Diplomatic Farce in Yemen

On March 8, 1965, the State Department announced that if “procedural difficulties” could be overcome it was ready to facilitate the shipment of surplus food supplies to the Muta- wakelite Kingdom of Yemen. The Department’s declaration is a gratifying though long overdue manifestation of humanitarian concern. State Department policies bear a heavy share of responsibility for the prolongation of the Yemeni war. This conflict broke out on September 26, 1962, when a group of army officers seized control of the government of the south Arabian state. They failed, however, to kill the King and Imam (religious leader descended in the female line from the Prophet, Muhammad) . Muhamad al-Badr, escaped from the capital city, San’a. When they found that he was raising the northern and eastern tribes against them, the conspirators asked the United Arab Republic to send an army to Yemen to succor them.

President Gamel Abdel Nasser obliged by rushing 30,000 infantrymen with tank, air, and artillery support, to Yemen. The Egyptian president thought it would be a military pushover and that he would be able to establish “Arab Socialism” in Yemen. But the Yemeni are mostly small farmers and the only kind of socialism they will stand for is the very ancient form of communal ownership of flocks, herds, etc., that has prevailed in the Arab world from time immemorial. Royalist commandos mined the roads used by Egyptian armor, blew up tanks, motor convoys, staff cars, and artillery pieces with considerable regularity. Egyptian patrols were picked off and even in broad daylight no Egyptian dared to get very far away from his unit. It was only command of the air that allowed the occupation forces to keep the royalists bottled up in the northern and eastern mountains.

SG

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Stanko Guldesca

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On March 8, 1965, the State Department announced that if “procedural difficulties” could be overcome it was ready to facilitate the shipment of surplus food supplies to the Muta- wakelite Kingdom of Yemen. The Department’s declaration is a gratifying though long overdue manifestation of humanitarian concern. State Department policies bear a heavy share of responsibility for the prolongation of the Yemeni war. This conflict broke out on September 26, 1962, when a group of army officers seized control of the government of the south Arabian state. They failed, however, to kill the King and Imam (religious leader descended in the female line from the Prophet, Muhammad) . Muhamad al-Badr, escaped from the capital city, San’a. When they found that he was raising the northern and eastern tribes against them, the conspirators asked the United Arab Republic to send an army to Yemen to succor them.

President Gamel Abdel Nasser obliged by rushing 30,000 infantrymen with tank, air, and artillery support, to Yemen. The Egyptian president thought it would be a military pushover and that he would be able to establish “Arab Socialism” in Yemen. But the Yemeni are mostly small farmers and the only kind of socialism they will stand for is the very ancient form of communal ownership of flocks, herds, etc., that has prevailed in the Arab world from time immemorial. Royalist commandos mined the roads used by Egyptian armor, blew up tanks, motor convoys, staff cars, and artillery pieces with considerable regularity. Egyptian patrols were picked off and even in broad daylight no Egyptian dared to get very far away from his unit. It was only command of the air that allowed the occupation forces to keep the royalists bottled up in the northern and eastern mountains.