Yemen War…What the Hell!?!

Last week in America…and Great Britain…as well as Germany…(and coming soon to a Financial Sector near you!...) was a casual little catastrophic meltdown of the banking system.

Important, in that one comprehend even the best of us make mistakes, allow your Chagrinned Correspondent to sheepishly admit he lost a packet in the markets.

And yet Avast! – because the squandered fortune and more was made back within a few days.

Needless to say the experience was less than joyous. Moreover, it was easy to feel sorry for oneself midway through the misery...until a report appeared in English media about the war in Yemen…which instigated a good hard look in the mirror with an ultimate exclamation,

“What…the Hell!?!”

The Yemen War of Yore

For those of you – by which I mean nearly all of you – who have either forgotten or never knew there is currently a war in the Middle Eastern country of Yemen which intimately involves us all.

“Why?” you ask. Well, mainly because if you live in The West you’re paying for it.

The whole hoedown really took off back in 2014 when the official government (backed by Saudi Arabia) was challenged by the native Houthi peoples (backed extremely tenuously by Iran).

One thing they never bother to mention about this mayhem is the “Houthi Rebels” – as they are disingenuously regarded in the Controlled Media – practice the Zaydi religion (branch of Shiite Islam) which has actually been in control of Yemen for most of its existence…around 1,000 years.

In fact, they were Head Honcho until the 1960s which in geopolitical terms is approximately yesterday.

Support them or not, Houthis as representing the Zaydi belief system are basically trying to take back what has traditionally been their own.

Calling them “rebels” is like saying the Romanovs had a “vague” association with Russia.

Or in other words, “What…the Hell!?!”

How Western Taxpayers Fund Famine

Okay, so a bunch of Arabs are squabbling half a world away – shocking, I grant you.

And if that was where it began and ended I would agree the entire thing would be best ignored.

Except – as is usual per the Western Powers – the United States and its pals had to get involved.

In order to teach the “bad guys” (as is typical, the poorer faction) a lesson about improving their lot in life the American government has supported a near-total embargo on the nation which is still ongoing.

Even when specific necessities are not outright restricted the concomitant delays in arrival have devastating consequences.

Not only applying to weapons or munitions, this brutal act of aggression largely affects such non-essential items as: technology, raw materials, textiles, medicine and even food.

By 2016 the result was as one might anticipate – around 8 million Yemenis at risk of acute starvation, 2.2 million children malnourished and since then somewhere around 200,00 have actually famished to death.

Naturally this is all okay because, again, these people are poor and brown – kidding!

Seriously – “What…the Hell!?!”

Sky News Offers a Bird’s Eye View

So like everyone else who has their own problems – stock market crash-y or not – to deal with, this author was not thinking much about dead Yemeni children last week.

Except lying in bed weeping like a little girl (joking…but a stiff drink was involved) I happened to tune in to the live feed on Sky News out of Britain which featured a story on this repugnant situation.

Specifically, it dealt with the always fun topic of land mines, horrific mutilation and abject sorrow. (You should probably listen rather than read because it contains some extremely graphic material.)

There is no need to regale anyone with detailed incidents because only a truly sick individual needs more specifics than “maimed children” to get the big picture.

Even so, some of the lowlights of an excellently done report:

• a little girl was playing in the street and lost a leg and her new prosthesis broke after a few months,
• the people of Yemen are so poor prosthetic devices are merely cosmetic and not functional,
• so much of such ordinance is in the area some is lodged into homes with the possibility of detonating at any time.

This is how the average Yemeni lives.

Indeed, “What…the Hell!?!”

Did I Mention the Sinking Oil Tanker

Just to round out the perfection of the horror that is Yemen today, there is a dilapidated oil tanker in the port which has been grounded for some time.

Aside from the fact it is – unsurprisingly – full of oil which might blow at any moment is the incidental that if it sinks there will be an ecological disaster in the Red Sea.

Personally, I find the starving people a more compelling drama but then again I am not Greta Thunberg.

Yes, The West is to Blame

It is important to remind you once more the Yemen War began in 2014…does that date seem familiar?

That it is roughly the temporal frame of another little conflict we constantly, endlessly, repeatedly hear of these days?

Something about a peninsula someplace in Eastern Europe purportedly the most important thing ever to occur in all of the history of mankind?

Yeah…poor people, brown people, whatever people…and King Zelensky needs more money for weapons! Pay no attention to those dusky urchins clawing at your feet for spare change.

Anyway, only about a million humanitarian organizations have been trying to convince various American administrations (including “liberal” Joe Biden) what a starving Yemeni baby looks like and that a total embargo does nothing to ameliorate this conflict and there are myriad other approaches to solve this political issue without – you know – the whole massive death of infants thing…

Only, as one might anticipate, neither American politicians nor American bureaucrats seem to care.

Plenty of reasons: kickbacks, policies, armaments profits and the like but…

Exhaustedly, “What…the Hell!?!”

The Week that Was

So there I was feeling pretty lousy about myself last week until Sky News set me straight.

Because in the span of seven days I lost – and made back – more money than some desperately poor Yemeni will make working full-time in a menial task for nearly five years of his life merely because I know some financial tricks and honestly nothing seems at all correct about that to me…

Because however bad matters are even on the worst of days I am not a little girl trying to jam my leg into a broken fake leg and who – nonetheless brown and poor – has now had her “life dream” redirected from being a physician to becoming a mine sweeper and to tell the truth that infuriates me…

Because as awful as some of the things I have done in this world may be at least I am not a senile degenerate man doddering his way off to spend another weekend in some Delaware mansion while my government intentionally punishes children for no good reason whatsoever which is noxious to my sensibilities and causes some pauses toward a sudden realization…

“Wait…is this Hell!?!”

Guy Somerset writes from somewhere in America