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There isn’t an argument against the rich blowback potential of drone strikes in Waziristan or missile strikes in Afghanistan that isn’t also an argument against the same thing in Yemen. We can’t have a real conversation about sustainable counterterrorism that revolves around two poles and two poles alone:
1. Ground-force heavy counterinsurgency with heavy political involvement; and
2. Ground-force light/absent aerial bombardment, redolent with the risk of exacerbating radicalization, with with minimal/absent political involvement.
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Can’t put ground forces on any more Saudi borders. Just can’t, and especially not on unambiguously Peninsular Arabia. Regardless of the apparent atrocities we’ve committed, a lot of the big money reactionaries in Saudi Arabia really were mollified by the removal of US forces. The closest we could possibly get away with would be moving in some of the Iraqi forces we’ve been training while keeping all American supervision floating offshore. You understand how crazy that idea is, but I’m saying that any other scheme that puts American-aligned ground forces in Yemen is crazier.
And wouldn’t it be nice if we could have a serious conversation about our values as a culture and a people. Targeted assassination is a pretty dark practice, and something we’ve not only denounced in the past, but would still denounce if NorKor or Iran was doing it.
When the most powerful nation in the world decides it’s very survival depends on murdering people in secret without evidence, proof or due process, unconcerned with associated or collateral deaths or maiming, that nation has a deep moral sickness. And when that nation likes to represent itself as a “Shining City on the Hill”, the last best hope for mankind, the hypocrisy isn’t just appalling, it’s obvious and toxic….
mikey
The Yemeni people, those that condone terrorism and abhor al qaeda, are our allies. The corrupt and reprehensible Saleh government is not. Sadly, while this strike incinerated some al qaeda members and allegedly was “preventive” in nature, it alienated many civilians who otherwise would side with America.
Surely the bad guys draped themselves in civilians but pointing this out will not win us the IO battle. Force protection often leads to the demise/scrubbing of a mission. Civilian protection/alienation must be considered as well. It’s hard to judge since we aren’t in the TOC, with eyes on target and knowledge of their intention.
It’s coarse to say but we shouldn’t have allowed our participation in this go public. We could have saved face, eradicated the vermin and had the blowback fall on Saleh and Saleh alone.