On August 9, 2018 -- These young boys boarded a school bus for what was meant to be a daylong
field trip filled with excitement.
But that day of fun, soon turned into a day of horror and tragedy.
A Saudi Arabian-led military coalition reportedly dropped a 500 pound laser guided bomb on the
bus, killing at least 40 children, 11 bystanders and injuring about 79 other people.
The horrific images that emerged from the scene of the attack not only drew the world’s
attention to this tragedy, but also to the international partnerships that are supporting
Saudi Arabia’s relentless bombardment of its neighbor to the south.
Especially after subsequent reporting revealed that the bomb used in the attack might have
been supplied by the United States.
I’m Judah with NowThis World, and in this episode we’re going to look into this horrific
attack and the role that the U.S. continues to play in Yemen.
The conflict in the country has created what the United Nations has called “the worst
humanitarian crisis” in the world today.
“We are here, afraid in Yemen.
They are targeting bridges.
They are targeting schools.
They are targeting roads.”
Conservative estimates say that this war has resulted in death of at least 5,000 civilians,
created a famine in the country that has claimed the lives of about 50,000 people, pushed 8.4
million Yemenis to the brink of starvation.
It also sparked a cholera epidemic that has affected more than 1 million people.
And the United States has supported this Saudi Arabian-led military campaign since March
2015.
This recent conflict began with Yemen’s civil war, which launched out of the instability
that followed a popular uprising in 2011.
That uprising, eventually led to the removal of Yemen’s longserving authoritarian leader,
Ali Abdullah saleh.
He eventually ceded power, handing over the presidency to his deputy, Abd-Raabu Mansour
Hadi.
But he was never able to fully assert his authority in the divided country, that was
dealing with an armed rebellion by a Shiite, Iranian-backed group called the Houthis.
By September 2014, that group gained control of large parts of Yemen, including its capital
Sana’a.
And by March of 2015, Hadi fled to Saudi Arabia, where he’s been ever since.
And that is when the war got worse.
A Saudi Arabian and United Arab Emirate-led military coalition began an airstrike campaign
against Houthi targets in the country.
Enter the United States, and other western powers.
The U.S. sells weapons to Saudi Arabia, provides logistical support in the war, and even refuels
Coalition fighter jets during flight.
To put it all very simply; The Saudi Coalition is dropping American-made bombs from planes
refueled by American soldiers, which kill innocent civilians, including children.
And while this might come as a surprise for some, it shouldn’t.
That’s because globally, the U.S. exports more than a third of all major weapons -
and the biggest beneficiary?
You guessed it: Saudi Arabia.
The U.S. supplies more than 60% of Saudi Arabia’s arms imports – billions of dollars worth
of weapons including cluster bombs and anti-tank missiles, as well as armored vehicles, tanks,
attack aircrafts, and other equipment.
Experts say that though sales of equipment is easy to track, the Pentagon doesn’t publish
when the arms have been delivered or how they’ve been used.
They’ve also claimed numerous times that U.S. officials don’t track or investigate
airstrikes by the Saudi-led coalition.
But, in recent months, exclusive reporting from outlets like the Intercept and New York
Times have challenged that, indicating that officials may know more than they say they
do, and may be more directly involved in Yemen than they say they are.
Some of these weapons are reported to have ended up in the hands of ISIS and al-Qaeda
militants.
To complicate things even further, according to recent AP reports, the U.S. has conflicting
interests on the Peninsula, which include both counterterrorism efforts to eliminate
al-Qaeda, and simultaneously driving out the Houthis – a fight al-Qaeda has joined.
U.S. weapons support ramped up under the Obama administration, under which, according to
the Center for International Policy calculations, more than $115 billion in military sales were
offered to Saudi Arabia from 2009 to 2016.
Support for Saudi and the UAE further expanded under the Trump administration, with the state
department approving billions of dollars in arms sales.
President Trump has also met with Saudi King Salman and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman
on several occasions.
His first overseas trip as president, in fact, was to Riyadh.
The Trump administration has argued that selling precision-guided munitions could result in
fewer civilian deaths, because the targeting is more precise.
But experts we’ve spoken to say that’s not the case.
“All that argument about helping them be more careful is nonsense.
And we’ve seen this by the increase in civilian casualties and the kinds of targets like school
busses and weddings and so forth that have been hit.
From my point of view when you’re hitting those kinds of civilian targets repeatedly,
to me that looks like a war crime.”
So what actions, if any, are U.S. lawmakers taking?
Senator Elizabeth Warren recently wrote a letter to the U.S. Central Command asking
for answers about an intelligence report uncovered by The Intercept that appears to contradict
the Pentagon’s reported lack of involvement in the Saudi-led airstrikes.
“I think the Pentagon is well aware that U.S. bombs are being used to hit civilian
targets.
This fiction that they’re putting forward that ‘we don’t even track those things,’
first of all is unconscionable.
I mean, if you're selling the weapons, you should try to track how they’re used.
Second of all, as Senator Warren suggests, doesn’t square with the truth.”
Earlier, in March 2018, a group of Senators led a bipartisan effort to pass a resolution
ending U.S. involvement in the war.
The resolution was tabled, but it wasn’t the first time members of Congress tried to
pass legislation to get out of Yemen, and it certainly won’t be the last.
“So the responsibility is clearly on our shoulders, the shoulders of our companies,
our government.
And the citizens of the United States have a responsibility to push their government
to stop enabling these kinds of crimes."