Opinion: Yemen is Falling Apart

How long will it take/

To fix what they break?

– Julian Casablancas, Left & Right in the Dark

Back in 2013 an analysis by Reuters warned that the cozy relationship between Yemen’s president Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi and the US government could spell big trouble, as it “risks alienating the people, who resent the US drone war on al Qaeda in their country.” Imagine that.

People there only grew angrier in the nineteen months since that alarm bell was sounded, and the country is now at war with itself.

Par for President Obama, who is too busy patting himself on the back to notice another disaster he helped create.

Meanwhile, US News & World Report noted the country’s “swift and striking” transformation – just six months after President Obama ”heralded” the US operation in Yemen “as the template for efforts to fight the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria.”

“Once hailed by President Barack Obama as a model for fighting extremism, the US counterterrorism strategy in Yemen has all but collapsed as the country descends into chaos,” reports the AP.

Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi is on the run, parliament dissolved by the rebels, and American military personnel are pulling out – or “repositioning forces,” as a Pentagon spokesman euphemistically put it. Antiwar.com reported on March 24 that dozens of people had been killed in the fighting. The Saudis are panicking, and the Arab League has called an emergency meeting to discuss military intervention.

ISIS surely trembles with fear.

While President Obama congratulates himself for delivering another foreign policy slam dunk – like Libya – truth conspires once more to show us what a really bad foreign policy looks like.

Obama waxed Pollyanna while Yemen steadily rose to a boil. The US government poured “millions of dollars into efforts to stabilize Yemen’s government and boost its security forces.” The drones kept at it – Barry does like his drones – and the body count grew. Then it all blew up.

The drones are still at it, surely killing more innocent people. This is what success looks like.

Enamored as he is of American military splendor being demonstrated somewhere on the globe, Mr. Obama joins with those many war happy members of Congress from both parties – in being guilty of gross incompetence bordering on criminal negligence.

So typical of this president’s whimsical, foolish prescriptions, his touch isn’t exactly that of Midas. And though we can be assured that he has moved on – to really important things, like telling us we should be compelled to vote for such cretins – Yemen joins the list of countries unfortunate enough to be helped by the US government.