How Saudi Arabia captured Washington

[n2doc]

by Max Fisher on March 21, 2016
There was a moment almost exactly one year ago, in March 2015, that revealed some uncomfortable truths about America's relationship with Saudi Arabia.

That month, as Saudi Arabia prepared to launch what would become its disastrous war against Shia rebels in neighboring Yemen, the Saudi ambassador in Washington, Adel al-Jubeir, brought a list of "high-value targets" to CIA Director John Brennan. The Saudis were asking for American support in the war; the list was meant as a show of cooperation.

But when US intelligence agencies checked the list against their own information, they found that many of the targets had little or no military value, according to a report at the time by the Wall Street Journal's Maria Abi-Habib and Adam Entous. Many were civilian structures in or near population centers.

The US warned Saudi Arabia off the targets, and Saudi officials said they complied. But when the air war began, Saudi bombs fell heavily on "hospitals, schools, a refugee camp, and neighborhoods," according to the Journal.

The US initially held back from the war. But soon, in an apparent effort to purchase Saudi acquiescence to the nuclear deal with Iran, the US substantially increased support for the Saudi-led campaign, providing midair refueling, weapons and supplies, targeting information, and 45 dedicated intelligence analysts.

more
http://www.vox.com/2016/3/21/11275354/saudi-arabia-gulf-washington

[dixiegrrrrl]

1. Some of those weapons we supplied were cluster bombs

about 700 million $$$ worth, according to a story in VICE tv program, which showed the empty shells in Yemen villages.
There was deliberate bombing...HUGE 2,000 # bombs....of villages, schools, houses, shops, which reduced food and water levels to almost nothing,
leaving the Yemeni people nothing but giant holes in the ground.

[highoverheadspace]

2. This tells you all you need to know.