From: Berhane Habtemariam (Berhane.Habtemariam@gmx.de)
Date: Tue Dec 22 2009 - 07:47:48 EST
Despite U.S. Help, Yemen Faces Growing Al-Qaeda Threat
By <http://www.time.com/time/letters/email_letter.html> Abigail Hauslohner
Tuesday, Dec. 22, 2009
With Yemen apparently on the verge of becoming the world's next failed state
and a regional base for al-Qaeda, a series of U.S.-assisted air and ground
assaults that shook pockets of Yemen last week might have seemed like a
positive development in the troubled country's otherwise downward spiral.
But the dramatic action, which appears to have resulted in a number of
civilian casualties, may not right the situation at all. "The U.S. has been
growing very concerned about al-Qaeda in recent years, but it seems as
though the U.S. is coming rather late to the party," says Princeton
University Yemen expert Gregory Johnsen, who contends last week's attacks
would ultimately prove counterproductive.
Immediately after 9/11, a combined U.S.-Yemeni effort to decapitate the
Islamist group's leadership in the country and dismantle its infrastructure
met with considerable success, Johnsen says. But since 2006, al-Qaeda has
managed to regroup and grow stronger as Yemen's government struggles to hold
on to its territory amid multiple rebellions and rising poverty. Now,
Johnsen adds: "You can't just kill a few individuals and the al-Qaeda
problem will go away."
<http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1947623,00.html> (See a story
about whether Iran is causing trouble in Yemen.)
At least 34 people died last week, when Yemeni forces hit suspected al-Qaeda
targets in the southern governorate of Abyan and in Ahrab, a district
northeast of the Yemeni capital Sana'a. Western and Yemeni media outlets
reported that the United States provided Yemen with key intelligence and
firepower to carry out the strikes, but to what extent is unclear. Yemeni
state media reported that President Obama phoned Yemeni President Ali
Abdullah Saleh to congratulate him on a job well done, and ABC News said
that U.S. cruise missiles had been used.
<http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1925334,00.html> (See
pictures of the hidden war in Yemen.)
But regardless of who did what, a primary target in the attacks - Qasim
al-Raymi, the al-Qaeda leader who is believed to be behind a 2007 bombing in
central Yemen that killed seven Spanish tourists and two Yemenis - is still
at large. And reports of a U.S. role, and mass civilian casualties at the
sites of the attacks, have sparked a public outcry and added to
anti-American sentiments across the country. "They missed that individual,"
says Johnsen of the targeted al-Qaeda chief. "And at the same time, they
ended up killing a number of women and children in the strike on Abyan. So
now you have something where there are all these pictures of dead infants
and mangled children that are underlined with the caption 'Made in the USA'
on all the jihadi forums. Something like this does much more to extend
al-Qaeda."
Indeed through the backlash that followed, the attacks have started to look
like more of a boon than a bust for Yemen's al-Qaeda revival, as well as for
other opponents of Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh's regime. Iran -
which Yemen accuses of backing the Shi'ite Houthi rebellion in the north -
headlined the attacks on its state-sponsored Press TV with: "Obama ordered
deadly blitz on Yemen."
"The al-Qaeda threat in Yemen is real, but now after this operation, it will
be greater," says Mohammed Quhtan, a member of Yemen's opposition Islamist
al-Islah party. "Al-Qaeda will be able to recruit a lot more young people,
at least from the tribes that were hit. And it will have reasonable grounds
to attract more people from Abyan governorate, and from the Yemeni
population in general."
That's a frightening prospect for a country on the brink of collapse.
Yemen's economy is in tatters; its population complains of neglect and
development woes; and Yemeni children suffer from a 50% malnutrition rate.
Observers warn that poverty and unemployment are prime recruitment factors
for al-Qaeda, something they say the U.S. government and other foreign
powers should have done more to address. "If you're going to carry out [an
attack] like this, you have to have done a great deal of field work, where
you've sort of undermined al-Qaeda through development and aid so that when
something like this happens, al-Qaeda can't easily replace the individuals
that it has lost," says Johnsen. "But if you don't take those steps then the
pool of recruits just starts to multiply exponentially."
More troubling still is that last week's assault doesn't necessarily
indicate a renewed Yemeni commitment to fighting al-Qaeda. Analysts say
Yemen has been slow to confront the al-Qaeda threat with the gusto that the
U.S. has been pushing for, in large part because going after the Islamist
group hasn't always been in the government's best interests. "If the
government wants to fight [al-Qaeda] seriously, they can do it," says Ali
Saif Hassan, the director of Yemen's Political Development Forum. But, he
adds: "It's a matter of political decision - how much they will win, and how
much they will lose." Sana'a has recently focused more of its attention on
the rebel separatist movement in the south and on the recent Houthi uprising
in the north than it has on al-Qaeda.
While some western analysts say that al-Qaeda seeks to overthrow Yemen's
government, Hassan disagrees, saying that al-Qaeda only seeks to establish a
base there - a link between the Horn of Africa and the rest of the Arabian
Peninsula - and that so long as Saleh leaves al-Qaeda alone, they'll do the
same for him. "The government still sometimes thinks it is too costly for it
to fight al-Qaeda. If you ask them to go and fight al-Qaeda, they say 'Why?
And what do I get back?'" says Hassan. Fighting al-Qaeda would mean losing
key fundamentalist support in the country, support that is already falling
away. What would compel Saleh to turn it around? "It is business," says
Hassan. "If the government gets more support from the Americans, they will
change." The Obama administration has requested $65 million to help Yemen
battle its resurgent terrorist threat.
Last week's attacks may mean that change is indeed on the horizon. But if
the Yemeni backlash to the attacks are any indication, cruise missiles and
firepower may not be the support Yemen needs.
<http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1926015,00.html> Read why
Yemen may be the next Afghanistan.)
<http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/0,28757,1945379,00.html> See
the top 10 pictures of the year.
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