[Peace-discuss] Daniel Larison | The American Conservative: Lloyd Austin & The War On Yemen

[Robert Naiman]

ICYMI.

---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Robert Naiman <naiman.uiuc at gmail.com>
Date: Thu, Dec 17, 2020 at 1:32 PM
Subject: Daniel Larison | The American Conservative: Lloyd Austin And The
War On Yemen

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/state-of-the-union/lloyd-austin-and-the-war-on-yemen/

DECEMBER 16, 2020|12:56 PM
DANIEL LARISON

Mark Perry has written an excellent report
<https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/12/16/lloyd-austin-isnt-who-you-think-he-is/>
on
Lloyd Austin’s policy views. Among other things, Perry finds that Austin
was strongly opposed to the Saudi-led intervention in Yemen when he was in
charge of Centcom:

What’s crucial is what Austin did in the aftermath of these failures,
particularly after the Saudi intervention in Yemen. “Lloyd was enraged by
the Saudi intervention,” a senior officer who worked with Austin at Centcom
said, “because we [the Americans] were quietly supporting the Houthi fight
against AQAP [al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula] at the time.” Austin was
so angered by the Saudi move, this now-retired officer said, that he
considered formally requesting that the Obama administration denounce the
intervention. “We waved him off of that,” the officer with whom I spoke at
the time said. But Austin also predicted the troubles the Saudis would face
and made his views known to senior civilians at the Pentagon. “He thought
the Saudis would lose in Yemen and that, before it was all over, we would
have to bail them out,” this same officer noted. Austin was right on both
counts: The Saudis found themselves mired in Yemen and dependent on U.S.
intelligence assets in their fight.

The Obama administration’s support for the war on Yemen was one of its
greatest and most destructive errors. If the president and the Secretary of
Defense had listened to Austin’s advice and refused to support the war,
that could have been avoided. It reflects very well on Austin’s judgment
that he understood that the Saudi intervention wasn’t going to succeed. One
of my concerns about Austin is that he would be too indulgent of the Saudis
and the UAE because of his Centcom experience, just as Mattis had been when
he was Defense Secretary, but this record suggests just the opposite. At
the very least, that bodes well for how the Biden administration will act
in Yemen. Austin’s view of the war on Yemen helps make sense of why Biden
selected him.

Perry’s report includes additional details about Austin and the Yemen
debate that deserves more attention:

As crucially, the Saudi intervention marked the first time that Austin
would cross swords with then-Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John
McCain, who slammed the military for its failure to fully support the Saudi
effort. The reason the Saudis didn’t notify Centcom of their plans ahead of
time, McCain said, was because “they believe we are siding with Iran.” The
rebuke didn’t sit well with senior U.S. officers at Centcom or at the U.S.
Special Operations Command, who had been quietly supporting the anti-AQAP
effort. And it didn’t sit well with Lloyd Austin. A senior commander who
served with Austin said that McCain purposely “blindsided” Austin in order
to make the Obama White House look bad. Siding with Iran? McCain, this
officer suggested, knew better: “The reason the Saudis didn’t inform us of
their plans,” the officer told me at the time, “is because they knew we
would have told them exactly what we think—that it was a bad idea.”

McCain was one of the most vocal supporters of U.S. involvement in the war
until his death in 2018, and his eagerness for even greater involvement was
part of a decades-long record of getting major foreign policy issues wrong.
The fact that Austin kept being on the opposite side of these policy
debates from McCain is a useful reminder of just how reckless McCain was
and how sensible Austin apparently is. Austin’s nomination should receive
careful scrutiny, and there are still more questions for him to answer at
his confirmation hearing, but reports like this one suggest that Biden has
made a good choice.
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