This past week, president Biden gave an important speech on US foreign policy. He included a pledge to scale back US military involvement in the war that has destroyed the nation of Yemen.
However, as with every political speech, Biden’s words were measured
US President Joe Biden speaks about foreign policy at the State Department in Washington, DC, on February 4, 2021. (Photo by SAUL LOEB / AFP) (Photo by SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images)
carefully. In fact, they hid as much as they revealed — perhaps more.
While any reduction in US war investment is worth cheering, Biden’s verbal hedging was a deliberate strategy to appease peace activists while leaving lots of room for war-hawks to maneuver.
Those who care about the fate of the Yemeni people still have a lot of word to do.
Abby Martin does a good job of parsing the president’s words. Watch and listen as she explains the issues below:
CBN News reported on one of president Trump’s final edicts in declaring
Pro-life demonstrators participate in the 47th annual “March for Life” in Washington, DC, on January 24, 2020. (Photo by OLIVIER DOULIERY / AFP) (Photo by OLIVIER DOULIERY/AFP via Getty Images)
Friday, January 29 National Sanctity of Human Life Day.
“The pro-life organization Operation Rescue named the president its pro-life person of the year for 2020, saying:
“The Malachi Award is given by Operation Rescue every year to recognize individuals who sacrificially work to advance the cause of protecting the pre-born. …during President Trump’s administration, he has done more to protect unborn lives than any other president in U.S history.”
NATIONAL SANCTITY OF HUMAN LIFE DAY, 2021
– A PROCLAMATION BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA –
– DONALD J. TRUMP –
“Every human life is a gift to the world. Whether born or unborn, young or old,
(Photo by OLIVIER DOULIERY / AFP) (Photo by OLIVIER DOULIERY/AFP via Getty Images)
healthy or sick, every person is made in the holy image of God. The Almighty Creator gives unique talents, beautiful dreams, and a great purpose to every person. On National Sanctity of Human Life Day, we celebrate the wonder of human existence and renew our resolve to build a culture of life where every person of every age is protected, valued, and cherished. . .
“. . . Since my first day in office, I have taken historic action to protect innocent lives at home and abroad. . .
WASHINGTON, DC – JANUARY 24: People gather for the 47th March For Life rally on the National Mall where U.S. President Donald Trump addressed the crowd. (Photo by Mark Wilson/Getty Images)
“. . . As a Nation, restoring a culture of respect for the sacredness of life is fundamental to solving our country’s most pressing problems. When each person is treated as a beloved child of God, individuals can reach their full potential, communities will flourish, and America will be a place of even greater hope and freedom.”
The hypocrisy of this statement is glaring, even though the same accusation could be laid at the feet of every presidential administration. After all, hypocrisy is at the heart of American politics.
However, as an American evangelical, I am always troubled by the anti-abortion movement’s hypocrisy in calling itself pro-life. For, as I and many others have said before, groups like Operation Rescue are anti-abortionactivistsNOT pro-life activists.
It is no small difference. Words matter.
Standing up for the sanctity of all human life everywhere is nowhere to be found on the agenda of evangelical activists. Neither was it a concern of Donald Trump’s.
In fact, Donald Trump’s total disregard for human life — other than his own — has been obvious over the past 4 years. The list of his anti-life actions is too long to cover here, so I will give only a few examples.
Lisa Montgomery, the first federal prisoner executed in 67 years. She also suffered acute mental illness.
the final weeks of his presidency. Trump’s last minute execution spree has killed more federal prisoners (including one mentally ill woman) than any previous president. (Yes, I believe every Christian, every American, must object to the death penalty.)
I could talk about Trump’s anti-life border policies — separating refugee families; losing track of children taken from their parents; keeping children in holding pens; arresting legitimate asylum seekers, labeling them as illegals, and then sending them back to their countries where they will face certain death.
These are not the actions of a pro-life president.
But I want to focus my attention on only one specific humanitarian scandal that has been enormously worsened by Trump’s policies: the war in Yemen.
For more than five years, Yemenis have faced near-famine conditions while enduring a naval blockade and routine aerial bombardment. The United Nations estimates the war has already caused233,000 deaths, including 131,000 deaths from indirect causes such as lack of food, health services and infrastructure.
Systematic destruction of farms, fisheries, roads, sewage and sanitation plants and health-care facilities has wrought further suffering. Yemen is resource-rich, but famine continues to stalk the country, the UN reports. Two-thirds of Yemenis are hungry and fully half do not know when they will eat next. Twenty-five percent of the population suffers from moderate to severe malnutrition. That includes more than two million children.
Her bruised eyes still swollen shut, Buthaina Muhammad Mansour, believed to be four or five, doesn’t yet know that her parents, five siblings and uncle were killed when an air strike flattened their home in Yemen’s capital. The air strike, which killed at least 12 civilians. REUTERS/Khaled Abdullah SEARCH “STRIKE MANSOUR” FOR THIS STORY. SEARCH “WIDER IMAGE” FOR ALL STORIES. TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY. Matching text: YEMEN-SECURITY/AIRSTRIKE – RC1BFFB8F240
All of this blood is on American hands.
And if American church-goers were genuinely pro-life, we would be emphatically anti-war. We would be marching in the streets, pressuring the president to stop the bloodshed anywhere and everywhere that American power is killing, maiming, and suppressing the Image of God in this world.
But, then, that behavior would require us first to truly believe in the “sanctity of all human life” — which we obviously do not.
Sadly, few American evangelicals care about places like Yemen because we are a painfully provincial and ignorant people, too distracted by the obnoxious glitterati of commercialized, Christian success stories to look beyond our own self-centered existence.
The Yemeni civil war is another among America’s several proxy wars where we use others to do our bidding and kill our “enemies” (whether or not they have ever done anything to us).
In this case, the real enemy happens to be Iran, even though it’s the Yemeni people who now have the privilege of suffering from American terrorism in their own country.
Our sub-contractor in this horrific proxy war is Saudi Arabia, a long-time enemy of Iran — which makes outgoing Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s audacious accusations about Iran now providing safe harbor for Al Qaeda terrorists a laughable, buffoonish statement that should not only have set his pants on fire but left his body an ash heap on the podium.
(Perhaps I should stop being so surprised when infamously dishonest people like Mike Pompeo attend DC Bible studies and offer smiling testimony to their devout, evangelical, Christian faith.)
Even worse, the State Department has recently declared the Houthi/Yemeni group that is fighting against the US/Saudi-backed rebels “a terrorist organization,” opening the flood gates even wider for US military attacks in the future.
The fact of the matter is that WE, the good old US of A, are the real terrorists who are destroying, not just Yemen, but a host of suffering nations around the globe.
As a radical, Salafist, jihadist, Sunni organization, Al Qaeda originated in Saudi Arabia. They are sworn enemies of the Shia nation, Iran.
So, Al Qaeda now happily works with us (as we happily work with them) in assisting their countrymen, the Saudis, to destroy the people of Yemen.
Saudi Arabia has been slaughtering people in Yemen, largely civilians, since 2015. Its #1 financier and weapons supplier is none other than the USA.
In March 2019 both houses of Congress passed a bill requiring the US to end its financial support and military involvement the Yemen war.
But President Donald J. Trump vetoed that bill as an “unnecessary” and “dangerous” attempt to weaken his powers to make war.
How very pro-life of him…
Thus, the slaughter in Yemen continues with the help of US intelligence services, covert ops, training, money, fighter jets, missiles, bombers, and other US military equipment.
The war-torn country of Yemen is in the midst of the largest humanitarian crisis in the world thanks in large part to a Saudi-led war fueled by American weapons. Now, as the war nears its six-year anniversary in March, any hopes for a diplomatic resolution have faded faster than the presidency of Donald Trump, whose outgoing administration recently announced plans to designate the Houthi rebels, the principal force battling both the Saudi-led Coalition and al-Qaeda militants in Yemen, as a foreign terrorist organization. The move effectively eliminates any ray of hope for the more than 24 million people struggling for survival amid war, siege, famine, and countless diseases and epidemics, according to the United Nations.
The largest humanitarian crisis in the world, made possible and sustained by United States of America. (Also see Juan Cole’s article at Informed Comment.)
Yemeni mother and child.
These tragic events illustrate the obscenity which lies at the heart of American politics, our foreign policy, and the evangelical, Christian nationalism that perpetuates the anti-life lies of American exceptionalism.
While purportedly Christian news organizations such as CBN prostitute themselves by offering establishment propaganda about a pro-life president and American evangelicals, here are a few hard, cold, truths to be faced:
Evangelicals, by-in-large, are not pro-life people. We may be anti-abortion people. But we then use that pro-life label like an infant’s pacifier to sooth ourselves into a comfortable, conscienceless coma allowing us to ignore the slaughter of foreign innocents.
American is not a great, humanitarian nation. Rather, to quote Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., “The United States is the greatest purveyor of death, violence, and destruction in the world today.” (My favorite line from his anti-Vietnam war speech; a speech that is rarely included in the bastardized memorials touted on MLK Day).
No, electing Christians to political office does not improve anything. In fact, it only confirms the doctrine of total depravity. Mike Pompeo is only one of millions of Donald Trump’s loyal, evangelical enablers.
Christian support for Trump was the equivalent of an anti-spiritual hysteria spread like a virus within the church. I pray that the fever will break soon.
For years, the Religious Right insisted that voting Christians into high office was the solution to America’s problems. But Mike Pompeo (and his numerous minions now scattered throughout DC bureaucracy) is only the latest poster-child for how very, very wrong-headed that idea has always been.
We may debate when exactly life begins. But we can all agree that a fully human life has entered this world with the delivery of a new baby.
Sadly, however, evangelical pro-lifers behave as if life ends at birth. Why else would anyone care more about the unborn than those who have been born?
Genuine members of the Kingdom of God will honor the sanctity of all human life everywhere; will work to defend those lives globally; and will seek to stop the deliberate destruction of human life anywhere and everywhere.
No. Neither president Trump nor the evangelical church in America have ever been noteworthy defenders of the sanctity of human life.
In fact, American foreign policy relishes trampling upon the Image of God without a second thought.
Yep, recent reports reveal that as the US continues to supply Saudi Arabia with armaments and other military assistance for its genocide in Yemen, we are also funding al Quaeda linked militias there.
How many Americans understand that our government has been cooperating for years with al Quaeda networks in both Yemen and Syria (here and here)? Not many.
Welcome to the completely immoral, conscience-free world of warfare American style.
Sadly, Senator Chris Murphy’s proposed amendment to the new Pentagon appropriations bill (itself a moral travesty we will discuss another day), which would have ended US support for Saudi atrocities, went down to defeat. Take a moment to watch the Senator’s defense of the amendment, complete with details about our involvement in Saudi war crimes.
Let’s all continue to pray for an end to this war and for a peaceful settlement determined by the Yemeni people, not by the US, Saudi Arabia or Iran.
In fact, while we are praying for peace, let’s not forget that American troops continue to fight, die and kill others in many other countries world-wide.
US troops killed while “fighting terrorism” in Niger
The latest official war report from the White House, called the “Report on the Legal and Policy Frameworks Guiding the United States’ Military Force and Related National Security Operations,” admits to active military operations in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Somalia, Libya, and Niger — 7 countries!
And those are only the unclassified wars. Who knows how many other places there may be around the globe where US troops are fighting, dying and killing innocent civilians.
According to DefenseOne, America’s global war on terrorism now involves 39% of the world’s countries! Check out the map of global US military activity here.
Under president Trump, the number of US troops deployed in war zones around the world has only increased.
And do I need to repeat the often noted insanity displayed by declaring war against a tactic, i.e. terrorism?!
By such ridiculousness is the American public manipulated. For this absurd mantra — the war against terror — has never been anything more, or less,
My Lai, only one of many Vietnam massacres committed by US troops
than a big, fat, blank check for the arrogance and cruelty of American empire. Let’s not be so naive as to believe the official propaganda insisting that America only fights to bring other people freedom. Such blind patriotism demonstrates a profound ignorance of history.
Every right-thinking Christian is bound to abhor and to condemn all these features of US foreign policy.
My goodness, there is a LOT for all of us to add to our prayer lists.
Yes, there have been a few pinpricks of light recently in the corporate media’s blackout on coverage of the war in Yemen. The monolithic wall of silence was breached by Chris Hayes on MSNBC after a year of silence. Several days ago Ali Soufan visited MSNBC to participate in another report. Although the moderator provides a rather skewed overview of the conflict’s history, the segment does present a survey of Yemen’s ongoing humanitarian catastrophe, America’s war crimes there and US responsibility for perpetuating the conflict.
Yemeni school bus hit by Saudi Arabia with laser-guided bomb made by Lockheed Martin
Our corporate media’s grotesque negligence in failing to report on the American fueled war in Yemen is more evidence of how deeply rooted and all pervasive the “military-industrial complex” (to quote president
Eisenhower again) remains in this country. Media corporations are always hesitant to tell stories that may directly or indirectly hurt them on Wall Street.
How many average Americans have heard about the recent bombing of a school bus that killed 40 Yemen children? Not many. Bomb fragments, which you can see in a video here, show the bomb to have been “a 500-pound (227 kilogram) laser-guided MK 82 bomb made by Lockheed-
A handout video grab photo made available by the Houthi Movement showing wounded Yemeni children lying on beds receiving treatment at a hospital after being injured in an alleged Saudi-led airstrike in the northern province of Saada, Yemen, 09 August 2018. According to reports, an alleged Saudi-led airstrike hit a bus carrying children in a market in the northern Yemeni province of Saada, killing at least 43 people, including children, and wounding 63 others.
Martin.” But this is only one tragedy among many others that have never been reported in the US. In fact, Human Rights Watch reports that this was only 1 0f 50 strikes on civilian vehicles this year alone.
According to USAToday, Lockheed Martin is one of the top ten companies profiting most richly from American war-making and arms sales, enjoying “$36.3 billion in sales in 2011, slightly higher than the $35.7 billion the company sold in 2010.”
Thankfully, Senator Chris Murphy continues the fight in Congress to end this senseless slaughter of innocent people in Yemen. Below I have copied
Yemenis dig graves for children, who where killed when their bus was hit during a Saudi-led coalition air strike, that targeted the Dahyan market the previous day in the Huthi rebels’ stronghold province of Saada on August 10, 2018.
the latest notice from Just Foreign Policy explaining Murphy’s recent amendment to the Pentagon’s appropriations that would enforce a ceasefire and terminate US funding and military support for Saudi Arabia.
Please take a moment to help. Call your senators and sign the petition.
“On August 9, an airstrike by the Saudi-UAE-U.S. coalition bombing Yemen struck a bus packed with children in the northern village of Dahyan, killing at least 51 people, including 40 children, according to the Red Cross. Saudi regime spokesmen have defended this horrific massacre, calling the bus a “legitimate military target.”
“When journalists asked a senior U.S. official if the U.S. supplied the bomb the Saudis used to blow up the bus full of kids and refueled the Saudi warplane that dropped the bomb on the bus full of kids, he responded: “Well, what difference does that make? We are providing the refueling and support to Saudi aircraft. We are also selling them munitions that are being used … We are not denying that.”
“CNN has established that the bomb that the Saudi regime used to blow up the bus full of kids was made by Pentagon contractor Lockheed Martin; transfer of the bomb to the Saudi regime was approved by the U.S. State Department.
“The Washington Post editorial board says: “It is long past time to end U.S. support for this misbegotten and unwinnable war. There is a clear path out: A U.N. mediator has called the various parties to Geneva early next month to discuss a peace process. Among the first steps would be a cease-fire… U.N. sources say the Houthis…are ready to strike these accords, but the Saudi and UAE regimes have been resistant…[the Saudi and UAE regimes] will accept a peace process only if it is clear that they will not have Washington’s support for more war.”
“Senator Chris Murphy has introduced an amendment to the Pentagon appropriation that would cut off U.S. tax dollars for this unconstitutional war – the war was never authorized by Congress, every day the war continues it violates Article I of the Constitution – unless Secretary of Defense Mattis certifies that the U.S.-enabled Saudi airstrike on the bus full of kids complied with international law and U.S. policy, something Mattis could never do unless he wants to be known as a shameless liar.
“52 Senators have voted against the war in a floor vote, either in June 2017 or in March 2018 on the Sanders-Lee-Murphy bill invoking the War Powers Resolution. Among Senate Democrats, only Joe Donnelly, Joe Manchin, and Bill Nelson have never voted against the war in a floor vote.
Urge Senators to speak out for and vote for the Murphy amendment to cut off U.S. tax dollars for the kid-killing Saudi war in Yemen by signing our petition.
The organization Just Foreign Policy has been advocating for the Yemeni War Powers bill to be passed by Congress in order to stop the genocide now occurring in that country.
Yemen has become the scene of the largest humanitarian crisis in the world.
Leaked! Despite War Crimes in Yemen US Trains Saudi Pilots
See my previous posts here, here, here, here . We have soldiers and intelligence assets on the ground. The US also the largest arms supplier to Saudi Arabia, the principle antagonist in Yemen’s civil war.
American money, arms, and soldiers, directed by our president and an acquiescent, do-nothing
congress, have helped Saudi Arabia to turn Yemen into a slaughter house where innocent men, women and children are butchered every day.
Please read the latest call for action from Just Foreign Policyreproduced below and make those three phone calls. Thank you.
“The House goes out on recess this week. If a Yemen war powers bill is going to be introduced in the House before recess, that decision will be made today. If no bill is introduced, we’ll have no Congressional vehicle in August to respond to the threatened Saudi-UAE escalation of the war. The UN has warned that ten million more Yemenis will be pushed to the brink of starvation if the U.S.-Saudi war in Yemen does not end this year.
“The actions today of three Representatives will be key:
Ro Khanna: (202) 225-2631
Adam Smith: (202) 225-8901
Ted Lieu: (202) 225-3976
“Please call their offices now, in that order. When you reach a staffer or leave a message, you can say something like:
“’I urge you to move forward with the introduction of a Yemen war powers bill in the House before recess. This will deter Saudi-UAE from escalating and pressure them to agree to the UN peace deal. If Saudi-UAE escalate, the bill will give grassroots activists a vehicle for response.’
“The UN and aid groups have warned that if the U.S.-Saudi war in Yemen is not ended this year, another ten million Yemenis will be pushed to the edge of starvation. The UN envoy has said he is close to a deal that would stop the Saudi-UAE assault on Hodeida and return the parties to peace talks. Thus, if the UN envoy is successful in his efforts, it could spare millions of Yemenis from being pushed to the edge of starvation. The crucial thing needed to end the war is more U.S. pressure on Saudi-UAE.
“That is why the question of what Members of Congress do now is so urgent. What Members of Congress do now to increase pressure on the Trump Administration and Saudi-UAE to end the war is the only variable apparent on the scene that appears to have any chance of sparing millions of lives in Yemen.
“In particular, the introduction of a House war powers bill before the recess would give us a vehicle around which to organize public opinion to pressure Congress. Without such a vehicle and without such organizing, past experience indicates that the worsening of the U.S.-Saudi imposed humanitarian crisis in Yemen is a tree that falls in the forest without making an effective sound in the U.S. The worst developments are occasionally reported in mainstream U.S. press. But the attention is not sustained. The last time the issue received sustained attention in the U.S. was in March, when Senators Sanders, Lee, and Murphy introduced a war powers bill in the Senate and pushed for a vote. That is the kind of attention that we need in the U.S. on Yemen now.
The folks at Just Foreign Policy are sending a petition to Congress and attempting to rally popular support in order to end American support for Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen.
Yemeni children are dying of malnutrition and cholera.
Please take the time to read the excerpt posted below from their appeal. Check out the embedded sources. Reread my past blog posts about the tragedy unfolding in Yemen (here, here and here).
And remember…this is not a natural catastrophe. It is an entirely man-made disaster.
Recalling the Old Testament story of Nathan the prophet confronting King David: The prophet today points his finger in the face of America and Saudi Arabia saying, “You are the nation.” WE are the culprits condemning innocent Yemeni people to starvation and disease.
The guilt and responsibility is ours, America. And we have the power to end it whenever we choose. Here is the excerpt:
“The long-feared U.S.-backed Saudi-UAE assault on Hodeida, where four-fifths of Yemen’s food imports enter, has begun. ABC News reports: “Assault on Yemen’s largest port threatens to increase mass starvation.” Aid experts warned that an assault on the city could immediately threaten the lives of 250,000 people and put millions more at risk of starving to death. The U.S.-backed Saudi-UAE war against Yemen’s indigenous Houthi rebels has already created the worst humanitarian crisis in the world, leaving 60% of the population – 17.8 million Yemenis – food insecure, and 8.4 million a step away from famine. “ABC noted that the U.S. is providing “vital guidance and supplies” for the Saudi-UAE attack on Hodeida. The Wall Street Journal was more explicit: “The U.S. military is providing its Gulf allies with intelligence to fine-tune their list of airstrike targets in Yemen’s most important port, one sign of the Trump administration’s deepening role in a looming assault that the United Nations says could trigger a massive humanitarian crisis.” “33 Representatives tried to stop the attack by threatening the Trump Administration with a vote invoking the War Powers Resolution to force an end to U.S. participation in the war. They were: Mark Pocan, Justin Amash, Ro Khanna, Thomas Massie, Barbara Lee, Walter Jones, Ted Lieu, James McGovern, Tulsi Gabbard, Yvette Clarke, Pramila Jayapal, Peter DeFazio, Debbie Dingell, Earl Blumenauer, Eleanor Holmes Norton, Gwen Moore, Adriano Espaillat, Judy Chu, Bobby Rush, Keith Ellison, Jan Schakowsky, Raúl Grijalva, Jamie Raskin, Donald Beyer, Karen Bass, Frank Pallone, Beto O’Rourke, Alan Lowenthal, Betty McCollum, Zoe Lofgren, Jared Huffman, Eddie Bernice Johnson, and Hank Johnson. “The Members wrote: “We urge you to use all available means to avert a catastrophic military assault on Yemen’s major port city of Hodeida by the Saudi-led coalition…We remind you that three years into the conflict, activeU.S. participation in Saudi-led hostilities against Yemen’s Houthis has never been authorized by Congress, in violation of the Constitution…In light of a possibly disastrous offensive on Hodeida, we remind you that under Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution, Congress alone has the power to declare and authorize war, and the War Powers Resolution allows any individual member of Congress to force a debate and floor vote to remove U.S. forces from unauthorized hostilities.” “Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and the Trump Administration have ignored these warnings. They don’t believe that Members of Congress have the courage to follow through on their threat.
“Help us prove Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and the Trump Administration wrong. Press Members of Congress to invoke war powers to force a vote to end unconstitutional U.S. participation in the catastrophic Saudi-UAE assault on Hodeida by signing our petition.”
For more on Yemen, here is an excellent summary (from Democracy Now!) on the political machinations and disturbing developments coming out of Washington D.C. over the past few days.
It offers fine interviews from knowledgeable people, a C-SPAN clip of Sen. Sanders on the Senate floor, more about the Saudi crown prince, Trump’s weapons deal, and Yemeni suffering. It is about 15 minutes long.
I hope you will set aside a few minutes to keep yourself apprised of the many nasty strands that make up the spider’s web of US foreign policy.
In a 55-44 vote yesterday, primarily along party lines, the US Senate decided to table the bipartisan S.J.Res.54. In effect, killing it for the foreseeable future. The vote was scheduled deliberately to coincide with the state visit of Saudi Arabia’s ruling crown prince Mohammad bin Salman.
Nora O’Donnell’s groveling interview for “60 Minutes” (see good discussions here and here) offered a Marie Antoinette moment for American viewers. Not only did she not ask a single question about the war in Yemen (something that would have never passed muster in the days of Mike Wallace).
But those of us who knew what was happening on the other side of The Hill, watched a repulsive spectacle. The United States Senate and CBS News, a king-pin in corporate broadcasting, were genuflecting before Saudi royalty while telling the Yemeni victims of our illegal war — “let them eat cake.”
Especially noteworthy was the president’s afternoon press conference with the crown prince. President Trump chose to focus attention on the tens of billions of dollars in arms sales that the Saudis will continue to buy from US manufacturers (what’s the deal with the big visual aids? I kept expecting Trump to poke the prince in the eye).
Obviously, in the calculus of our capital city, Yemeni lives just aren’t worth very much. At least not when Boeing, Lockheed-Martin, Ratheon and other weapons manufacturers stand to make billions in profits.
But, then, this has always been the American way of war and diplomacy.
If you have never read it before, take a look at Marine General Smedley Butler’s important book “War is a Racket” (1935).
Sadly, it has ever been this way. As the Greek historian Thucydides (c. 460 – c. 400 BC) wrote, “The rich will do what they can, while the poor will suffer what they must.”
The rich have won another round, for the time being.
The poor in Yemen — and others like them who suffer wherever the American Empire (and our collaborators) places selfish, national, economic interests above the needs of humanity — will continue to die of starvation, disease, bombs and bullets. Each weapon proudly stamped “made in the USA.”
Yesterday’s political maneuvers were signed in blood, by both the Senate and the White House. America’s cup fills to overflowing, and the inspired warnings of John the Revelator (Revelation 18:23-24) were never more relevant:
“Your merchants were the world’s great men. By your magic spell all the nations were led astray. In her/you was found the blood of prophets and of the saints, and of all who have been killed on the earth.”
Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, by Durer
Their blood, like Abel’s, will cry out from the ground on Judgement Day (Genesis 4:10). God keeps close accounts. They will be avenged, and America, with all her leaders responsible, will be condemned.
Yet, followers of Jesus are neither shocked nor discouraged when sin shows its ugly public face, as it did yesterday. Justice and mercy will not always triumph in this world, but Christians know that goodness and love WILL reign supreme on that Last Day.
In the meantime, we have every reason to continue our witness to see Humanity Renewed here and now through Jesus Christ.
Check to see how your senators voted. If they voted AGAINST tabling the resolution (as did my two!), call or write and express your gratitude and appreciation. If they voted IN FAVOR of tabling S.J.Res.54, let them know in no uncertain terms that they have not represented your values. If their moral compass does not change, then they may not remain in office much longer.
And Pray. Pray for the people of Yemen. Pray for the victims who die every day in the multiple American wars raging continuously around the globe.
Pray for the people of God, especially that Christians in the USA will be conformed to the mind of Christ (Romans 12:1-2) even as we are exorcised of the spirit of partisan politics and of Donald Trump.
Retired Army Col. Lawrence Wilkerson is an honest man of deep integrity, intelligence and straightforwardness. He was Gen. Colin Powell’s chief of staff in the last Bush administration and is now a Distinguished Professor of Government & Public Policy at William and Mary. His recent article in the New York Times, “I Helped Sell the False Choice of War Once. It’s Happening Again” illustrates his depth of conscience.
I always try to read and/or listen whenever I come across anything from Wilkerson. So, given my recent posts on the catastrophe unfolding in Yemen (here and here), I am sharing an 18 minute interview with Wilkerson available on the RealNews (an excellent source of information I look at regularly).
Col. Wilkerson discusses vital topics: the Saudi Arabian bloodletting going on; US involvement; the famine; Pentagon malfeasance; Iran and more.
Please take a few minutes to hear a man of conscience discuss American culpability in the poorest Arab-speaking country in the Middle East. (I was hoping to post the video here, but it is too large. So, click the link above.)
The bipartisan bill (SJ Res 54) that will help to end the war in Yemen could come up for a vote as early as today (3/20/10). Call now if you haven’t already.
Recall that the US has helped Saudi Arabia create the largest humanitarian crisis in the world right now. A few weeks ago, I asked you to call your elected officials in support of SJ Res 54, insisting that the US stop arming the Saudis in violation of the War Powers Resolution of 1973.
We are the largest weapons supplier to the Saudis government, which means billions in profits for the US military-industrial complex. Not long ago, Pentagon officials openly admitted that THEY HAD NO IDEA exactly how, when or where US bombs and missiles were being deployed!
But US military strategy is not the point. MONEY — profiting from another war — is the point.
When the Pentagon now warns that withdrawing US support for the Saudi slaughter in Yemen will damage our relations, what they really mean to say is that American weapons manufacturers will make less money than they had otherwise hoped. After all, Saudi Arabia is one of our “best” customers. President Trump recently announced a $350 billion arms deal with them.
There is a lot of profit to be found in butchering innocent men, women and children in the poorest nation in the Arab world! A gruesomely devilish calculus when measured against the tens of thousands of innocent Yemenis that continue to suffer death, injury, malnutrition and starvation in yet another illegal, American proxy war.
We cannot allow Trump’s war machine to win this contest. Innocent lives literally depend upon the outcome of this vote. If you called previously, THANKS! Please take a moment to call again, while we still can.
enduring a naval blockade and routine aerial bombardment. The United Nations estimates the war has already 
The Yemeni civil war is another among America’s several proxy wars where we use others to do our bidding and kill our “enemies” (whether or not they have ever done anything to us).
group that is fighting against the US/Saudi-backed rebels “a terrorist organization,” opening the flood gates even wider for US military attacks in the future.
are also 
appropriations bill (itself a moral travesty we will discuss another day), which would have ended US support for Saudi atrocities, went down to defeat. Take a moment to watch the Senator’s 
congress, have helped Saudi Arabia to turn Yemen into a slaughter house where innocent men, women and children are butchered every day.
bill is introduced, we’ll have no Congressional vehicle in August to respond to the threatened Saudi-UAE escalation of the war. The UN has warned that ten million more Yemenis will be pushed to the brink of starvation if the U.S.-Saudi war in Yemen does not end this year. 
over the past few days.
Nora O’Donnell’s groveling interview for “60 Minutes” (see good discussions 
billions of dollars in 
intelligence and straightforwardness. He was Gen. Colin Powell’s chief of staff in the last Bush administration and is now a Distinguished Professor of Government & Public Policy at