Tag: Yemen

How Washington Adds to Yemen’s Nightmare

Exclusive: Tangled in corrupt old alliances, such as with the Saudi monarchy, the Obama administration has now joined a war in Yemen that pits some of the region’s most anti-democratic forces and Al-Qaeda against a home-grown rebel movement with limited backing…

Neocons, R2Pers and Hypocrisy

Exclusive: R2Pers say America has a “responsibility to protect” endangered people around the world, but this R2P moral imperative is selective, often indistinguishable from neocons tolerating some slaughters and choosing to wage war against certain enemies — just dressed up in liberal rhetoric,…

Obama’s Fateful Indecision

Exclusive: With Israel and Saudi Arabia siding with the Islamic State and Al-Qaeda versus Iran and its allies, President Obama faces a critical decision whether to repudiate those old allies and cooperate with Iran or watch as Sunni terrorist groups possibly…

Iran Deal: A Possible Crossroads to Peace

Exclusive: The Israeli-Saudi alliance and the American neocons are furious over the framework agreement for a peaceful settlement to the Iran nuclear dispute, but the deal gives hope to people who see the need to end the perpetual wars that have roiled…

Yemen as Vietnam or Afghanistan

With U.S. intelligence help, Saudi Arabia has launched air strikes into Yemen and wants Egypt and Pakistan to invade, threatening to turn a long-simmering civil war into a regional conflict, a scenario that reminded retired U.S. diplomat William R. Polk of…

US Vets Join Gitmo Hunger Strike

Of the 166 detainees still at the Guantanamo Bay prison, 104 are on a hunger strike that has lasted over four months as they protest indefinite detentions without trial or even charges. They have now been joined by several U.S.…

Playing Games with Narratives

In an age of spin and propaganda, one trick is to falsify the chronological order of events to turn reactions into instigations and vice versa, like when George W. Bush says he went to war in Iraq in response to…

Still Fighting Bush’s GWOT

President Obama rebranded the “global war on terror” the “war on Al Qaeda,” but his counterterrorism strategy hews closely to President George W. Bush’s, as the U.S. joins conflicts in Yemen and elsewhere that have little connection to the 9/11 attacks, as ex-CIA analyst Paul…

Barack Obama: Drone Warrior

President Obama has taken personal command over lethal drone strikes against alleged al-Qaeda operatives in Yemen and other countries. To some, this is an inappropriate use of presidential power. But ex-CIA analyst Paul R. Pillar sees some benefit in Obama…

The Slippery Slope of Assassinations

With the assassination of Anwar al-Awlaki, a U.S. citizen and al-Qaeda associate based in Yemen, the Obama administration has stepped onto a slippery slope where loosening standards for extrajudicial killings could slide into a terrifying use of government power, the…