The attempted bombing of a Christmas-day flight into Detroit, Michigan, has rekindled a long-simmering debate about the stability of Yemen. It is widely reported that the suspect in the bombing case spent up to four months in Yemen and received technical assistance and direction during his time there. This incident has ratcheted up the rhetoric regarding Yemen to unprecedented levels. In fact, Joe Liebermann now believes that Yemen could be our “next Afghanistan.”
In truth, Yemen has always been a central theater in the running conflict between the U.S. and al-Qaeda and its affiliates. Yemen is Osama bin Laden’s ancestral homeland — his father came to Saudi Arabia from Yemen. At the conclusion of the Soviet-Afghan war, Bin Laden and his associates briefly considered focusing their attention on Yemen before settling instead on chasing the U.S. out of Saudi Arabia first. The port city of Aden was the site of the USS Cole bombing. In the past couple of years, the U.S. has launched a number of drone strikes against suspected al-Qaeda figures there– most recently targeting the inspirational figure implicated in the Fort Hood massacre.
So what is the US Government doing now about Yemen?
Central Command has maintained a task force over the past couple of years, Combined Joint Task Force – Horn of Africa, working on at least two levels in Yemen. To address the short-term threat of Yemen serving as a terrorist safe haven, CENTCOM has fed the Yemenis intelligence and even mounted direct attacks against targets in Yemen. To manage the long-term threat of instability in Yemen, CENTCOM has coordinated a broader effort to build capacity and partner with the Yemeni Government.
So why do things appear to be getting worse in Yemen?
In short, Yemen continues to be a failed-state. It is not yet capable of precluding terrorist activity within its territory. More optimistically, it’s conceivable that al-Qaeda is looking to shift more of its weight there as a result of U.S. security gains in Afghanistan and Iraq and the increasing pressure of Pakistani security forces in the Af-Pak border region. In other words, it is not just that Yemen presents an attractive target in absolute terms, it is that Yemen is relatively more attractive than the alternatives.
The bottom line.
Over time, it is becoming increasingly apparent that insecurity anywhere contributes to insecurity everywhere. Progress in one theater will increase the likelihood of digression in weaker states elsewhere. The US and its allies must re-double efforts to improve the capability and legitimacy of failing governments the world over, but especially in those regions where al-Qaeda has social linkages and historical ties — Yemen, Somalia, and the Sudan are at the top of that list. CJTF-Horn of Africa has its work cut out for it.
UPDATE: An excellent link on the same from epapadopoulos via Twitter – http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/dec/29/yemen-terror-failed-state
