Wednesday, September 18,
2019
Will
Americans Let Trump Start World War III for Saudi Arabia and Israel?
If Congress successfully reclaims its constitutional authority
over the US role in this conflict, it could be a critical turning point in
ending the state of permanent war that the U.S. has inflicted on itself and the
world since 2001.
On Saturday, September
14th, two oil refineries and other oil infrastructure in Saudi Arabia
were hit and set
ablaze by 18 drones and 7 cruise missiles, dramatically slashing Saudi
Arabia’s oil production by half, from about ten million to five million barrels
per day. On September 18, the Trump administration, blaming Iran, announced it
was imposing more sanctions on Iran and voices close to Donald
Trump are
calling for military action. But this attack should lead to just the opposite
response: urgent calls for an immediate end to the war in Yemen and an end to
US economic warfare against Iran.
The question of the
origin of the attack is still under dispute. The Houthi government in
Yemen immediately
took responsibility. This is not the first time the Houthis have brought the
conflict directly onto Saudi soil as they resist the constant Saudi bombardment
of Yemen. Last year, Saudi officials said they had
intercepted more than 100 missiles fired from Yemen.
This is, however, the
most spectacular and sophisticated attack to date. The Houthis claim they got help
from within Saudi Arabia itself, stating that this operation “came after an
accurate intelligence operation and advance monitoring and cooperation of
honorable and free men within the Kingdom.”
This most likely refers
to Shia Saudis in the Eastern Province, where the bulk of Saudi oil facilities
are located. Shia Muslims, who make up an estimated 15-20 percent of the population
in this Sunni-dominated country, have faced discrimination for decades and have
a history of uprisings against
the regime. So it is plausible that some members of the Shia community inside
the kingdom may have provided intelligence or logistical support for the Houthi
attack, or even helped Houthi forces to launch missiles or drones from inside
Saudi Arabia.
Secretary of State Mike
Pompeo, however, immediately blamed Iran, noting that that the air strikes hit
the west and north-west sides of the oil facilities, not the south side that
faces toward Yemen. But Iran is not to the west or northwest either - it is to
the northeast. In any case, which part of the facilities were hit does not
necessarily have any bearing on which direction the missiles or drones were
launched from. Iran strongly denies conducting the
attack.
CNN reported that Saudi and US
investigators claim "with very high probability" that the attack was
launched from an Iranian base in Iran close to the border with Iraq, but that
neither the U.S. nor Saudi Arabia has produced any evidence to support these
claims.
But in the same report,
CNN reported that missile fragments found at the scene appeared to be from
Quds-1 missiles, an Iranian model that the Houthis unveiled in July under the
slogan, “The Coming Period of Surprises,” and which they may have used in a
strike on Abha Airport in southern Saudi Arabia in June.
A Saudi Defence Ministry press briefing on
Wednesday, September 18th, told the world’s press that the wreckage of missiles
based on Iranian designs proves Iranian involvement in the attack, and that the
cruise missiles flew from the north, but the Saudis could not yet give details
of where they were launched from.
Also on Wednesday,
President Trump announced that he has ordered the U.S. Treasury Department to
“substantially” increase its sanctions against Iran. But existing U.S.
sanctions already place such huge obstacles in the way of Iranian oil exports
and imports of food, medicine and other consumer products that it is hard to
imagine what further pain these new sanctions can possibly inflict on the besieged people of Iran.
U.S. allies have been
slow to accept the U.S. claims that Iran launched the attack. Japan’s Defense
Minister told reporters “we believe the
Houthis carried out the attack based on the statement claiming responsibility.”
The United Arab Emirates (UAE) expressed
frustration that the U.S. was so quick to point its finger at Iran.
Tragically, this is how
U.S. administrations of both parties have responded to such incidents in recent
years, seizing any pretext to demonize and threaten their enemies and keep the
American public psychologically prepared for war.
If Iran provided the
Houthis with weapons or logistical support for this attack, this would
represent but a tiny fraction of the bottomless supply of weapons and
logistical support that the U.S. and its European allies have provided to Saudi
Arabia. In 2018 alone, the Saudi military budget was $67.6 billion, making it the world’s
third-highest spender on weapons and military forces after the U.S. and
China.
Under the laws of war,
the Yemenis are perfectly entitled to defend themselves. That would include
striking back at the oil facilities that produce the fuel for Saudi warplanes
that have conducted over 17,000 air raids, dropping at least
50,000 mostly U.S.-made bombs and missiles, throughout more than four long
years of war on Yemen. The resulting humanitarian crisis also kills a Yemeni
child every 10 minutes from preventable
diseases, starvation and malnutrition.
The Yemen Data Project has classified
nearly a third of the Saudi air strikes as attacks on non-military sites, which
ensure that a large proportion of at least 90,000 Yemenis reported killed
in the war have been civilians. This makes the Saudi-led air campaign a flagrant
and systematic war crime for which Saudi leaders and senior officials of every
country in their “coalition” should be held criminally accountable.
That would include
President Obama, who led the U.S. into the war in 2015, and President Trump,
who has kept the U.S. in this coalition even as its systematic atrocities have
been exposed and shocked the whole world.
The Houthis’ newfound
ability to strike back at the heart of Saudi Arabia could be a catalyst for
peace, if the world can seize this opportunity to convince the Saudis and the
Trump administration that their horrific, failed war is not worth the price
they will have to pay to keep fighting it. But if we fail to seize this moment,
it could instead be the prelude to a much wider war.
So, for the sake of the
starving and dying people of Yemen and the people of Iran suffering under the
“maximum pressure” of U.S. economic sanctions, as well as the future of our own
country and the world, this is a pivotal moment.
If the U.S. military,
or Israel or Saudi Arabia, had a viable plan to attack Iran without triggering
a wider war, they would have done so long ago. We must tell Trump, Congressional leaders and all our elected representatives that we reject another
war and that we understand how easily any U.S. attack on Iran could quickly
spiral into an uncontainable and catastrophic regional or world war.
President Trump has
said he is waiting for the Saudis to tell him who they hold responsible for
these strikes, effectively placing the U.S. armed forces at the command of
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman.
Throughout his
presidency, Trump has conducted U.S. foreign policy as a puppet of both Saudi
Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, making a
mockery of his “America First” political rhetoric. As Rep. Tulsi Gabbard quipped, “Having our country
act as Saudi Arabia's bitch is not ‘America First.’”
Senator Bernie Sanders has issued a
statement that Trump has no authorization from Congress for an attack on Iran
and at least 14 other Members of Congress have made similar statements,
including his fellow presidential candidates Senator Warren and Congresswoman Gabbard.
Congress already passed
a War Powers Resolution to end U.S. complicity in the Saudi-led war on Yemen,
but Trump vetoed it. The House has revived
the resolution and attached it as an
amendment to
the FY2020 NDAA military budget bill. If the Senate agrees to keep that
provision in the final bill, it will present Trump with a choice between ending
the U.S. role in the war in Yemen or vetoing the entire 2020 U.S. military
budget.
If Congress
successfully reclaims its constitutional authority over the US role in this
conflict, it could be a critical turning point in ending the state of permanent
war that the U.S. has inflicted on itself and the world since 2001.
If Americans fail to
speak out now, we may discover too late that our failure to rein in our venal,
warmongering ruling class has led us to the brink of World War III. We hope
this crisis will instead awaken the sleeping giant, the too silent majority of
peace-loving Americans, to speak up decisively for peace and force Trump to put
the interests and the will of the American people above those of his
unscrupulous allies.
Medea Benjamin,
co-founder of Global Exchange and CODEPINK:
Women for Peace, is the author of the new book, Inside Iran: The Real History and
Politics of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Her previous books
include: Kingdom of the Unjust: Behind the
U.S.-Saudi Connection; Drone Warfare: Killing by Remote
Control; Don’t Be Afraid Gringo: A Honduran
Woman Speaks from the Heart, and (with Jodie Evans) Stop the Next War Now (Inner Ocean
Action Guide). Follow her on Twitter: @medeabenjamin
Nicolas J. S. Davies is
the author of Blood On Our Hands: the American
Invasion and Destruction of Iraq. He also wrote the chapters on
"Obama at War" in Grading the 44th President: a Report
Card on Barack Obama’s First Term as a Progressive Leader.
Our work
is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License. Feel
free to republish and share widely.
Donations can be sent
to the Baltimore Nonviolence Center, 325 E. 25th St., Baltimore, MD
21218. Ph: 410-323-1607; Email: mobuszewski2001 [at] comcast.net. Go to http://baltimorenonviolencecenter.blogspot.com/
"The master class
has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles.
The master class has had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject
class has had nothing to gain and everything to lose--especially their
lives." Eugene Victor Debs
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