that Washington is involved in can be spun into some excuse about monopoly rents! How Yemen plays a role as a monopoly rent seeker when it has no oil is a mystery.
By axiomatic definition, Washington can never do any wrong, at least when it's dealing with the outside world. Washington suddenly becomes the secretary of state for the Lord baby Jesus, and if there's one thing the Messiah hates is monopoly rents, especially non-existent ones to cover up the deaths of possibly hundreds of thousands of innocent peasants. That Yemen has no oil and sells no oil to the US is an irrelevant fact, because another explanation would have to be found to explain Washington's actions in murdering a country that has never done the US any harm, notwithstanding the fantastical gibberish about monopoly rents.
Not that it matters to the Washington-Saudi jihad on a defenceless people, but if the poor boo-hoo US (read Washington) cared about these wildly implausible monopoly rents then it could quite easily drill it out of the ground, but since the hegemon chooses not to do so it must be right, and those who cry "monopoly rents" are predictably quiet. And why help Saudi Arabia murder an innocent country when it it the Saudi jihadi petrostate that is the swing "monopoly rent" producer?
The mystery therefore simply builds further, at least if you clutch desperately at an explanation which at best makes no sense, and in fact makes mincemeat of the very argument being defended. Clearly the rationale given is impossible: Washington is assisting (worse than assisting because the Saudi jihadis are incapable of murdering Yemen without Washington's help) the swing oil producer of these alleged monopoly rents, and jihadi terror exporter, in the Salafi jihadi murder of an innocent country which possesses no oil as a way of destroying the alleged but non-existent payment of monopoly rent to Yemen!!!
There are plenty of monopoly rents, but energy isn't one of them. The monopoly rents that do exist (all the intellectual property rights argued over at the WTO and elsewhere) are the ones that get no fanfare, but that's because those rents are backed by the US war machine. Move along, nothing to see here.
Yemen is an Iranian proxy... the whole place over there is imploding... the whole place cannot eat without the oil rent being distributed to subsidize for food purchases... now munnie is getting tight so you see some of the older people being hung upside down by the young people... its a metaphor like the munnie is going to fall out of their pockets...
Look at the attack now in Egypt over the holidays...
Look at the Syria article below its all about controlling oil/gas routes to the west...
Iran hates Saudi because Iran thinks they have a better strategy to screw the west out of more of the west's munnie and they should control Ghawar not Saudi... etc...
F all of them... they all may be finally starting to get what they all deserve which is nothing ... good riddance...
1. There is zero evidence that Yemen is an Iranian proxy, so that theory goes down the drain. The issue is that Saudi Arabia treats Yemen like a colony. Yemen cannot be allowed to pursue its own political course.
2. Egypt has for decades fostered Islamist Frankenstein monsters, and so it's no surprise what happened.
3. As for the oil and gas routes, apparently Syria's geography is Syria's fault and should be obliterated by Salafi jihadis in order to get energy prices down to a range Mr Franko believes conducive. How about this, build the routes somewhere else? Or continue to ship the oil/gas in. Or go green. Or a hundred other things. No, the only policy is to murder everyone.
4. Iran hates Saudi Arabia because "they have a better strategy of screwing the west's munnie..." Matt, where the hell do you get your information? First of all, it's Saudi Arabia who hates Iran and arms jihadis to attack it; Iran is on the whole fighting a rearguard defensive action against the Saudi nutters. What's with this Trumpian gibberish about it being the West's money? Have you never heard of supply and demand or trade (you know, I give you some of my stuff for some of your stuff)?
Anyway, what's a fair price, a dollar a barrel? And if you want cheap oil then drill American oil, and if that's still too expensive then why not subsidise it? Even a hundred dollars a barrel is artificially cheap. The reason the oil price is so damn cheap is because Washington's client regimes, who'd be overthrown without Washington's help, set the price where the boss tells them to. You'd soon see where a democratic government sets the oil price, and it's not at the paltry sum you think is ripping you off.
5. "F all of them... they all may be finally starting to get what they all deserve which is nothing ... good riddance..."
Having armed the most maniacal despots in the modern age and their jihadi offshoots, Americans blame the victims - yeah, fuck them by, er, supporting the motherfuckers who attacked us on 9/11! Having elected rotten politicians who have pursued stupid economic policies for decades, Americans blame the world ('Murica, fuck yeah!) rather than their own policymakers. Instead of looking in the mirror, the natural reaction seems to be shed foreign blood, and the more the better, just as long as not one ounce of special American blood is spilt, the life force of the most deluded mammal on planet earth, homo Americanus hypocriticus mendaciticus. Amen.
Yo ever hear of OPEC? Its a cartel...
Why did Iran ask for $100Bs in the deal that the Obama people just did with them?
Whats with the USD for those zombies? Dont they have their own munnie?
What's stopping Iran from sending food into Yemen? Yes the cargoes would probably be searched for weapons but as long as none were there it would go right in...
I normally agree with Pat Buchanan but I dont get his point here... maybe he thinks we should blow all these morons too while we're at it... he can go right ahead and be the first...
You bleeding hearts are going to get your US withdrawal from the region ... its starting... the whole place is going to implode you aint seen nothing yet...
OPEC is a cartel with zero power. The major OPEC producers are all dependent on Washington. The hundreds of billions of dollars the Salafi butchers pay Washington for protection should tell you something. OPEC sets the price where Washington wants it and they get hundreds of billions of dollars of weapons to butcher their own people and save their Salafi jihadi regimes.
I never hear you make the same anti-cartel, anti-monopoly, anti-rent seeking argument about US products that dominate a good part of global trade, like artificially subsidised agriculture that has made the lives of people a living misery, a misery far worse than the OPEC of your imagination. I suppose that makes me a bleeding heart again.
It's irrelevant whether they have their own money because oil is priced in dollars, as you well know. Washington went ape shit over the Russia China deal. Again, that should tell you something. Washington doesn't like deals not priced in dollars. Rather than the world being dollar zombies, Washington is enforcing a dollar regime on the rest of the world via its client states. None of this is a conspiracy, it's openly debated by the leading policymakers and can be read in declassified Pentagon and State reports. Are the Pentagon and State Department making this stuff up, and if so why ensure it can't be read for decades?
US withdrawal? What are you smoking. Washington's not going to let it's Salafi jihadi exporting client petrostates be overthrown by their people, send the price of oil to the moon and worse still make pro-China deals. Even that monosyllabic orangutan in the Oval Office understood this much by moving his fat backside from the golf course over to Saudi Arabia and do a sword dance with his jihadi exporting friends. Perhaps the State Department and Pentagon have finally kicked some sense into the orange dunce after scuppering TPP and other anti-China deals.
Bleeding heart? What the hell does that mean? What, everyone is supposed to support anything Washington does because otherwise it makes you a vegan gender fluid pansy, as opposed to the raw meat eating Chuck Norris WWE-watching super patriots who'll happily eat glass if Washington tells them to because that's patriotism? And yes, like all normal people, I don't like whole countries people being turned into ash by Washington's proxy jihadi army. What, am I supposed to jack off to children being beheaded by jihadis? Is this your idea of patriotism or whatever the opposite of bleeding heart is - tough guy chickenhawk?
As you should know by now, I hate "liberals", but everyone with any historical knowledge knows that liberals make the best imperialists. So-called "conservatives" are comically incompetent and amazingly stupid. Between Dubya and Trump, Washington has allowed another hegemonic American century turn into anything but. Even Pat Buchanan, a stupid man, understands this much. Paul Craig Roberts, a smart but erratic and overly hyperbolic conservative, understands the issues, as does Bruce Bartlett and Mike Lofgren. Simply put, there are "conservatives" who know stuff, a lot of stuff. Then there are the "conservative" fantasists like the neocons, "Christian" right, Trump and his inner circle of village idiots. Apparently the knowledgeable conservatives are also bleeding hearts. Perhaps if they just watched more Chuck Norris and Stallone films their hearts would turn into concrete, good American concrete, although it's probably bought from China.
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