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I'm going to go fight the global war on
terror I'm going after bad people evil
people when I get a chance to Stamp Out
evil in this world I love that sorry I
love hunting down bad guys and ending
them driving from the base down into a
city there this weird mix of excitement
fear and also an odd Serenity we wanted
to make a statement hence the choice to
use a Detonator and a
bomb you have Al-Qaeda on every street
corner as soon as the vehicle stops the
doors open and it's
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showtime would you say that it was a
successful
operation
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yes Yemen's armed factions have an
impact throughout the Middle East and
Beyond most recently as the houi rebel
group attacks ships in the Red
Sea
the US military launched another air
strike in Yemen the US and UK hit around
30 sites across
Yemen this film is about the complex
roles Western and Regional Powers have
played in Yemen's
War and the Story begins with an
assassination
mission Isaac Gilmore is a former Navy
SEAL who later became second in command
of a private US military firm called
Spar operations group yeah me too I want
to be pretty when I first met him in
2020 human rights lawyers were trying to
prosecute spear for war crimes this is
the first time anyone from Spar has
spoken on
camera one of the reasons that I agreed
to participate in this and be part of
this documentary is to be very clear
about what we're doing and why this
isn't you know innocent till proven
guilty it's war and so you have
intelligence and then you act on
it in December 2015 spare group was
hired by the UAE to carry out
assassinations in Yemen we met with the
appropriate bodies within the UA
government at the amirati army
base the pitch was to put pressure on
Isis and al-Qaeda in the state of Yemen
and make sure that it didn't become
another chaotic hub of terrorist
activity especially with the proximity
to the Horn of
Africa in 2015 Yemen was gripped by
fighting on several fronts a rebel group
called The houthis had taken over the
capital
S they also briefly held Aiden before a
Saudi UAE Le Coalition backed by the US
and the UK recaptured the
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city Al-Qaeda had long been a presence
in the South and were now gaining
territory the US feared they might plant
terrorist operations Beyond Yemen's
borders the UAE took over security for
southern Yemen and became the US's main
counterterrorism Ally in the
region how much were you offered for
this operation 1.5 million per month The
Next Step was then to recruit guys not
every guy would be comfortable with
doing something that was essentially
somewhat in the gray area
and we had to find the right people with
the right
mentality ready 3 2 1
execute Dale comto spent decades in the
US Special Forces before becoming a
mercenary all right three collapse on us
he now runs combat training courses for
civilians did you enjoy your time in
Yemen um honestly no why would anybody
want to do anything in yon it's I mean
you've been there it's a freaking
hellhole but we weren't there to go to
Club Med you know we had a job to do and
that's just what soldiers do you suck it
up look in in yon you know this as as I
do Al-Qaeda everywhere I've had Al-Qaeda
within inches of me inches of
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me everything that we did we made sure
we did the right thing if we were going
to Target somebody that was on this list
then we made sure in our minds that
we're not going to go out and murder
somebody because this guy doesn't like
that guy we would do our own due
diligence do our own background checks
on the guys and if we felt like yeah
okay he's he's a legitimate Target we're
good to
go who gave you the targets we received
the target intelligence from the UA
government the initial operation was
Target
Alisa leader Alisa is the Yi branch of
the Muslim
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Brotherhood
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for
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Ana fled Yen after the attack and now
lives in
Exile on May in particular
what was it that made you decide that he
is a
terrorist um well there's a couple
things one we already know that he was
being financed by the Muslim Brotherhood
and I can tie it all together so the but
the Muslim brotherhoods aren't they're
not a terrorist organization yeah they
are the United States government doesn't
believe the Muslim Brotherhood is a
terrorist they did at one point they did
yes it did if my handlers say here's the
intelligence this is the Target and this
is why who am I to question I'm a
soldier for you Roger that and your
handlers are the UAE
yeah they're the client yeah they're the
client Ana's party Al islah or the
Reform Party is one of the biggest
political organizations in
Yemen its policies are inspired by the
Muslim Brotherhood a popular
international islamist
movement the Muslim Brotherhood is
banned in several countries including
the UAE where their political activism
and support for elections is seen as a
threat to the rule of the Royal
Family
but the US has never classified the
Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist
organization hey how are you legal
action group reprieve has been tracking
assassinations in southern
Yemen what you see here is basically
tens and tens of
assassinations between 2015 and 2018
they've counted 102 they've all followed
the same pattern placing IED bombs on
doors or on cars and then someone comes
after and starts shooting the individual
if you see then here you see surge in
assassinations that are happening
throughout
2016 this happens after the arrival of
Spears into
Yemen 25 of these assassinations took
place during the months that Isaac spent
in
Yemen how many targets did you execute
not answering
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by early 2016 Dale and Isaac's time with
spear was coming to an
end but the assassinations
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continued it was not until 2018 when we
started to pinpoint that actually this
is part of a systematic targeting
policy you have this chaotic situation
where everyone can name anyone a
terrorist and start going after them
these are extrajudicial
killings we've seen documents that
appear to show that spare group
continued to receive payments from the
UAE until
2020 a senior yemeni army officer from
Aiden who worked directly with the UAE
tells us what spear was
doing operation
group
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a
after months of trying I've managed to
obtain a UAE kill
list it's from 2018 and is 7 pages
long it was leaked by a source who was
working with the MREs and was horrified
by the names he saw on the
list it includes this woman hudel
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sarari it is now my great honor to
announce this year's Lou Who is a lawyer
who was in Geneva to receive an award
for her work investigating the UAE human
rights abuses in
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Yemen
in the end it wasn't Huda who was
attacked it was her
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son
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for
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after a month in intensive care M died
he was
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18 eyewitnesses told the prosecutor that
they recognized the gunman as a member
of a counterterrorism unit funded by the
UAE
but nobody was
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charged Huda now lives in Exile she's
still in fear of her
life
us laws on Mercenaries are unclear and
to date spear hasn't been prosecuted for
its role in the uae's assassination
program I went to meet Isaac
again did you feel like the operation
you took part of was legal yes is that
because there was some sort of not from
Washington no it's because we were in
line with the US's mission in the region
and we were participating with an ally
of the US one thing we discussed last
time is the kill list one of the names
that was on the list that I've seen is
Huda sarari who's a female a human
rights lawyer um not on my list so the
list you have is something different I
would absolutely remember if that name
was on the list did you know that after
you left the mrti forces that you
trained then trained yemenis to conduct
assassinations you train people you give
people a tool and how they choose to use
it is not really not your
responsibility so my personal feelings
is unfortunate and war is
always messy but anytime there's
conflict there's going to be people that
are hurt or killed that you wish
weren't
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I