Before serving as the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Samantha Power served on President Obamaโs National Security Council, where she was instrumental in advocating for intervening militarily in the Libyan civil war. While serving as UN Ambassador during Obamaโs second term, she continued to advocate for military interventions, this time in the Syrian war. In both cases, she framed her case for intervention as a moral oneโโโa โhumanitarian interventionโ necessary for saving Libyans and Syrians from their dictators.Despite this glaring omission, her memoir has received mostly positive reviews that fail to criticize her for helping turn Yemen into the worldโs worst humanitarian crisis.
These interventions, however, were anything but humanitarian: They led to aย sharp increase in the loss of human lives, exacerbated aย refugee crisis, enabled extremist groups, and caused an overall exacerbation of already-tenuous civil conflicts. Yet, in her recently-published memoir,ย The Education of an Idealist, Powerย downplaysย her role in the bloodshed that followed in Libya, and she goes as far asย lamentingย Obamaโs inaction earlier in the Syrian Civil War. Though these interventions are certainly career-defining, they are also not the only foreign policy injustices by which Power should beย remembered.
The most striking thing about Powerโs memoir is her complete omission of her role in what became the worldโs worst humanitarian crisis: the ongoing U.S. intervention inย Yemen.
Inย 2011, two years before Powerโs tenure as Ambassador to the UN began, Yemenisย protestedย against long-time dictator Ali Abdullah Saleh who eventually resigned andย transferredย power to his then-vice president (and now president) Abdu Rabbu Mansour Hadi. By the time Power took office in Augustย 2013, U.S. policy in Yemen was defined byย droneย warfare, while Yemenis awaited an election following Hadiโs two-year term. Then in lateย 2014, the Houthi rebel group marched to the capital Sanaโa, in what many saw as aย coup, thereby threatening Saudi Arabiaโs interests in Yemen. Months later, aย coalition consisting of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and other neighboring countries launched aย surpriseย attackย on Yemen, ostensibly aimed at restoring Hadi toย power.
Ambassador Powerย supportedthisย intervention.
Her support did not waver whenย evidencesurfaced that the Saudis and Emiratis were fighting alongside members of al-Qaeda. By the end of her tenure, at leastย 10,000Yemenis were dead and at leastย 80% of theย populationย was in need of humanitarian aid. Despite this, there were no public statements made by Power at the time indicating waning support for the disastrous U.S. intervention inย Yemen.
In Juneย 2016, Ambassador Power was asked to comment on then-UN Secretary-Generalโs Ban Ki-moonโs stunningย admissionย that Saudi threats to UN funding led him to remove Saudi Arabia from aย list of armies responsible for killing and wounding children (Saudi Arabia was initially on that list for its role in targeting Yemeni children). Power and her staff reportedlyย ignoredย aย journalistโs questions about this.ย โโSince news broke of Banโs decision, Iย have asked Powerโs office for aย direct response to Saudi funding threats,โ journalist Samuel Oakfordย wroteย forย Politicoin Julyย 2016.ย โโNeither she nor her staff has everย replied.โ
Years later, Power still prefers in her memoir to look away from Yemen rather than confront her role in enabling the Saudis to kill innocent Yemenis when she had the power to oppose suchย aggression.
Yemen is mentioned twice in her book, with neither reference having anything to do with the war in Yemen. Such aย glaring omission can only be seen as aย lack of reckoning and accountability for her actions as aย representative of the United States at the UN at the onset of the war in Yemen. During her critical role at the UN, the Obama administration supported the Saudi and UAE coalition militarily through targeting assistance, intelligence, midair refueling, arms sales and training. Furthermore, Power helped provide cover for the Saudis and the Emiratis at the United Nations, allowing them to investigate their own crimes, and enabling them to carry out atrocities against civilians withย impunity.
Her omission of Yemen is indeed surprising given her new-found criticism of the U.S. role in the war in Yemen. Months after leaving office, Ambassador Power beganย tweetingย against the war in Yemen, even going as far as openlyย acknowledgingย that it was wrong for the Obama administration to support the Saudi-led coalition while it killed civilians and imposed aย famine-inducing blockade on the country. Yet, when writing her own story, she chose to ignore Yemenย altogether.
Despite this glaring omission, her memoir has received mostly positive reviews that fail to criticize her for helping turn Yemen into the worldโs worst humanitarian crisis. And while the press and Congress have become much more critical of the war in Yemen since Trumpโs election, Obama and his officials remain relatively unscathed byย criticismย for their role in launching the U.S. intervention in the Yemen back inย 2015. Had there been more outrage and calls for accountability at the onset of Obamaโs unconstitutional intervention in Yemen, perhaps Trump would not have had aย war to inherit. Perhaps nearlyย 100,000ย Yemenis would not have been killed. And perhapsย 85,000ย Yemeni children would not have starved toย death.
In choosing to entirely ignore one of her most glaring failuresโโโas a self-proclaimed activist and diplomatโโโAmbassador Power missed a crucial opportunity to set the record straight on her horrific actions and inactions as ambassador. In the eyes of this Yemeni-American, Ambassador Power remains neither educated nor an idealist
