G Edwards writes (April 28) that “Western powers are wise to keep out of (the war in Yemen). If only this were so. But there is too much money to be made out of the war in Yemen.
BAE Systems, Britain’s largest defence company, was contracted by the government to produce bombs, assemble jets, train Saudi pilots and carry out maintenance for them. The UK has sold £6.4 billion worth of arms to the Saudi-led coalition.
The US is more directly involved; it has conducted thousands of air strikes, provided intelligence sharing and logistical support, and has Green Berets on the ground “advising” Saudi-led forces. From 2015 to 2020, the US sold over $64.1 billion worth of weapons to Saudi Arabia, making the Kingdom the world’s largest arms importer.
In the context of Ukraine’s dreadful fate, is drawing attention to the war in Yemen, with over 100,000 deaths and now the world’s worst humanitarian crisis (according to the World Food Programme), a play for “ideological purity” (Anthony Bradley, April 28th)? It’s clearly not widely known and surely our responsibility to know what our government gets up to.
It is, however, definitely an attempt to be less hypocritical or selective when it comes to our opposition to the suffering and destruction caused by arms sales and war.
Bruce McLeod
Otterburn
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