Supply & Demand

The incessant border squabbles along the bleak mountainous boundary between independent, isolated Yemen and the British Protectorate of Aden, on the southern tip of Arabia, are, as one British diplomat put it, part of the "burden of empire." Last spring, Aden's British Governor Sir Reginald Champion added another straw to his imperial burden. An Adenese chieftain, the Sharif of Beiham, had asked that a frontier customs post be set up to tap the rich stream of smuggled coffee, skins and qat (an Arabian drug) which kept flowing into his territory over an ancient traders' trail from Yemen. Governor Champion ordered the post built, but the Yemeni launched a strong objection. Later, they simply started shooting at the new customs house.

The customs garrison replied in kind, and for two months the fusillade continued back & forth across the frontier. Then the Yemeni built a small fort to improve their position. After a fruitless exchange of diplomatic protests, Aden's British government dropped a few smoke-bombs near the fort. The Yemeni sat tight. A fortnight later the British dropped real bombs, and Yemen's new fort was flattened. But no one was hurt, because the British had considerately informed the Yemeni of their plans well ahead of time and the fort's garrison of 20-odd stalwarts had prudently withdrawn.

In fertile Middle Eastern imaginations, the incident blossomed to vast proportions. "The Egyptian people," wrote the Cairo newspaper Al Misri, "were very surprised and annoyed when they heard of the bombing of Yemenite villages by the R.A.F. We don't know how Britain could do such a thing. She should be ashamed of herself." Last week, four be-daggered Yemeni arrived at Flushing Meadows to lay their case before .the United Nations.

Back home, meanwhile, enterprising traders made the most of the incident --and furnished economically backward Yemen a perfect illustration of the law of supply & demand. While the shooting was still going on, tireless scavengers on both sides of the embattled border had diligently collected the bullets from the bullet-riddled countryside; on the local market, the price of lead was down 50%.

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