TOKYO MASTER BANNER

MINISTRY OF TOKYO
US-ANGLO CAPITALISMEU-NATO IMPERIALISM
Illegitimate Transfer of Inalienable European Rights via Convention(s) & Supranational Bodies
Establishment of Sovereignty-Usurping Supranational Body Dictatorships
Enduring Program of DEMOGRAPHICS WAR on Europeans
Enduring Program of PSYCHOLOGICAL WAR on Europeans
Enduring Program of European Displacement, Dismemberment, Dispossession, & Dissolution
No wars or conditions abroad (& no domestic or global economic pretexts) justify government policy facilitating the invasion of ancestral European homelands, the rape of European women, the destruction of European societies, & the genocide of Europeans.
U.S. RULING OLIGARCHY WAGES HYBRID WAR TO SALVAGE HEGEMONY
[LINK | Article]

*U.S. OLIGARCHY WAGES HYBRID WAR* | U.S. Empire's Casino Unsustainable | Destabilised U.S. Monetary & Financial System | U.S. Defaults Twice A Year | Causes for Global Financial Crisis of 2008 Remain | Financial Pyramids Composed of Derivatives & National Debt Are Growing | *U.S. OLIGARCHY WAGES HYBRID WAR* | U.S. Empire's Casino Unsustainable | Destabilised U.S. Monetary & Financial System | U.S. Defaults Twice A Year | Causes for Global Financial Crisis of 2008 Remain | Financial Pyramids Composed of Derivatives & National Debt Are Growing | *U.S. OLIGARCHY WAGES HYBRID WAR*

Who's preaching world democracy, democracy, democracy? —Who wants to make free people free?
[info from Craig Murray video appearance, follows]  US-Anglo Alliance DELIBERATELY STOKING ANTI-RUSSIAN FEELING & RAMPING UP TENSION BETWEEN EASTERN EUROPE & RUSSIA.  British military/government feeding media PROPAGANDA.  Media choosing to PUBLISH government PROPAGANDA.  US naval aggression against Russia:  Baltic Sea — US naval aggression against China:  South China Sea.  Continued NATO pressure on Russia:  US missile systems moving into Eastern Europe.     [info from John Pilger interview follows]  War Hawk:  Hillary Clinton — embodiment of seamless aggressive American imperialist post-WWII system.  USA in frenzy of preparation for a conflict.  Greatest US-led build-up of forces since WWII gathered in Eastern Europe and in Baltic states.  US expansion & military preparation HAS NOT BEEN REPORTED IN THE WEST.  Since US paid for & controlled US coup, UKRAINE has become an American preserve and CIA Theme Park, on Russia's borderland, through which Germans invaded in the 1940s, costing 27 million Russian lives.  Imagine equivalent occurring on US borders in Canada or Mexico.  US military preparations against RUSSIA and against CHINA have NOT been reported by MEDIA.  US has sent guided missile ships to diputed zone in South China Sea.  DANGER OF US PRE-EMPTIVE NUCLEAR STRIKES.  China is on HIGH NUCLEAR ALERT.  US spy plane intercepted by Chinese fighter jets.  Public is primed to accept so-called 'aggressive' moves by China, when these are in fact defensive moves:  US 400 major bases encircling China; Okinawa has 32 American military installations; Japan has 130 American military bases in all.  WARNING PENTAGON MILITARY THINKING DOMINATES WASHINGTON. ⟴  
Showing posts with label Yemen. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Yemen. Show all posts

June 04, 2017

BRITISH & NATO-ALLIED OIL ARAB ALLIANCE & IMPERIALIST FOREIGN POLICY RESPONSIBLE FOR JIHAD ON WEST




BRITISH & NATO-ALLIED OIL ARAB ALLIANCE & IMPERIALIST FOREIGN POLICY RESPONSIBLE FOR JIHAD ON WEST


HIGHLIGHT FROM JOHN PILGER ARTICLE  ...

British foreign policy ... alliance with extreme Islam, especially the sect known as Wahhabism or Salafism, whose principal custodian and banker is the oil kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Britain's biggest weapons customer.

This imperial marriage reaches back to the Second World War and the early days of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt. The aim of British policy was to stop pan-Arabism: Arab states developing a modern secularism, asserting their independence from the imperial west and controlling their resources. The creation of a rapacious Israel was meant to expedite this. Pan-Arabism has since been crushed; the goal now is division and conquest. —John Pilger




Britain, Saudi Arabia, Jihad on Britain, FBI Leak, David Cameron, Theresa May, David Blair, UK-Saudi Arms Deal, Bank of Scotland Cluster Bombs, Yemen, South Sudan, Congo, Central African Republic, Libya, Uganda, Mali, MI5,



Follow John Pilger on twitter @johnpilger

http://johnpilger.com/articles/terror-in-britain-what-did-the-prime-minister-know



TERROR IN BRITAIN: WHAT DID THE PRIME MINISTER KNOW?
31 May 2017


The unsayable in Britain's general election campaign is this. The causes of the Manchester atrocity, in which 22 mostly young people were murdered by a jihadist, are being suppressed to protect the secrets of British foreign policy.

Critical questions - such as why the security service MI5 maintained terrorist "assets" in Manchester and why the government did not warn the public of the threat in their midst - remain unanswered, deflected by the promise of an internal "review".

The alleged suicide bomber, Salman Abedi, was part of an extremist group, the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, that thrived in Manchester and was cultivated and used by MI5 for more than 20 years.

The LIFG is proscribed by Britain as a terrorist organisation which seeks a "hardline Islamic state" in Libya and "is part of the wider global Islamist extremist movement, as inspired by al-Qaida".

The "smoking gun" is that when Theresa May was Home Secretary, LIFG jihadists were allowed to travel unhindered across Europe and encouraged to engage in "battle": first to remove Mu'ammar Gadaffi in Libya, then to join al-Qaida affiliated groups in Syria.

Last year, the FBI reportedly placed Abedi on a "terrorist watch list" and warned MI5 that his group was looking for a "political target" in Britain. Why wasn't he apprehended and the network around him prevented from planning and executing the atrocity on 22 May?

These questions arise because of an FBI leak that demolished the "lone wolf" spin in the wake of the 22 May attack - thus, the panicky, uncharacteristic outrage directed at Washington from London and Donald Trump's apology.

The Manchester atrocity lifts the rock of British foreign policy to reveal its Faustian alliance with extreme Islam, especially the sect known as Wahhabism or Salafism, whose principal custodian and banker is the oil kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Britain's biggest weapons customer.

This imperial marriage reaches back to the Second World War and the early days of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt. The aim of British policy was to stop pan-Arabism: Arab states developing a modern secularism, asserting their independence from the imperial west and controlling their resources. The creation of a rapacious Israel was meant to expedite this. Pan-Arabism has since been crushed; the goal now is division and conquest.

In 2011, according to Middle East Eye, the LIFG in Manchester were known as the "Manchester boys". Implacably opposed to Mu'ammar Gadaffi, they were considered high risk and a number were under Home Office control orders - house arrest - when anti-Gadaffi demonstrations broke out in Libya, a country forged from myriad tribal enmities.

Suddenly the control orders were lifted. "I was allowed to go, no questions asked," said one LIFG member. MI5 returned their passports and counter-terrorism police at Heathrow airport were told to let them board their flights.

The overthrow of Gaddafi, who controlled Africa's largest oil reserves, had been long been planned in Washington and London. According to French intelligence, the LIFG made several assassination attempts on Gadaffi in the 1990s - bank-rolled by British intelligence. In March 2011, France, Britain and the US seized the opportunity of a "humanitarian intervention" and attacked Libya. They were joined by Nato under cover of a UN resolution to "protect civilians".

Last September, a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Select Committee inquiry concluded that then Prime Minister David Cameron had taken the country to war against Gaddafi on a series of "erroneous assumptions" and that the attack "had led to the rise of Islamic State in North Africa". The Commons committee quoted what it called Barack Obama's "pithy" description of Cameron's role in Libya as a "shit show".

In fact, Obama was a leading actor in the "shit show", urged on by his warmongering Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, and a media accusing Gaddafi of planning "genocide" against his own people. "We knew... that if we waited one more day," said Obama, "Benghazi, a city the size of Charlotte, could suffer a massacre that would have reverberated across the region and stained the conscience of the world."

The massacre story was fabricated by Salafist militias facing defeat by Libyan government forces. They told Reuters there would be "a real bloodbath, a massacre like we saw in Rwanda". The Commons committee reported, "The proposition that Mu'ammar Gaddafi would have ordered the massacre of civilians in Benghazi was not supported by the available evidence".

Britain, France and the United States effectively destroyed Libya as a modern state. According to its own records, Nato launched 9,700 "strike sorties", of which more than a third hit civilian targets. They included fragmentation bombs and missiles with uranium warheads. The cities of Misurata and Sirte were carpet-bombed. Unicef, the UN children's organisation, reported a high proportion of the children killed "were under the age of ten".

More than "giving rise" to Islamic State - ISIS had already taken root in the ruins of Iraq following the Blair and Bush invasion in 2003 - these ultimate medievalists now had all of north Africa as a base. The attack also triggered a stampede of refugees fleeing to Europe.

Cameron was celebrated in Tripoli as a "liberator", or imagined he was. The crowds cheering him included those secretly supplied and trained by Britain's SAS and inspired by Islamic State, such as the "Manchester boys".

To the Americans and British, Gadaffi's true crime was his iconoclastic independence and his plan to abandon the petrodollar, a pillar of American imperial power. He had audaciously planned to underwrite a common African currency backed by gold, establish an all-Africa bank and promote economic union among poor countries with prized resources. Whether or not this would have happened, the very notion was intolerable to the US as it prepared to "enter" Africa and bribe African governments with military "partnerships".

The fallen dictator fled for his life. A Royal Air Force plane spotted his convoy, and in the rubble of Sirte, he was sodomised with a knife by a fanatic described in the news as "a rebel".

Having plundered Libya's $30 billion arsenal, the "rebels" advanced south, terrorising towns and villages. Crossing into sub-Saharan Mali, they destroyed that country's fragile stability. The ever-eager French sent planes and troops to their former colony "to fight al-Qaida", or the menace they had helped create.

On 14 October, 2011, President Obama announced he was sending special forces troops to Uganda to join the civil war there. In the next few months, US combat troops were sent to South Sudan, Congo and the Central African Republic. With Libya secured, an American invasion of the African continent was under way, largely unreported.

In London, one of the world's biggest arms fairs was staged by the British government. The buzz in the stands was the "demonstration effect in Libya". The London Chamber of Commerce and Industry held a preview entitled "Middle East: A vast market for UK defence and security companies". The host was the Royal Bank of Scotland, a major investor in cluster bombs, which were used extensively against civilian targets in Libya. The blurb for the bank's arms party lauded the "unprecedented opportunities for UK defence and security companies."

Last month, Prime Minister Theresa May was in Saudi Arabia, selling more of the £3 billion worth of British arms which the Saudis have used against Yemen. Based in control rooms in Riyadh, British military advisers assist the Saudi bombing raids, which have killed more than 10,000 civilians. There are now clear signs of famine. A Yemeni child dies every 10 minutes from preventable disease, says Unicef.

The Manchester atrocity on 22 May was the product of such unrelenting state violence in faraway places, much of it British sponsored. The lives and names of the victims are almost never known to us.

This truth struggles to be heard, just as it struggled to be heard when the London Underground was bombed on July 7, 2005. Occasionally, a member of the public would break the silence, such as the east Londoner who walked in front of a CNN camera crew and reporter in mid-platitude. "Iraq!" he said. "We invaded Iraq. What did we expect? Go on, say it."

At a large media gathering I attended, many of the important guests uttered "Iraq" and "Blair" as a kind of catharsis for that which they dared not say professionally and publicly.

Yet, before he invaded Iraq, Blair was warned by the Joint Intelligence Committee that "the threat from al-Qaida will increase at the onset of any military action against Iraq... The worldwide threat from other Islamist terrorist groups and individuals will increase significantly".

Just as Blair brought home to Britain the violence of his and George W Bush's blood-soaked "shit show", so David Cameron, supported by Theresa May, compounded his crime in Libya and its horrific aftermath, including those killed and maimed in Manchester Arena on 22 May.

The spin is back, not surprisingly. Salman Abedi acted alone. He was a petty criminal, no more. The extensive network revealed last week by the American leak has vanished. But the questions have not.

Why was Abedi able to travel freely through Europe to Libya and back to Manchester only days before he committed his terrible crime? Was Theresa May told by MI5 that the FBI had tracked him as part of an Islamic cell planning to attack a "political target" in Britain?

In the current election campaign, the Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has made a guarded reference to a "war on terror that has failed". As he knows, it was never a war on terror but a war of conquest and subjugation. Palestine. Afghanistan. Iraq. Libya. Syria. Iran is said to be next. Before there is another Manchester, who will have the courage to say that?

Follow John Pilger on twitter @johnpilger

http://johnpilger.com/articles/terror-in-britain-what-did-the-prime-minister-know






Very interesting article by investigative journalist, John Pilger, written in aftermath of Manchester Arena attack and ahead of the current London Bridge attack:



3RD JIHAD ATTACK - LONDON

  1. WESTMINSTER BRIDGE SLAUGHTER
  2. MANCHESTER ARENA SLAUGHTER
  3. LONDON BRIDGE SLAUGHTER



At least seven people died and 48 people were injured in a two-pronged attack on London Bridge and Borough Market, with police shooting the three suspected assailants dead.

The attack started when a van rammed into pedestrians on London Bridge and ended with multiple stabbings at restaurants nearby.

Police say the suspects were shot dead within eight minutes of the first call.

http://edition.cnn.com/2017/06/04/europe/london-terror-attack-witness-borough/index.html?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter




It appears that the Western, including British, political establishment is in fact responsible for the attacks on Britons and all Europeans, by Jihadists - as the Jihad was manifested by British and NATO-allied oil Arab (terrorist funding) alliance machinations,  coupled with imperialist Western capitalist foreign policy, as well as capitalist-serving domestic ideology & accompanying domestic policy of decades standing, the consequences of which, the hostage domestic public subsequently reaps.






November 27, 2016

American Capitalist Oligarchy's War on Yemen






WikiLeaks




YEMEN FILES RELEASE



25 November 2016
https://wikileaks.org/yemen-files/releases/


Hillary Rodham Clinton
Sec State - 2009-2013


DISPLACED:  3.15 million persons internally in YEMEN

USG provided most bombs & is involved in conduct of war in Yemen

strategic value:  Yemen controls choke point to Red Sea + Suez canal
(world 11% petroleum shipments daily)

Yemen access to ARABIAN SEA
another 20% of world's petroleum shipments
from:  Strait of Hormuz
incl. oil of SAUDI ARABIA and IRAN

(bordering countries:  Saudi Arabia & Oman)

SAUDI ARABIA attempts to control a port in YEMEN
as means of avoiding potential of IRAN being capable of restricting oil shipments
in future along STRAIT OF HORMUZ
(or by countries that can control SAUDI ARABIA oil shipments along Red Sea)

YEMEN FILES - show documentary EVIDENCE of:
USA:  arming, training & funding Yemen - years ahead of war
USA sold:
*aircraft
*vessels
*vehicles
*US biometric systems

2015 - US closed its embassy  / continuing unrest between different factions

war broke out in Yemen within a month


25 November 2016
https://wikileaks.org/yemen-files/releases/



https://www.rt.com/usa/368205-yemen-us-military-wikileaks/


YEMEN FILES - 2009-2015
WikiLeasks release docs:  US embassy in Sana’a, Yemen
cover Hillary Rodham Clinton & John Kerry (2 years) - terms as as US Sec. of State

2010 - Aug. Defence Dept. presentation
lays out a detailed plan for equipping the Yemeni government with arms
> by:
US FOREIGN MILITARY FINANCING (FMF) PROGRAM
> + other “security assistance programs”

RISK:   mounting costs for the US (ie already burdened US taxpayer)

NOTE:  increasing expenses on the training, maintenance and upgrades required to use them
follows:   initial US taxpayer funded non-refundable $147-MILLION 'donation' outlay for weapons to Yemen

CLAIMED AIM:

Yemen “a stable state where violent extremists cannot operate”
   + “to limit the regional impacts of terrorism, trafficking and piracy”
COMMENT:  in my view this is really about gaining and maintaining power/ DOMINANCE:
ie. Prevent internal and external armed & other opposition to US oligarchy & allied interests (Saudi, Gulf Arab, Israeli, British & EU) in the region and internally in Yemen

ESTIMATED COST of US military supplies to Yemen:  $147 million

RISK:  arms could potentially be used “for other purposes counter to US interests”  eg.

1.  against Houthi rebels in northern Yemen
2.  against secessionists in south of Yemen

YEMEN ECONOMY is in such poor stated, US govt funds are:  NON-REPAYABLE LOANS
COMMENT
& ordinary US taxpayers are therefore the wage-slaves that are lumbered with the costs of this arms funding - while the arms manufacturing oligarchs profit, and the oil industry oligarchs profit from this taxpayer-funded investment
US taxpayer enslavement pays for this, however long it takes, in an America that is TRILLIONS in debt to private bankers
Meanwhile, Yemen, with a really poor economy is being flooded with weapons instead of the US using some of those same resources in helping Yemen increase agricultural and other production, as needed to improve living contentions in the country.

Almost all money spent 'helping' is spent on arming the Yemen military
GIVEN by USA in non-repayable loans from US government funds (ie. US taxpayer resources)

2002 to 2008:  US gave the Yemeni government over $105m worth of weapons
  • via  non-repayable grants and donations

program: International Military Education and Training (IMET)
sends 20-25 Yemeni military students to various military schools in the US
funded to the tune of about $1 million p.a.
>  very effective return on investment “for advancing US diplomatic or policy goals
>  ie.  advancing US CAPITALIST RULING OLIGARCHY GOALS

TRUE TO FORM
WESTERN PRESS is largely silent re the US & ALLIED CAPITALIST RULING OLIGARCHY war on Yemen

https://www.rt.com/usa/368205-yemen-us-military-wikileaks/






January 04, 2016

Yemen re Iran - False Accusations, False Testimony, False Reports, Fake News & Iran Vilification

Article
SOURCE
Gareth Porter
Independent Investigative Journalist
/ Historian US National Security Policy
Link | Source


"How False Stories of Iran Arming the Houthis Were Used to Justify War in Yemen"

Thursday, 31 December 2015 10:42
By Gareth Porter, Truthout | News Analysis
Independent Investigative Journalist
/ Historian US National Security Policy
Link | Source

Summary

March 2015
Bombing campaign initiated by Saudi Arabia
  • + Gulf allies
  • + US support

Rationale for Saudi-led war on Yemen:
  • Houthis portrayed as merely proxies of Iran
  • Houthis allegedly armed by Iran (for years)
  • allegations repeatedly echoed in press
  • allegation not proven
  • yet allegation REINFORCED by UN experts report

UNSC PANEL OF EXPERTS - REPORT


REPORT
UN Security Council
from:  Panel of Experts

established  pursuant to Security Council
resolution 1929 (2010)
Link | UNSC Panel of Experts Report
Report dated:  1 June 2015
Salomé  Zourabichvili
(Coordinator Panel Experts)
Mowaffaq al-Refai (Expert)
Jonathan Brewer (Expert)
Christian Kessler (Expert)
Chunjie Li (Expert)
Thomas Mazet (Expert)
Kazuto Suzuki (Expert)
Elena Vodopolavoa (Expert)


RESULTS REPORT
-- concluded Iran shipping arms to Houthi rebels in Yemen
-- allegedly by sea, since at least 2009

HOWEVER
-- investigation of x2 main allegations re arms by Yemen govt
-- & cited by expert panel
-- shows both allegations "CRUDELY CONSTRUCTED RUSES"

-- President Saleh govt of Yemen
-- claimed vessel (Mahan 1) seized Yemen waters Oct 2009
-- & that weapons found on-board (& Iran crew x5 convicted)

WIKILEAKS CABLES 2010
-- (from US Embassy in Yemen)

REVEALS
-- 'arms onboard' was concocted by Yemen government
-- US cable of 11 Nov. 2009 reported to WA that:
-- Yemen govt failed to substantiate public claims
-- cable stated:  'sensitive reporting'
-- (ie US intelligence reports)
-- convey that SHIP WAS CARRYING NO WEAPONS AT ALL
-- given US knowledge, Yemen govt began changing story
-- (subsequent US cable notes)
--  Yemen changed story to:
--  ship empty, so arms must have been delivered

-- Article says, Pres. Saleh, Yemen
-- hoped to use Iran arms story to get political support of US
-- for war against Houthis (planned 'Op Scorched Earth')

YEMEN ARMS - MASSIVE MARKET
-- local arms market massive
-- directly from Yemen military itself
-- would explain where Houthis get arms from

2013 - JIHAN 1 (SHIP)
-- seized Jan 23, 2013
-- arms on-board (true)
-- but story of arms shipment from Iran is false
-- joint patrol: Yemen Coast Guard & US Navy
-- intercepted Jihan 1 ship
-- cargo:  portable SAM (& misc. multiple other)
-- weeks later, UN expert panel inspects arms seized
-- 'Ministry of Sepah' labels found on arms boxes
-- ie of former Iranian military logistics ministry
-- but no evidence connecting this to Iran
-- all crew & businessmen who arranged shipment from Yemen
-- no evidence for manufacture in Iran
-- allegations centred on testimony of Yemen crew
-- but GPS evidence not cited by panel
-- (as match for crew story)
-- panel claimed it had no info re location of loading of arms

WEAPONS UNDER DIESEL FUEL TANKS
-- weapons hidden under diesel fuel tanks
-- weapons could only be accessed after tanks emptied
-- report fails to discuss the significance of this fact
-- ie points to Yemen origin of arms

2013 - REPORT
UNSC MONITORING GROUP

-- on Somalia & Eritrea
-- says Jihan 1 crew divulged to diplomatic source:
-- ship headed for SOMALIA
-- confirmed by unnamed Yemen official
-- not disclosed to UNSC expert panel
-- (per UN Monitoring Report)

SOMALIA
-- destination Somalia
-- Jihan 1 commercial smuggling / not politically motivated
-- smuggling diesel fuel from Yemen to Somalia - lucrative
-- long-standing combo smuggling arms / Yemen to Somalia
-- Somalia outlawed fuel import b/c of arms smuggling

-- UN Monitoring Group report
-- reveals series of arms shipments to Somalia (late 2012)
-- before Jihan 1 seized
-- similar weapons main Jihan 1 shipment
-- report from Somalia (& own UNSC Monitoring Group)
-- Yemen = source of weapons
-- key evidence:  Bulgaria govt to UN Monitoring Group
-- stating rocket propelled grenade rounds + other
-- seized in Somalia
-- Bulgaria made & delivered to Yemen armed forces 2010
Going by info in UNSC Monitoring Group Report
-- arms on Jihan 1 belong to Yemen arms smugglers
-- Yemen govt exploited the situation, after transit busted
-- Yemen govt concocted the Iran story
-- Yemen govt had Yemen crew feed UN panel concocted story

UNSC Monitoring Group Report
-- re Somalia & Eritrea
-- problematic re concocted anti-Iran story
-- Yemen govt Western backers put a new spin on the story
-- Reuters quoted 'Western diplomat'
-- claimed Iran supplying al-Shabaab terrorists in Somalia
-- noted C-4 explosives
-- (used by al-shabaab terrorist bombings but not Houthi MO)
-- claim not credible b/c
-- al-Shabaab = close ties to al-Qaeda (enemy of Iran)
-- story only reported in pro-Saudi & pro-Israeli media

Yemen govt concocted 'Iran arms' on Jihan 1 story
+  recycled UNSC expert panel report
=  key, widely accepted narrative re Iran in Middle East

SOURCE
Gareth Porter
Independent Investigative Journalist
/ Historian US National Security Policy
Link | Source

---------------------- ꕤ ----------------------
COMMENT

As the source states no reproduction without permission, I've tried to summarise the article rather than copy over & mark up, like I do.

Not sure how I went with summary.  I'm sure I've covered everything, but it's probably not hugely different from the original.

Anyway, there it is. 

That means the bombing of Yemen and the vilification of Iran is based on false claims, fake testimony, fake reports, fake news stories and fake anti-Iran spin.  Wow.




December 29, 2015

Saudi Arabia Backed By West - Killing Civilians Wholesale in Yemen


Yemen
attacked & bombed by Saudi Arabia
supported by West
& Gulf  States










Yemen

93% of deaths & injuries in Yemen are civilian

Over 2,200 civilian deaths had been registered by September 2015

overwhelming from:
  • air-launched explosive weapons – 93%;
  • ground-launched explosive weapons – 94%;
  • improvised explosive devices – 97%.

Report | PDF
https://docs.unocha.org/sites/dms/Documents/Yemen%20EWIPA%20report.pdf

SOURCE
http://www.theguardian.com/global-development-professionals-network/2015/oct/27/yemen-deaths-93-civilian-this-must-change



Hakim Almasmari
@HakimAlmasmari


Yemen Expert. Reporting/analysis on CNN, WSJ, AJE, BBC, RT, etc. Editor in Chief of Yemen Post Newspaper @YemenPostNews, University Lecturer, Yemeni American.


reports:
  • 150,000 Saudi airstrikes
  • Over 40,000 civilians killed in 272 day war



---------------------- ꕤ ----------------------



COMMENT

I've not check the PDF report attached to The Guardian story.

Not sure what the go is with that figure.

Academic & Yemen Post editor gives a figure of 40,000 civilians killed (which is vastly more than that 2,200 figure).

No time to check now.

The man that's holding up 'something' is holding up a human hand.





UAE Mercenaries Fighting in Yemen - Western Advisers

Article
SOURCE

http://www.middleeasteye.net/news/mercenaries-charge-uae-forces-fighting-yemen-764309832



Middle East Eye
British news website
'independently funded'
David Hearst, editor
(formerly at The Guardian)
wholly owned by MEE Ltd
sole director: Jamal Bassasso
fmr director at Qatari-funded al-Jazeera

MIDDLE EAST EYE

Revealed: The mercenaries commanding UAE forces in Yemen
The UAE has brought in experienced foreign military officers to command an elite force reporting to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed

Rori Donaghy
Wednesday 23 December 2015 09:30 UTC

Last update:
Saturday 26 December 2015 12:25 UTC


An Australian citizen is the commander of an elite UAE military force deployed in Yemen as part of the Saudi-led coalition, which human rights groups accuse of war crimes.

Mike Hindmarsh, 59, is a former senior Australian army officer who is publicly listed as commander of the UAE’s Presidential Guard.

The Presidential Guard is a unit of marines, reconnaissance, aviation, special forces and mechanised brigades, according to the US State Department website.

Hindmarsh oversaw the guard’s formation in early 2010 shortly after he took up his estimated $500,000-a-year, tax-free job in Abu Dhabi, where he reports directly to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan.

The Presidential Guard has been lauded for playing a key role in the Saudi-led coalition seeking to reinstall the exiled Yemeni government of President Abd Rabbuh Mansour Hadi.

The coalition was formed in March to push back the rebel Houthi movement, which Arab Gulf states view as being backed by regional rival Iran.

Presidential Guard troops have been in Yemen since 4 May, and were reported to have played a key role in the recapturing of port city Aden by local Hadi-allied forces on 17 July.

Human rights groups
including Amnesty International have called for a suspension of arms exports to members of the Saudi-led coalition after reporting what they described as “damning evidence” of war crimes in Yemen. There is no evidence to suggest that Hindmarsh is responsible for the alleged war crimes claimed by rights groups.

At least 5,700 people – about half of them civilians – have been killed since the coalition launched its campaign. Yemen was already suffering a serious humanitarian crisis before the coalition's entry into the war; however, the country’s situation has since grown increasingly grave, with more than 80 percent of the population of 24.5 million needing humanitarian assistance.


The Australian connection

While the Arab coalition fighting in Yemen is widely described as being led by Saudi Arabia, one Gulf official told Middle East Eye on condition of anonymity that the external ground forces were in reality being steered by the UAE.

More than 10,000 coalition troops have been sent to Yemen and, while no official numbers have been released, it is believed that at least 1,500 Emirati troops are taking part in ground operations.

The best trained and equipped coalition troops are likely to be those from the UAE Presidential Guard, which was the only Arab force to undertake full military operations in Afghanistan, where they fought alongside American soldiers.

A defence website has estimated that there are around 5,000 soldiers in the Presidential Guard.

It was announced in 2014 that the UAE was to pay the US Marines $150mn to train the guards. Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed was reported to have ordered the force to be instilled with a “warrior ethos”.

Overseeing the development of this elite force has been Hindmarsh, who had a distinguished career in the Australian army before moving to Abu Dhabi.

Hindmarsh served in his home country’s military between 1976 and 2009, during which time he received 11 awards and took part in tours that included deployments to the Middle East.

Mike Hindmarsh (UAE Armed Forces)

After first heading up the Australian SAS between January 1997 and January 1999, he moved on to command Australian Special Forces between October 2004 and January 2008, before leading Australian forces in the Middle East from March 2008 until January 2009.

Hindmarsh was based in Baghdad and oversaw the moving of Australia’s regional base to the UAE after their withdrawal from Iraq. Local media reported that during this time Hindmarsh had “dealings at the highest security levels with senior officials and the UAE military”.

Since then Australian troops have been based at the Minhad Air base, and earlier this year then Prime Minister Tony Abbott announced that 600 Australian troops would be sent to the UAE as part of the wider fight against the Islamic State group in Syria and Iraq.

After moving back to Australia from the Middle East, Hindmarsh took up a new role in March 2009 heading up the Army Training Command at Victoria Barracks in Sydney for a salary of $230,000 a year.

However, in October 2009 it was announced that the Australian government had approved Hindmarsh retirement from the army to take up a new role commanding the UAE Presidential Guard.

Military expert Michael Knights said Hindmarsh's role in the guard, reported on Twitter, was a “smart” move by the UAE.

“All GCC (Gulf) states should be doing this. Don’t just buy the best equipment, buy talent too,” he wrote, referring to the Gulf state's huge investment in military hardware.

It would appear that the UAE has followed the principle of bringing in experience to develop the Presidential Guard, as a quick search through LinkedIn throws up numerous results of experienced soldiers - mainly from Australia - who occupy senior roles in the elite force.

Among those working in Abu Dhabi is Peter Butson, a former Australian soldier and intelligence corps officer who since February 2014 has been an adviser to the Presidential Guard.

Scott Corrigan, a former special operations commander in the Australian army, has been a specialist adviser to the Presidential Guard since January 2013. Kevin Dolan is an evaluator for the guard and was previously a warrant officer in both the Australian and British armies. Steve Nichols is another former senior commander in the Australian army who is now in his fifth year as a senior adviser to the guards.

It is not known how many Australians work for the UAE army; however, local media reported at the time of Hindmarsh's appointment that there were "dozens" working in "leadership, training and mentoring roles".

While Australians appear to dominate the foreign contingent of commanders in the Presidential Guard, there are other nationalities who are advising and training the force.

Dizzy Dawson, a former manager at the UK’s Ministry of Defence and an ex-Royal Marine officer, is a senior security adviser to the guard; and American Robert B Cross Sr headed up the UAE Presidential Guard Institute as part of the US Marine Corps training programme.

Responding to critical comments about the UAE employing mercenaries, military expert Knights tweeted: “It is the same business whether for your original state or a new one. A good general can end a war faster, save lives.”

Knights added that employing foreign mercenaries “was a fairly traditional part of conflict before the age of nationalism”.

Mike Hindmarsh speaks to a room of Emiratis (UAE Armed Forces)

Mercenaries killed in Yemen

Some mercenaries have been killed in Yemen. The Houthi-run Saba News reported on 8 December that six Colombians and their Australian commander were killed in fighting around the flashpoint southeast province of Taiz.

Saba News updated their report on 9 December to say 14 foreign mercenaries had been killed – including two Britons and one French citizen on top of the Australian and Colombians – although this claim is unconfirmed.

Colombian mercenaries were first reported to have been fighting in Yemen in October, when about 100 former Colombian soldiers were said to have joined coalition troops, with about 800 in total planned to be sent in to back up pro-Hadi forces.

The Colombians are believed to have been recruited to fight in Yemen by the UAE. The New York Times reported in 2011 that experienced Colombian troops had been offered high salaries to join a secretive UAE force established in response to the Arab Spring uprisings.

It is not known if the Colombians fighting in Yemen are linked to the Presidential Guard; however, both the secretive force established in 2011 and the guard report directly to Mohammed bin Zayed.

Many reports have referred to the Colombians as being employees of Blackwater – a controversial American military company whose guards killed 17 Iraqi civilians in Baghdad in 2007. However, as former Guardian Middle East editor Brian Whitaker has written, the contractor who set up the UAE force is a company called Reflex Responses.

Reflex Responses, which is also known as R2, has denied that Erik Prince, the former Blackwater chief, is behind their company.


Presidential Guard recruitment

While the Colombian and Australian mercenaries remain largely behind the scenes, the UAE Presidential Guard is far from secretive, at least in its recruitment strategies.

The guard has been promoted as a symbol of national strength, rooted in pride at how strong the UAE has become since its establishment in 1971.

The UAE has engaged in military action across the region, including in the Saudi-led coalition and the US-led coalition fighting against the Islamic State (IS) group in Iraq and Syria.

Abu Dhabi has independently launched air strikes in Libya – to the surprise of American officials – and been described as a “potent ally” for the US.

This developing sense of military strength is on full display in a 2011 promotional video for the Presidential Guard. Men in military fatigues singing nationalistic songs are interspersed with images of the country’s rulers and shots of the UAE’s military hardware.

A recruitment presentation posted online in October 2013 said the guard is at the “heart of the nation”. The presentation said recruitment should be targeted at men and women between the ages of 16 and 29 who are at a “crossroads” in their lives.

The guard has a Facebook page and Twitter account. Recruitment has been publicly advertised, projecting Emirati members as proud citizens protecting their country.

The Presidential Guard has not only sought to expand its numbers but its members experience has also been used to train young men completing their national service.

Mandatory national service was introduced by the UAE in June 2014. All men aged between 18 and 30 who completed secondary education must serve nine months, while those who did not must serve for two years. National service is voluntary for women, and those who sign up are trained for nine months.

A way of completing national service is to train with the Presidential Guard, according to the LinkedIn profile of one Emirati.

Some national service conscripts have been sent to fight in Yemen. However, this was stopped in September after 45 Emirati troops were killed in a Houthi attack.

Emirati families told MEE in August that they were shocked their sons had been sent to Yemen, as they had no conflict experience.

At the time, military expert Knights said the rationale behind sending national service conscripts to Yemen was likely to bring untrained troops experience as part of a nation-building exercise.

There is no official death toll of the number of UAE troops killed in Yemen.

'Ally with the Muslim Brotherhood'

There is no sign of the war in Yemen coming to an end. Peace talks between opposing sides ended in Switzerland at the weekend with little progress, while fighting continues on the ground.

According to one Gulf official, the UAE should build more pragmatic alliances on the ground in Yemen if they want the war to end soon.

The official, who spoke to MEE on condition of anonymity, said that the war could be over “in two to three weeks” if the Emiratis agreed to ally with Islah, the Muslim Brotherhood affiliate in Yemen
.

“But they won’t because they have this problem with the Muslim Brotherhood,” the official said.

The UAE has led a region-wide assault on the Muslim Brotherhood, including labelling the group as terrorists domestically and supporting the Egyptian army in overthrowing Egypt's first elected president Mohamed Morsi, who is a Brotherhood leader.

Abu Dhabi has refused to work with Islah, and Emirati officials have blamed the Brotherhood for the failure to drive Houthi rebels out of areas including Taiz province.

Emirati disdain for the Brotherhood has gone so far that Abu Dhabi is said to have aided and abetted the Houthis' takeover of Yemeni capital Sanaa in September last year, in order to undermine the role played by Islah in the country's governance, senior sources told Middle East Eye at the time. Now, 15 months later, the Emiratis are mired in a battle to push back the Houthis, but are wary of empowering their Brotherhood foe.

The Gulf official said: “It is time for the UAE to prioritise the lives of Yemenis and ally with Islah. Their men are being killed by the Houthis and there is a clear way to end this.”

http://www.middleeasteye.net/news/mercenaries-charge-uae-forces-fighting-yemen-764309832



SMH

Australia's basing its $87m secret on sensitive absurdity

Date     November 8, 2009

DON'T tell anyone, but the Federal Government is spending $87.5 million of your money on a new Middle East military base.
Not that it uses the word ''base''. Instead, budget papers say that the money is being spent on ''command and control enhancements'' which will ''consolidate ADF supporting assets to one location''.

Nor will it say where the base is because under a deal with the host country, Australia agrees not to reveal it. Nor does it give the location of the old bases the new one is replacing.

An ADF spokesman told The Sunday Age that Defence did not say where the bases are because of security considerations and ''host national sensitivities''.

The coyness has less to do with security and more to do with the ''sensitivities'' of the the Arab hosts, who don't want to advertise that they accommodate foreign troops and their hardware, including big, noisy aircraft with red kangaroos stencilled on the fuselage.

The secrecy leads to a curious absurdity: details and images of most of the bases are on the internet, in the Middle East press and even on ADF websites. Australian ambassadors have openly said where they are. They are mentioned in Hansard.

The Sunday Age is also a party to the subterfuge. On an ADF-escorted trip to the Middle East and Afghanistan, we undertook not to reveal ''operationally sensitive information'' - including ''the country in which ADF support bases are located outside of Iraq and Afghanistan''.

Without breaching that undertaking, we can reveal - drawing on what spies call ''open sources'' and Sunday Age readers call Google - where these bases are.

One of them has a big sign out the front, adorned with red kangaroos and the words ''Billabong Flats''. Drawing on the public record, we can reveal that bases have been or are being closed in Kuwait and Qatar.

The new one is at Al Minhad Air Base in Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates.

Australia's Middle East bases have mushroomed since the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Now their focus is supporting the war in Afghanistan. Australian troops going to Afghanistan acclimatise in Kuwait, at a compound attached to a US base notorious for its fast food outlets on a stretch of sand and gravel known as Fat Alley.
The base is alongside Kuwait's Ali Al Salem Air Base. You can find more than you need to know about the base at globalsecurity.org, including its precise location: 29°20'48"N 47°31'15"E.

Liberal senator David Bushby visited the base on an ADF-escorted trip and told the Senate all about it on June 18. ''The ADF conducts a training course for all personnel arriving in the Middle East theatre at Billabong Flats, a base Australia maintains in Kuwait,'' he said.

The community information page on the website of the army's 3rd Brigade also mentions the Kuwait base and its fast food outlets, including one that boasts ''the world's best cheesesteak''.

About 110 soldiers at Billabong Flats form what is called the force support unit. Their presence in the emirate has been reported in newsletters issued by the Australian embassy in Kuwait.

Billabong Flats is due to close at the end of the year, in a phased consolidation of Australian bases. While its Kuwait location was handy for invading Iraq, it's not convenient for Afghanistan.

Moving it will slash flying time, saving fuel bills and offsetting the cost of the new base.

When the force support unit moves to Dubai, it will join Defence's regional headquarters and the RAAF.
The Government has not announced this but Australia's ambassador to the UAE has, in an interview with Abu Dhabi's The National newspaper last month.

The paper revealed that 250 ADF personnel have been stationed at Dubai's Al Minhad Air Base since December.

Air force Hercules and crews completed their move from Qatar to Dubai last Thursday, joining an Orion detachment that has been there since 2003.
By the end of the year, 500 Australians will be permanently based there, the numbers boosted by hundreds more as troops transit to and from Afghanistan.

The fact that the locations are widely known does not prevent media groups on ADF trips from spicing their stories with references to ''secret'' installations they can't identify ''for security reasons''.

Townsville radio host Steve ''Pricey'' Price revealed in a report last month, presumably filed from Billabong Flats, that: ''I'm with another wonderful bunch of Aussies in a secret spot that James Bond, Frodo Baggins or even Lawrence of Arabia could never find.''

There's a serious side to all this, said academic Richard Tanter, director of the Nautilus Institute at RMIT, which maintains an online database on Australian forces abroad.
''Governments ought to be as transparent as possible, and secrecy should only be justified in serious cases of potential danger to persons,'' Professor Tanter said.
''The double standard imposed by the UAE Government corrodes trust in co-operation between allies.

''They are fooling no one, certainly not their own people. Forcing Australia to collude in what's a fairly destructive process is a hypocritical basis for public policy.''

http://www.smh.com.au/national/australias-basing-its-87m-secret-on-sensitive-absurdity-20091107-i2vy.html



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COMMENT

Who knew Australia was such buddies with the United Arab Emirates, and who knew Australia has a base in Iraq?

It sounds like the Emirates is some kind of proxy for Western interests in the region.

The Houthis don't deserve to be attacked by Columbian mercenaries (and the rest of them) in their own country, irrespective of the military expert's history lesson.

Foreign powers are interfering with the Yemen's right to self-determination.

Might have to come back to look at this.  Trouble taking it all in.