PBS高端访谈:为什么沙特阿拉伯中止了对也门的军事行动?

 　　GWEN IFILL: Saudi Arabia abruptly¹ announced an end today to a month-long air campaign against Shiite rebels in Yemen. The Saudis and their Sunni allies said they will focus on political efforts, but continue military action as needed.

　　At the same time, a senior rebel leader said a political accord is almost ready.

　　Meanwhile, the White House explained its decision to send in the aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt.

　　JOSH EARNEST, White House Press Secretary: The movement of the — of this particular aircraft carrier would augment² the American military presence in the Gulf³ of Aden, and would send a clear signal about our continued insistence⁴ about the free flow of commerce and the freedom of movement in the region.

　　GWEN IFILL: That effort could also include intercepting⁵ Iranian vessels⁶ trying to ferry weapons to the rebels.

　　For more on all this, we turn now to our chief foreign affairs correspondent, Margaret Warner.

　　Margaret, what was behind Saudi Arabia's decision to suspend whatever it is they were doing, their military action?

　　MARGARET WARNER: Gwen, U.S. officials believe that it was basically a cost-benefit analysis by the Saudis, that in fact the costs were outweighing⁷ the benefits.

　　That is, this has been going on a month. They have been heavily criticized internationally for a lot of civilian⁸ deaths. They have not achieved two of their three main objectives, which was to roll the Houthis back north. That didn't work upon. And to restore the President Hadi to power, which they have not been able to do, and that that was going to require a ground campaign, which they don't have the assets to do despite what they spend on military hardware, and no one was willing to help them, including the Pakistanis.

　　Secondly⁹, and very importantly, the U.S. was really pressing them hard. The U.S. was concerned about all the civilian casualties. The U.S. intelligence view is, they had an objective, but they never really had a plan. They never thought through how to do it. And the U.S. was very, very concerned that all this chaos¹⁰ is giving al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula and other really extremist terrorist groups more room to operate.

　　And a senior intelligence person told me today that in fact AQAP operations have increased in this month. So, from a U.S. perspective, it was time to roll this back, freeze this in place, and try to get a political dialogue going.

　　GWEN IFILL: You said that Saudi Arabia didn't achieve its goal of rolling back the Houthis. Yet they announced this afternoon that they are going to also step back, that some sort of accord has been reached?

　　MARGARET WARNER: Well, there is. And I have just confirmed this with both U.S. officials and people close to the Saudis.

　　There is a commitment on the part of both the Houthis and the Saudis to get back to some sort of political dialogue, which originally was under the umbrella of the U.N. and the Gulf Cooperation Council and so on. Now, U.S. officials think it's for real, though they are very cautious about this.

　　But, apparently¹¹, a White House statement is about to come out applauding the Saudi decision and saying — applauding the chances for political dialogue, and, most important, talking about the possibility of resuming humanitarian¹² aid.

　　GWEN IFILL: You're always ahead of the curve on these things, Margaret, but I want to ask you about one more thing, and that is Iran's role in all of this. They always seem to be in the middle of every conflict.

　　MARGARET WARNER: And they are indeed, Gwen.

　　Do you know that it was this morning that the Iranians put out a little notice statement in which they predicted the Saudis were about to suspend their air campaign? This is hours before the Saudis did it. So they knew something everybody else didn't know.

　　Secondly — and I don't know if we can say that they have been encouraging the Houthis to go to political dialogue. Certainly, the U.S. has been working the Saudis hard. I'm prepared and I could not confirm that there has been any kind of tacit or whatever communication here because, obviously, also, the U.S. is being very critical of Iran for moving ships in the area and are they moving weapons and so on.

　　And, of course, this all gets tangled¹³ up with the Iranian nuclear talks. And part of reason the U.S. got sucked into this in the first place, if you look at the timing¹⁴, March 26, this was just as they were neither a deal with Iran and they wanted to assure their Gulf partners that, no, no, the U.S. isn't abandoning them.

　　You can figure Iran is playing a major role here, both overtly¹⁵ and as a sort of, yes, motivation.

　　GWEN IFILL: It is a tangled web, as always.

　　MARGARET WARNER: As always.

　　GWEN IFILL: Margaret Warner, thank you.

　　MARGARET WARNER: Always a pleasure.

1 abruptly   

adv.突然地，出其不意地

参考例句：

• He gestured abruptly for Virginia to get in the car.他粗鲁地示意弗吉尼亚上车。
• I was abruptly notified that a half-hour speech was expected of me.我突然被通知要讲半个小时的话。

2 augment   

vt.(使)增大，增加，增长，扩张

参考例句：

• They hit upon another idea to augment their income.他们又想出一个增加收入的办法。
• The government's first concern was to augment the army and auxiliary forces.政府首先关心的是增强军队和辅助的力量。

3 gulf   

n.海湾；深渊，鸿沟；分歧，隔阂

参考例句：

• The gulf between the two leaders cannot be bridged.两位领导人之间的鸿沟难以跨越。
• There is a gulf between the two cities.这两座城市间有个海湾。

4 insistence   

n.坚持；强调；坚决主张

参考例句：

• They were united in their insistence that she should go to college.他们一致坚持她应上大学。
• His insistence upon strict obedience is correct.他坚持绝对服从是对的。

5 intercepting   

截取（技术），截接

参考例句：

• The police had been intercepting my mail, ie reading it before it was delivered. 警方一直截查我的邮件。
• We've been intercepting radio transmissions from Moscow. 我们已从莫斯科拦截到无线电信号。

6 vessels   

n.血管( vessel的名词复数 )；船；容器；（具有特殊品质或接受特殊品质的）人

参考例句：

• The river is navigable by vessels of up to 90 tons. 90 吨以下的船只可以从这条河通过。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• All modern vessels of any size are fitted with radar installations. 所有现代化船只都有雷达装置。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

7 outweighing   

v.在重量上超过( outweigh的现在分词 )；在重要性或价值方面超过

参考例句：

• Consider(sth good or positive)as balancing or outweighing(sth bad or negative) 视（某好的事物）可抵消或抵偿（某坏的事物） 来自互联网
• The accused and accusers all succeed in outweighing the Bible. 原告和被告都成功地通过了第一项测试。 来自互联网

8 civilian   

adj.平民的，民用的，民众的

参考例句：

• There is no reliable information about civilian casualties.关于平民的伤亡还没有确凿的信息。
• He resigned his commission to take up a civilian job.他辞去军职而从事平民工作。

9 secondly   

adv.第二，其次

参考例句：

• Secondly,use your own head and present your point of view.第二，动脑筋提出自己的见解。
• Secondly it is necessary to define the applied load.其次，需要确定所作用的载荷。

10 chaos   

n.混乱，无秩序

参考例句：

• After the failure of electricity supply the city was in chaos.停电后，城市一片混乱。
• The typhoon left chaos behind it.台风后一片混乱。

11 apparently   

adv.显然地；表面上，似乎

参考例句：

• An apparently blind alley leads suddenly into an open space.山穷水尽，豁然开朗。
• He was apparently much surprised at the news.他对那个消息显然感到十分惊异。

12 humanitarian   

n.人道主义者，博爱者，基督凡人论者

参考例句：

• She has many humanitarian interests and contributes a lot to them.她拥有很多慈善事业，并作了很大的贡献。
• The British government has now suspended humanitarian aid to the area.英国政府现已暂停对这一地区的人道主义援助。

13 tangled   

adj. 纠缠的，紊乱的 动词tangle的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• Your hair's so tangled that I can't comb it. 你的头发太乱了，我梳不动。
• A movement caught his eye in the tangled undergrowth. 乱灌木丛里的晃动引起了他的注意。

14 timing   

n.时间安排，时间选择

参考例句：

• The timing of the meeting is not convenient.会议的时间安排不合适。
• The timing of our statement is very opportune.我们发表声明选择的时机很恰当。

15 overtly   

ad.公开地

参考例句：

• There were some overtly erotic scenes in the film. 影片中有一些公开色情场面。
• Nietzsche rejected God's law and wrote some overtly blasphemous things. 尼采拒绝上帝的律法，并且写了一些渎神的作品。