Questions mount over botched Yemen raid approved by Trump
The Bunglers Have Now Cost An American Life … Allegedly By Way Of A "Dinner For Schmucks"
US military officials say Trump approved counterterrorism operation without sufficient intelligence or ground support
The US military has launched an investigation into the scale of civilian casualties in a botched special forces raid against a suspected al-Qaida base in Yemen, the first such mission to be approved by Donald Trump , as questions mount over the operation.
After initially denying there had been any civilian casualties in Sunday’s raid, US Central Command (Centcom), which is responsible for military operations in the Middle East and central Asia, acknowledged some of the dead may have included women and children, though claimed some of the women were armed.
A statement said its assessment “seeks to determine if there were any still-undetected civilian casualties in the ferocious firefight.”
The Pentagon has said a US Navy Seal, chief petty officer William Owens, and 14 militants were killed in the raid in al Bayda province, which was launched to gather intelligence on suspected operations by al-Qaida in the Arabian peninsula (AQAP). Medics at the scene said about 30 people, including 10 women and children, were killed. Three US special forces were wounded.
The mission was approved over dinner five days after the presidential inauguration by Trump and his closest advisers, including his son-in-law Jared Kushner and his special adviser and former Breitbart executive Stephen Bannon, as well as defence secretary General Jim Mattis.
Both the New York Times and Reuters carried quotes from unnamed military officials that seemed to shift blame for the mission to Trump and his inner team. It would be an extraordinary development for a president, who is commander-in-chief, to be briefed against in such detail.
The briefings suggested that one thing after another went wrong from the start of the mission, with the Yemen villagers seemingly alerted to the impending raid by drones flying lower than usual.
The special forces, apparently lacking full intelligence, were confronted by heavily-fortified positions, including landmines, and faced heavy gunfire from buildings all around during the 50-minute firefight. One of the US planes sent in to help had to be left behind and was deliberately destroyed.
US military officials told Reuters that Trump approved his first covert counterterrorism operation without sufficient intelligence, ground support or adequate backup preparations.
Trump’s spokesman Sean Spicer said that the White House considered the raid a “successful operation,” although he said it was difficult to call it a success because of Owens’ death.
The civilian dead included an eight-year-old girl, Nawar al-Awlaki, according to her family, who may have been an US citizen. Her father was al-Qaida propagandist and US citizen Anwar al-Awlaki, who was killed in a September 2011 US drone strike in Yemen.
The girl’s grandfather, Nasser al-Awlaki, told the Guardian that the village where the raid took place was not an AQAP stronghold, but rather home to tribal sheikhs who were actually fighting with the legal government of Yemen, which the ruling Iran-backed Houthi movement ousted in a coup .
Awlaki said the exiled former government was sending arms to his relatives from its southern stronghold in Aden, to combat the Houthis.
The Centcom statement said: “A team designated by the operational task force commander has concluded that civilian noncombatants likely were killed in the midst of a firefight during a 29 January raid in Yemen, and that casualties may include children.
“The known possible civilian casualties appear to have been potentially caught up in aerial gunfire that was called in to assist US forces in contact against a determined enemy that included armed women firing from prepared fighting positions and US special operations members receiving fire from all sides, including from houses and other buildings.”
The mission had been prepared under the Obama administration but it had not been approved.
Centcom insisted the raid resulted in the seizure of material and information that is providing valuable intelligence.
US Air Force colonel John Thomas said: “Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula has a horrifying history of hiding women and children within militant operating areas and terrorist camps, and continuously shows a callous disregard for innocent lives. That’s what makes cases like these so especially tragic.”
US military officials told Reuters the special forces team called in Marine helicopter gunships and Harrier jump jets, and then two MV-22 Osprey vertical takeoff and landing aircraft to extract them.
One of the two suffered engine failure, two of the officials said, and hit the ground so hard that two crew members were injured, and one of the Marine jets had to launch a precision-guided bomb to destroy it.
source is The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/feb/02/trump-approved-yemen-raid-five-days-after-inauguration
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• NO DISMISSIVE COMMENTS (I will call for deletions in the event the are posted).
• No personal insults or ad hominem attacks.
• Feel free to state that you do not believe the seeded article … but do no make up "facts" to support your disbelief; if you have a problem with the source, explain SPECIFICALLY why you find the source not credible
During the campaign, it was easy to get tired of how many times Hillary Clinton repeated stories of tense nights in the Situation Room, where she along with President Obama and other members of his staff, waited for word on some military action from the far side of the world. No one is going to get tired of hearing those stories from Donald Trump. Because for the first military action that Trump launched as commander in chief, he didn’t bother to show up.
According to Press Secretary Sean Spicer, Trump was not in the Situation Room for the raid.
That Trump didn’t come down in PJs is completely understandable, considering that by 5 PM Trump was too fatigued to hold a civil conversation with the leader of an allied nation. The Yemen raid just didn’t happen within business hours.
And those earlier suggestions that President Obama had somehow cleared the raid? Completely false. Donald Trump was totally responsible for authorizing the botched raid. But he didn’t take that responsibility seriously enough to let it keep him out of bed while Navy SEALs were putting their lives on the line.
The raid ended with not just the death of U.S. Navy SEAL William “Ryan” Owens and the wounding of three others , but the killing of an unknown number of civilians.
Military insiders are pointing the finger at Trump, who apparently gave the mission the thumbs up after a dinner discussion with noted military experts Steve “leave no white man behind” Bannon and Jared “totally not nepotism” Kushner.
What did these experts on the world accomplish over a nice dessert?
By this point in a Hillary Clinton administration, we would already be onto the third announcement of committees dedicated to investigating this tragedy and daily desk thumping for a special prosecutor. Yemenghazi!
But this really shouldn’t be called Yemenghazi. Because this looks like a situation where people really did die because of a miserable, thoughtless decision carried out by people who couldn’t be bothered to get up from dinner to give it serious study, or come down from the bedroom to see the results of their action.
http://www.dailykos.com/stories/2017/2/2/1629117/-Trump-didn-t-bother-to-show-up-in-Situation-Room-for-botched-Yemen-raid?
Maybe all new, incoming presidents should automatically scrap their first military raid, until they can really vet the plan. I'm thinking the Bay of Pigs, here. But, at least Kennedy went downstairs to see about it...
If we are going to have such restrictive authoritarian red box rules we should probably follow the COC.
6. Please keep the names of articles and seeds accurate and non-inflammatory. Headlines must not be misleading and should fairly accurately reflect the content of the seeded or authored article.
6. Please keep the names of articles and seeds accurate and non-inflammatory. Headlines must not be misleading and should fairly accurately reflect the content of the seeded or authored article.
Which headline is misleading? THE headline above the article is verbatim from the article itself.
This one is my comment …
The Bunglers Have Now Cost An American Life … Allegedly By Way Of A "Dinner For Schmucks"
A bungled operation in fact cost an American life … the decision to go forward with the operation apparently was put in to place, NOT BY CONSULTING WITH ALL OF THE SECURITY AGENCIES ACCORDING TO PROTOCOL, but a dinner!
Any such reckless decision could only be made by schmucks!
Where's the problem, Dean?
schmuck
noun
This was the original headline pasted here someone changed it.
The Bunglers Have Now Cost An American Life … Allegedly By Way Of A "Dinner For Schmucks"
That was my commentary … but, fair enough, Dean, the actual headline now appears.
I accept the blame.
In this particular case I think more responsibility goes to the military planners. It bothers me that trump may have decided this over dinner, but I doubt if the decision would have been any different in the oval office. It is the people giving him the information plus his own shortcomings.
But I think you have to cut him a little slack until he understands things better.
And I remember when everyone blamed Jimmy Carter for the outcome of the 1979 hostage rescue effort. He didnt design the mission, he didnt plan it, he didnt lead it. With any individual mission, All the president can really do is go by what the generals tell him.
The president is more responsible for the overall strategy, not every mission.
Wonder if Trump will pull an Obama? My guess is no.
15 Seals die in old helicopter and Obama Administration will not follow judge's order.
In my short life, I have read so many accounts of war and its atrocities, I HATE it. Yet, both sides of the "Republicrat" duopoly, support it.
Some "watchdog" …
Freedom Watch, which is headed by Larry Klayman, Jason Chafitz and Darrell Issa!
Following Klayman's behavior in a 1992 trial in California federal court, Judge William Keller barred Klayman from his courtroom for life. Five years later, in a separate case in New York, Klayman's behavior led then district judge Denny Chin to issue a lifetime ban on the attorney practicing law before him. [29] Klayman has written about his dealings with Keller and Chin, claiming that Keller acted "erratic" and was "obviously drunk" at the bench and that Chin was "belligerent and disrespectful." [30]
In 2007, Klayman received a $25,000 retainer from a Daytona Beach woman facing criminal charges and she accused him of not providing legal services in return. [31] The Florida Bar Association mediated the matter and Klayman agreed to pay off a small portion within 90 days, but after the deadline lapsed he was reprimanded by the association. [32] [33]
In 2014, Klayman agreed to be publicly censured by the D.C. Bar . Klayman represented three individuals who had sued Judicial Watch, his former employer and client, but he failed to obtain Judicial Watch's consent to waive his conflict of interest. Klayman maintained that the bar "recognized there was no evidence of dishonesty or personal gain." [34]
An October 2016 opinion by a federal appellate court noted twelve cases "in which Klayman’s ability to practice law in an ethical and orderly manner was called into question." [35]
This is Larry Klayman …
Check the lie about not holding a vote on a POTOS Supreme Court Nominee and about Scalia's Death.
AMac, that link included a whole lot more than Larry Klayman's name in it. Why did you avoid the article and just pick him out to denigrate? Let me give you some other specifics.
The Obama administration is violating a judge’s order to turn over documents in the Aug. 6, 2011, shootdown of a U.S. helicopter — call sign Extortion 17 — that killed members of SEAL Team 6 in Afghanistan. We don't need the Watchdog because that was a fact no matter who said it.
On the fourth anniversary of the worst one-day loss of military life in the war on terror, families of the dead say they are aghast that the government will not honor basic requests under the Freedom of Information Act. Larry Klayman had nothing to do with this either. He may have made the request, but it was the Obama Administration who have been so deceitful in every aspect of Freedom of Information taking years to get something that should have been available much earlier and then having to sue them to finally get part of the information.
It was exactly four years ago, at 2:22 a.m., that a rebuilt conventional CH-47 Chinook helicopter took off from a forward operating base, carrying some of the most skilled and advanced warriors ever molded by U.S. special operations. I kind of would like to know why so many Seals were on that one helicopter, wouldn't you? It's a big bulky helicopter and do you know of any other time that many Seals have been put in a situation like that? I'd like to know, wouldn't you? But I guess we won't find out, will we? Maybe it was just another bump in the road, you know.
Anyway, you could leave Larry Klayman out of the whole article and it would have been the same. The Obama Administration didn't get the reputation of being the least transparent administration in the history of this country for no reason at all .
The Least Transparent Administration in History
For all of President Obama’s assurances that his administration would be the most transparent in history, it has been anything but. Yet the mainstream media fail to cover, again and again, evidence of a corrupt administration hiding regulations from Congress and controlling the press.
“For instance, in March 2015, the Obama administration rescinded a regulation requiring the administration to comply with Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, thereby exempting itself from public scrutiny and oversight,” writes H. Sterling Burnett in an opinion piece for Forbes. “So much for transparency.”
~More~
Yes, you can go after one name in a whole article and attack that person because you can, but you can't deny the facts in the article themselves.
Oh and by the way, how do I get one of those "Get Out Of Jail" cards or "Don't Have To Post the Link" cards? It's getting to be a habit, I've noticed lately. If it's your own words, I understand, but most everything you post is not your own words, but a copy/paste and a link would be a nice thing to see. If you just overlooked it, don't worry about it this time, I think I made my point, attacking someone who just happens to be mentioned in the article or one sentence to avoid responding to the article itself is no legitimate response in my opinion.
I'm sure there were mistakes made and I'd like to know how they handle it in this incident with Trump. I certainly hope they aren't as deceitful as the last administration was. It is clear that the MSM has flipped the switch from massage to scrape since Trump was elected and we know it would not have been any different it any other Republican Candidate had won the election. The MSM is corrupt with Liberals.
AMac, that link included a whole lot more than Larry Klayman's name in it. Why did you avoid the article and just pick him out to denigrate? Let me give you some other specifics.
Once the head of a bogus "watchdog" group (Freedomworks and Judicial Watch in this case) is exposed as such, why would I cite its "findings" other than to reveal its dishonesty, Six?
I'm not surprised to read a number of comments from the Trump supporters here blaming the former President for this mission's outcome.
My question is why would President Trump even consider adopting a plan developed by former President Obama when Trump has continuously touted how incompetent Obama was. For President Trump to not take the time to develop his own plan but rather continue with a preliminary plan from former President Obama tells me several things. (1). President Trump was lying (2) President Trump is incompetent and went with a plan he already knew wasn't up to par based on his opinion that President Obama was incompetent, weak and a muslim lover (3) President Trump is a fucking moron and so are his supporters or (4) President Trump is lazy. I'm going to go out on a limb and choose all of the above.
Thanks,Pj. I'll go with choice #3.
The military posted a 10 year old video as an example of the intelligence gathered in the Yemen raid.
US military touted 10-year-old videos from Yemen terror raid
Pentagon mistakenly posts 10-year-old video to back up Yemen raid
Telegraph.co.uk - 3 hours ago
Had this happened while Obama was president, the right would be using it as proof of Obama's incompetence. Should we do the same now with the new prez?
Incompetent morons. Releasing that video is a telling mishap.
Incompetent morons. Releasing that video is a telling mishap.
It's worse than just the work of morons; THE VIDEO IS 10 YEARS OLD AND HAD NOTING TO DO WITH THE RAID!
Liars and bunglers!
So take a deep breath, because I’m about to tell many of you something you do not want to hear: Blaming Trump for what happened is both inappropriate and counterproductive. There are some good reasons to disapprove of this president: He is a man of demonstrated low character whose first few weeks in office have weakened both the international alliances and American values that have preserved our preeminent place in the world for over a century. Keep your powder dry for those things—but not this.
This raid, according to The New York Times , was approved by and recommended to the president by his secretary of defense and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. For the recommendation to have gone forward to the president, the senior leadership of the Department of Defense would have signed off on this operation. And for that to have happened, special operations and regional U.S. commanders would have had to have blessed the planning that went into the operation itself.
The left cannot on the one hand claim Donald Trump is ignorant of military and security affairs, and then on the other hand expect him to second-guess the professional recommendations of his uniformed and civilian military leadership.
Some Obama-era counterterrorism and NSC officials are pointing to what happened as evidence that the very deliberate interagency process the Obama administration used to approve these operations has been justified.
I am inclined to disagree. My experience as a senior Department of Defense official in the last two years of the Obama administration leads me to the conclusion that the way we did things—with the military required to provide a “CONOPS,” or concept of operations, to be picked over by deputy cabinet secretaries and usually the secretaries themselves prior to being forwarded to the president for approval—was slow and ponderous in a way that created real opportunity costs and denied subordinate commanders the flexibility to exploit opportunities they saw on the battlefield. Yes, it eliminated a lot of physical and political risk, but in doing so it negated one of the primary advantages the U.S. military enjoys, which is a highly trained and capable officer corps in the field that can exercise independent judgment.
At one point toward the end of the Obama administration, cabinet secretaries—cabinet secretaries!—were literally debating whether or not it made sense to move three helicopters within Iraq and Syria. That decision should have been left to the very capable, very experienced commander on the ground, U.S. Army Lieutenant General Steve Townsend.
The raid was approved by the Sec Def and JCOS.
Some U.S. military officials, Reuters reports, blame President Trump for approving a military raid “ without sufficient intelligence, ground support or adequate backup preparations .” This is wrong headed, potentially damaging to civil-military relations, and masks deeper problems with U.S. counterterrorism efforts.
Navy SEAL William “Ryan” Owens died of wounds received on January 29th during a raid in Yemen. Three others were also wounded. 14 al Qaeda militants were reportedly killed as were over a dozen civilians. This was Trump’s first covert military action.
In keeping with Washington’s toxic political environment, Trump opponents seized upon this as evidence the president carelessly put American troops in harm’s way. This is nonsense.
For any military official to blame Trump for the raid’s technical and operational problems is as unacceptable as it is factually untrue. Such conduct undermines trust and damages the military’s credibility. It also creates an impression that officials seek presidential approval for operations with the intention of avoiding blame if things go wrong.
The raid raises bigger questions that the president should ask his national security team.
First, what is our strategy in Yemen? For years, it seems, we have been playing whack-a-mole with drone strikes, only to watch al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) — the branch that is in Yemen — grow stronger . Meanwhile, we are supporting Saudi Arabia’s military operations there — operations that have caused significant numbers of civilian casualties and may be strengthening the terrorist group .
Trump should demand to know what goals the United States is trying to achieve, how elements of national power are being used to achieve them, and how to measure results.
Second, what operations require presidential approval and why? Withholding authority at higher levels does not necessarily improve decision-making or prevent civilian casualties. In fact, as General Stanley McChrystal suggests in his book Team of Teams , over-centralization can lead to worse decisions.
Subordinate leaders, knowing they can transfer risk upward, may make more aggressive recommendations than a situation warrants. Senior leaders rarely possess greater knowledge of a tactical situation, so may contribute little in the review process other than delays.
Micromanagement can needlessly impede the pace of operations, forfeit opportunities, and put lives at greater risk. Unless officials at more senior levels have critical information or perspectives that their subordinates cannot, authority should be given to the people in best position to make decisions.
Third, who is in charge? He is likely to find out that nobody below him is responsible and accountable for success in Yemen. Instead, he will probably discover that Defense, State, the intelligence community, and others operate in un-prioritized bureaucratic silos. These silos allow agencies to “do their own thing” while no one is focused on achieving U.S. goals. If that is the case, Trump should put someone in charge and hold that person accountable for results.
Last, why is the situation getting worse? After over 15 years of counterterrorism efforts, groups like AQAP should be much weaker or eliminated. Instead, they are stronger and reportedly have more support from the population than before . Trump is likely to find his agencies are measuring progress within their silos, and that such efforts may be operating at cross-purposes. He may also find that U.S. support to Saudi Arabia’s operations is damaging American credibility .
Trump has an important opportunity to examine U.S. counterterrorism strategies and make needed changes. This is an important way of honoring the sacrifices of those America puts in harm’s way.
Christopher D. Kolenda , a veteran of 4 combat tours in Afghanistan, was senior advisor to Under Secretaries of Defense Michèle A. Flournoy and James Miller and to Generals Stanley McChrystal, David Petraeus, and Joseph Dunford
And let's not let hypocrisy get in the way of a good blame game:
But I also know that I didn’t see this level of outrage after Awlaki’s 16-year-old son was killed in a drone strike in 2011 , or when Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs brushed aside criticism of that strike by saying that the boy “should have [had] a far more responsible father.” I wonder if those blaming Trump for the death of Navy SEAL William “Ryan” Owens, felt Obama was equally responsible for the death of Master Sgt. Joshua Wheeler, killed after a U.S.-Kurdish raid on an ISIS prison in Iraq went haywire in 2015. I know that the previous administration approved raids based on what turned out to be faulty intelligence, including the failed attempt to rescue hostages James Foley and and Steven Sotloff in 2014.
I wonder if those who find it outrageous that the Trump administration wants to, as the Times puts it, “speed the decision-making when it comes to such strikes,” found it equally problematic when the same paper reported that Obama had “embraced a disputed method for counting civilian casualties” that “in effect counts all military-age males in a strike zone as combatants.”
I certainly heard relatively little outrage from the left about the drone strike on an al-Qaida compound in Pakistan in 2015 that killed an American and an Italian hostage , or the U.S. bombing of a Doctors Without Borders hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan, that same year that arguably constituted a war crime, or the ongoing Obama administration support for Saudi Arabia’s brutal, civilian-targeting air campaign in Yemen.
Perhaps Obama supporters merely trusted that when the previous president, with his judicious and thoughtful temperament, had good reasons for taking the risks that led to the deaths of American troops or civilians. He certainly put far fewer Americans in harm’s way and his military actions caused far fewer casualties than George W. Bush. I certainly had more faith in him making these decisions than I do in Trump and am glad, however chaotic the world is today, that there aren’t massive numbers of American troops patrolling the streets of Middle Eastern capitals.
But the Obama administration did a lot to normalize the notion that in the name of fighting terrorism, it was authorized to carry out attacks against Islamist militants almost anywhere in the world and was expanding its use of that authority up until the final days of his presidency . The idea of an endless, vaguely defined war on terrorism, with no geographic boundaries and little accountability didn’t seem to be much of a priority to Democrats in Congress or Democratic voters as long as a Democrat was in the White House.
Disagree, Bruce.
"This particular raid was NOT DISCUSSED!"
Colin Kahl
Some Yemen facts: 1/DoD worked up GENERAL proposal for OVERALL set of expanded authorities for these types of raids at end of Obama admin
2/The broad package was discussed in the interagency in the closing weeks of the Obama term. This particular raid was NOT discussed.
3/Moreover no recommendation was made other than a recommendation to provide the next Administration with the necessary information.
4/Idea was for next team to run a deliberative process to assess risks.
5/And, critically, Obama made no decisions on this before leaving office, believing it represented escalation of U.S. involvement in Yemen
6/And therefore should not be something he decided a few days before leaving office. Obama thought the next team should take a careful look.
7/ And run a careful process. From what I've read and heard, however, team Trump didn't do a careful vetting of the overall proposal or raid
8/Instead, Trump apparently had dinner with Mattis/Dunford and greenlit the op. I've heard there was a Deputies meeting the next day, but...
9/DC was brief and basically irrelevant since the decision had been made the night before.
Did Trump say during his campaign that he knew more about fighting terrorism than the generals did.
If that is true, why is he appointing 4 or 5 general to positions in the administration.
Could it be that he's full of shit?
Did Trump say during his campaign that he knew more about fighting terrorism than the generals did.
If that is true, why is he appointing 4 or 5 general to positions in the administration.
Could it be that he's full of shit?
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
It looks like Obama was full of shit. Along with his useful idiots...
Can we be brutally honest with one another?
All politicians are full of shit. Each and every one of them.
I mean, if the Fu shits, wear it, and all that...
Observation - This could turn out to be Trumps "Benghazi".
The first of many no doubt.
NIxon resigned … to avoid further embarrassment and possibly revelations he did not want to be part of his "legacy"; I'd speculate, that once the big leaks begin to flow … and not just from his presidency … he'l resign and say that he's rich and successful and "who needs this crap"!