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Missile attack on US warship 'false flag operation': Analyst

Friday, 14 October 2016 7:35 AM [ Last Update: Friday, 14 October 2016 7:38 AM ]

A file image released by the US Navy shows the guided-missile destroyer USS Mason (DDG 87), August 3, 2016. (Photo by AFP)

The failed missile attacks against American warships off the coast of Yemen bear the hallmarks of false flag operations that the US is known to have staged in the past to justify military action, says a former American intelligence linguist.

“Obviously something may have been fired at a ship in international waters; whether it came from the Houthi [Ansarullah movement] or whether it came from Houthi-controlled areas has not been proven, certainly these kinds of false flags have been used in the past,” Scott Rickard told Press TV’s Debate program.

The analyst said the US is complicit in the destruction of Yemen through the sale of millions of dollars of weaponry to Saudi Arabia.

The USS Mason, a US Navy destroyer and the USS Ponce, an amphibious warfare ship, were targeted on Sunday in a failed missile attack from territory in the Red Sea off the coast of Yemen, according to the Pentagon.

The USS Mason came under attack on Wednesday for the second time, Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook claimed.

Rickard said the US has not been able to determine what kind of missile has been fired at the warship and who might have shot it; otherwise it would not have hesitated to return fire.

Yemeni forces rejected the US claims that they targeted the American destroyer in the Red Sea.

Yemen's Saba news agency quoted an unnamed military official allied with the Houthi movement as saying, "These allegations are unfounded and the army and the Popular Committees have nothing to do with this action.”

Meanwhile, the Pentagon said that three radar sites in Yemen had been targeted and destroyed early on Thursday in a retaliatory attack.

“What is clear here is that the United States is the number one provider of weaponry to Saudi Arabia and Saudi Arabia is the number one terrorist-supporting organization in the Middle East at the time alongside Bahrain and Qatar and Kuwait,” Rickard said.

These Arab countries are aligned with the US in wreaking havoc not only in Yemen but in Syria, Iraq, Libya and elsewhere, he said.

Also speaking in the “Debate” program, political commentator Jihad Mouracadeh said the US is simply “responding in self-defense.”

He added the US is not willing to be involved in the Yemen war particularly at a time when the Americans have stated that they are reviewing their cooperation with Saudi Arabia.

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