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8 | AUGUST 6 • 2020 

1942 - 2020

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Views

J

ewish Americans, maybe 
more so than other 
Americans, have reason 
to pay close attention to U.S. 
foreign policy. Were it not for 
U.S. intervention in World 
War II, the Nazi 
genocide of 
European Jewry 
may have con-
tinued unabat-
ed. Without 
Washington’
s 
assistance in 
the Yom Kippur 
War, Israel may not have been 
able to so soundly defeat its 
Arab neighbors, a precursor 
to its current regional securi-
ty and continued occupation 
of the Palestinian territo-
ries. So, Jewish Americans 
should understand the folly 
of Washington’
s ongoing sup-
port for the Saudi-led mili-
tary intervention in Yemen. 
We should correspondingly 
demand from Washington an 
immediate end to U.S. involve-
ment in the Yemen conflict.
While the war in Yemen 
started in 2014 between the 

separatists of the Houthi move-
ment and the central govern-
ment, it soon grew to include 
Iran (which backs the former) 
and Saudi Arabia and the 
United Arab Emirates (which 
back the latter). Ongoing aerial 
bombings and blockades have 
caused widespread maiming 
and starvation of millions of 
civilians — the U.N. has called 
Yemen “the world’
s largest 
humanitarian crisis.” 
Since Saudi Arabia began 
aerial strikes in 2015, 
Washington has provided 
intelligence and, until 2018, 
in-flight refueling of Saudi 
bombers. That Washington 
is backing unhumanitarian 
regimes is not in itself wrong; 
the U.S. actively supported 
authoritarian regimes, from 
Turkey to Taiwan, throughout 
the Cold War because compe-
tition with the Soviet Union 
was preeminent. But to sup-
port such immoral actions as 
the Saudi bombing of Yemeni 
school buses and weddings for 
no strategic benefit is as appall-
ing as it is senseless. 

Washington should be 
focused on containing its main 
great-power rival, China, or 
addressing international issues 
such as nuclear proliferation, 
climate change and disease. 
Assisting Saudi Arabia (which, 
despite being a U.S. “strategic 
partner,” killed and dismem-
bered a U.S. resident in 2018) 
in its faraway, unproductive 
expedition drains effort and 
taxpayer dollars from these 
more pressing problems.
In addition to crowding 
out higher strategic priorities, 
the Yemen conflict actively 
impedes the desirable and 
long-sought extrication of the 
U.S. from the Middle East. 
Supporting Riyadh only makes 
Tehran more convinced that 
the U.S. is attempting to tip the 
scales of power in the region; it 
turn, Iran acts more aggressive-
ly. Thus, by providing essential 
support to Saudi operations 
in Yemen, the U.S. sowed the 
seeds for Iran’
s alignment with 
the Houthis. 
Some warn that abandoning 
the Saudis will drive Riyadh to 

simply turn to other patrons, 
eliminating U.S. leverage. But it 
does not appear U.S. arms sales 
to Riyadh have translated into 
any real leverage so far. 
Of course, the prospect of 
a Houthi-controlled Yemen 
may provoke fears of a terror-
ist haven similar to pre-9/11, 
Taliban-ruled Afghanistan. But 
this simple formulation ignores 
the countless other factors that 
enabled al-Qaeda’
s rise, includ-
ing Washington’
s dual contain-
ment strategy and stationing 
of troops in Saudi Arabia. 
The supposed alternatives to 
U.S. involvement in Yemen 
— a more hostile Iran and a 
breeding ground for extremists 
— are in fact products of inter-
ventions like the current one. 
Ending involvement would 
thus further American security.
Given how counterproduc-
tive U.S. involvement in Yemen 
has been, one may wonder how 
it has managed to persist. The 
answer can be found in the 
decline of institutional checks 
on misuse of power. Congress’
s 
constitutionally-mandated 

Ethan Kessler

essay

Washington Should End Involvement in Yemen

continued on page 10

