Biden Policy in Yemen Appears to be in Line with the Interventionist Status Quo
Although Joe Biden is a neoliberal fixture, he did spark some optimism among opponents of American involvement in the Yemeni Civil War after he took a seemingly hardline against Saudi Arabia’s actions in Yemen.
Yemen has been spiraling out of control over the last decade and by 2014 the country has been engulfed in a civil war between the government of Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi and the Houthi rebels.
Fearing instability in its own geopolitical backyard, Saudi Arabia proceeded to build a coalition composed of the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Jordan and Bahrain to intervene in Yemen. Seeing a potential ally in the Zaydi Shiite Houthis and an opportunity to make Saudi Arabia sweat, Iran decided to back the Houthis, thus making the Yemeni Civil War another front in the Saudi-Iranian proxy conflict.
The Yemeni conflict has been pretty brutal. Over 230,000 people have died in this conflict thus far, with roughly 10 million at the risk of famine. A bipartisan cohort of politicians in Washington DC have actually challenged the American government’s participation in this war and has even forced the previous Trump administration to veto several measures to end US participation in Yemen and halt arms sales to Saudi Arabia.
William Rivers Pitt of Truthout noted that conflicts like the one in Yemen are a great business for war profiteers, who stand to gain from protracted military confrontations abroad. As the great Marine Corps General Smedley Butler observed, “war is a racket” and continues to be a lucrative endeavor for parasitic defense contractors.
Even if the US does not have much of a direct presence in Yemen, it still provides plenty of arms and military equipment to its numerous client states such as Saudi Arabia. Rivers Pitts outlined some of the harsh realities of war in the past century:
“Before Iraq and Afghanistan, Vietnam was the only active war that kept paying out on a daily basis for 20 years. Every bullet fired, every bomb dropped, every missile launched, every helicopter shot down, every body bag filled, translates into revenue for someone. For the war profiteers, those three actions made for 60 years of profit combined.”
Furthermore, the US government has a major cash cow in arm sales to other countries. His research uncovered some jaw-dropping stats on arm sales:
That being said, the long, quiet and reliable money is, and has been for decades, in this nation’s worldwide sale of weapons. Called “Foreign Military Sales” or FMS, it is a business with enormous reach and clout in Washington. At present, the U.S. represents 37 percent of all global arms sales, with half of that going to the Middle East. The U.S. is currently selling weapons to 96 countries around the world, and 169 countries have purchased U.S. weapons since 2001.
In continuing to provide arms and intelligence to the Saudis, the US has effectively co-signed the Saudi’s brutal campaign that has seen the Saudis commit numerous bombings against civilians that would normally fall under the category of war crimes.
“The U.S. sold $175 billion in weapons to foreign partners and allies in fiscal 2020, a 2.8 percent rise from the previous year’s total, according to a Friday announcement from the Defense and State departments,” a report from Defense News revealed.
Rivers recounted how one figure in the Trump administration, Inspector General Steve Linick made an effort to keep weapons sales to Saudi Arabia in check:
“In 2020, the Trump administration was bound and determined to sell billions in arms to Saudi Arabia. Inspector General Steve Linick attempted to investigate the sale, based on Saudi Arabia’s documented record of atrocities in the Yemen war. He was fired by the administration for attempting that investigation. ”
As mentioned previously, Congress has taken a stronger role in holding the Executive Branch accountable for signing off on foreign policy quagmires like the one in Yemen. However, these efforts have generally not been successful in curtailing arms sales as of late:
In December of 2020, despite enormous pushback from many in Congress, the State Department approved the sale of $290 million in weapons to Saudi Arabia. It was finalized an hour before Biden took the oath of office on January 20.”
Before coming into office, President Joe Biden vowed on the campaign trail to hold the Saudis accountable, specifically Crown Prince Mohammad Bin Salman, for orchestrating the assassination of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi. So far, the Biden administration has only implemented limited sanctions on the Saudis and is continuing the “sale of other matériel that can be construed to have a defensive purpose,” despite Biden campaigning to suspend the sale of many offensive weapons to Saudi Arabia in an effort to aid its brutal bombing campaign.
The United Arab Emirates has also had its hands in the cookie jar with regards to the Yemeni conflict and has lobbied extensively for continued arm sales, namely for “defensive weapons” such as the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter and Reaper drones. In today’s upside down world, such arms would be classified as “defensive.” Just ask Yemenis if those types of weapons are just used for defense purposes exclusively.
It’s clear that the US is completely beholden to Saudi interests. US-Saudi relations date back to 1933, when oil exploration kicked off in the Arab country. There were strong geoeconomic reasons for the US to be on good terms with the Saudis and use military assets to secure shipping lanes as a means of safely procuring oil.
Now that the US is no longer as dependent on the Middle East for its energy needs, it doesn’t need to slavishly rely on the Saudis. Let’s face it, sanctions are not the way to handle the Saudis. Instead, the US should cut off all military aid to the Saudis, withdraw all troops from there, stop providing diplomatic cover for the Saudi’s controversial foreign policy decisions, and maintain normal relations with the country.
Indeed, the Saudis do have a legitimate interest in maintaining stability in their backyard. However, the US should not blindly support the Saudi’s misbehavior and it must allow the Saudis to bear all of the costs of its sensitive foreign policy actions. Instead, the Saudis should engage with the Gulf Cooperation Council and other Arab partners to bring the Yemeni conflict to a close.
In sum, the US should stop holding the Saudis’ hands.