Pentagon "reassures" coalition ally UAE about Yemen: WP
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McKenzie will be meeting with UAE leaders to discuss enhancing information-sharing on air defenses and other forms of assistance requested by Abu Dhabi.
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Head of Pentagon's Central Command, Kenneth McKenzie. (Olivier Douliery)
In an article written by The Washington Post, it is revealed that the head of the US Central Command, Kenneth McKenzie, arrived in the UAE on Sunday to help Abu Dhabi "defend" itself against Yemeni targeting.
McKenzie will be meeting with UAE leaders to discuss enhancing information-sharing on air defenses and other forms of assistance requested by Abu Dhabi.
The US, last week, announced that it'll be sending the guided-missile destroyer, USS Cole, and some F-22 fighters to the UAE after Yemeni armed forces have targeted the country in retaliation to the Saudi-Emirati coalition's ongoing massacres.
Read more: "Everything is destroyed": Remembering Saudi-UAE massacres in Yemen
“The purpose of my visit is assurance" and to “make sure that they know we’re a reliable partner," McKenzie revealed in an interview.
He went on to make assertions that the "equipment they are firing is certainly Iranian," and that if they weren't, they're "morally responsible for it."
The newspaper explained that Ansar Allah and the UAE "have long been on opposite sides of the fighting in Yemen, but the strikes on UAE soil mark a dramatic change in tactics."
The Yemeni retaliation to the UAE's massacres has resulted in a switch-up in UAE' strategy.
To intercept Yemeni missiles, the US troops fired Patriot missiles from Al-Dhafra Air Base on at least 2 occasions in the past few weeks.
The CENTCOM head also contended that Iran lost influence in Iraq, and is seeking new fronts "in its bid for regional dominance."
Read more: Senior Iraqi official: Everyone knows UAE's bad role in the region
The US equipment being sent to the UAE is meant to "track and respond" to shipments of goods to Yemen, including "potential shipments of missiles," which the coalition has been claiming in poorly-produced fabricated videos.
The equipment, namely, the USS Cole, will stay on Emirati waters whereas F-22s will station at Al-Dhafra airbase where no US fighter jets currently are.
There is not much certainty as to whether Washington will see a backlash, as recently US' support to the war on Yemen has become under the critical eye back home.
“My visit here, and to some degree repositioning, is all designed to send a very careful, calculated message that the United States is a reliable partner … we’re not going to forget this part of the world,” McKenzie said. “We’ve got a lot of ships, we’ve got a lot of problems. We’ve always got an ability to help our friends.”
