Who Is to Blame for the Spread of al-Qaeda into Yemen?
In 2009, the United States reinforced its self-elected position of being the guardian of the free-world. During his speech at West Point, President Obama renewed his administration’s battle-ready attitude in the face of al-Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan and the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (F.A.T.A) of Pakistan. President Obama’s rhetoric insisted that the Conflict in Afghanistan was the good fight; a fight of good versus evil.
Over the past decade American counter-terrorism focused on the Taliban and al-Qaeda affiliates in Afghanistan and F.A.T.A, as the Jihadi paradigm tip-toed past the watch-towers and back into the Arabian Peninsula. To reconstitute its commitment to fighting a discernable and a deadly enemy, thus to rationalize its position, the United States downplayed the assessment of analysts that denoted al-Qaeda was no longer centralized in Afghanistan and the F.A.T.A. To legitimize the Afghan war, the Obama administration was willing to ignore the accumulation of Jihadism elsewhere.
While nursing my second bottle of seasonal Sam Adams and staring musingly into a Christmas Day fireplace, I joined the ranks of an American flock of people who sheepishly closed their eyes in disbelief and embarrassment at the security-failure to prevent Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, a twenty three year old Nigerian-born, al-Qaeda affiliated terrorist, who attempted to make Christmas Day the deadliest act of Terrorism against Americans since September the 11th 2001. The most embarrassing facet of the plot is not the lack of skill Umar Farouk showed while trying to catch his PETN and TATP laced trousers and getting gang tackled by co-flyers, but the lack of coordination and execution by those assigned to keep Americans safe, especially on the most widely celebrated religious holiday for Americans.
The surge of information that surfaced following the Christmas Day attempt showed a systematic failure to prevent measures that were breached nine years ago by Richard Reid, the shoe-bomber. The commonalities between Reid and Farouk terror plots (such as one way plane ticket to the United States from a European capital paid in full with cash, and no luggage) makes one wonder if our national security is not in the hands of the T.S.A, F.B.I., C.I.A or the White House, but in the hands of fate, chance, coincidence or any other gamble that cannot be rigged.
As is the American tradition, now that the incident is a few weeks old we begin to ponder who or what should be destroyed to secure our borders. The Guardians, engaged from their own Christmas Day fireplace, begin to sniff out the foul odor of the terrorists and extremists who have crept past their guard-tower in Afghanistan and F.A.T.A and resettled in the Arabian Peninsula, specifically Yemen.
Mixing with the mujahideen, or Islamic holy warriors, former Gitmo detainees have slithered from the Saudi and American arranged re-education programs in Saudi Arabia to the pragmatic elements in Yemen where al-Qaeda holds influence as close as twenty miles to San’a’, Yemen’s Capital. The mainstream media and bloggers have already spotted the plausibility of Yemen being the next front in the War on Terrorism.
As the proverbial smoking gun begins to fill the airwaves and web space, the world waits to see if the anti-terror lion that was Obama in 2009 will roar in 2010 and if the administration will open another front on the War on Islamic Extremism, this time near the heart land of Islam.
This was a guest submission written by Jeff Morris. Jeff Morris is a writer and Political Science Major at Appalachian State University. Email him at morrisjr@appstate.edu.
In my opinion we’ve pretty much just rediscovered something that we put on the back shelves to be left until it fell off…intelligence knew the peninsula is the origin of some high ranking Al-Qaeda members, as well as the natives’ sympathy to jihadists. I believe Bin Laden is from Yemen…
I guess intelligence just decided one day the Arabian Peninsula wasn’t a serious threat until it was going to be one again.
To me, declaring war on terrorism is the equivalent to declaring war on the world, though. The labeling of our feud with Al-Qaeda as a “War,” is just playing semantics with it all.
Somehow I think “Battle” or “Operation” would be more appropriate terms…but war?
We declare war on everything these days. And as John Yoo pointed out this week, in an intruiging interview with Jon Stewart, labeling our “feud” as a “War” all of a sudden gives the Pres. the ability to exercise a lot more power than normal. He can then use “Enhanced Interrogation Techniques,” put them in Gitmo, or just kill the enemy if he so chooses. And I believe the War in Iraq was PROOF of this exact logic. Wasted billions of dollars, killed hundreds (if not thousands) of civilians (I don’t care who tells you otherwise), and was a time of the Gov’t not properly representing the people in order to accomplish it’s own agenda, which was to invade Iraq from Day 1.
With this “Bush logic,” I wouldn’t be surprised if we tortured drug dealers during Bush…because after all… we are in a War on Drugs…
I’m going out on a limb and am going to say that “rediscovering” the threat originating from the peninsula is only us finding the TIP of the ICEBERG.
I’d be willing to be that al-qaeda stretches over much more territory than they believe.
20 years ago, an organization like al-qaeda would have taken much longer to spread over the large areas it has, but with the internet and better communication, it’s basically spread like a virus.
I believe that if we close our eyes to everything but the threats emanating from the Middle East, we’re going to be caught off guard by some white domestic terrorist who we completely overlooked because we had our eyes trained on, who we believed to be, the larger threat.
This is why a war on terrorists is just ridiculous. It should be more of a Defense against terrorists operation, opposed to a war. The best offense is a good defense…
For all we know they could very well indeed have white members of al-qaeda willing to sacrifice themselves for the cause.
I believe Bush administration IS, in the end, responsible for the spread into Yemen by basically ignoring Afghanistan after 9/11. BUT…the Obama administration should have acted on clues. I expected these sort of thing to happen under Bush, but it’s unfortunate to see even an attempt happen under Obama, as I believe he’s already done more for international relations than Bush accomplished in 8 years.
G’day
You know, I have my own opinion about it – separate from Jeff’s – which suggests that the spread makes sense. We attacked Afghanistan and we’ve been doing a nice job pushing al-Qaeda into nothing there. With them unable to operate there anymore, and obviously no interest in operating in Iran (Shia and Sunni just don’t get along), they needed to spread somewhere else.
They could have gone to the UAE, but that’s a relatively stable country. They prosper economically and there isn’t anything really bad going on there. The only way a terrorist group can really gain support is if the people are weak and in need of something crazy to make them feel a little better.
So, as you run from the Americans advance (Afghanistan/Iraq), you have to move deeper into Islamic territory. However, what happens when the Yemeni government takes care of al-Qaeda there? I guarantee that the spread of terrorists will flow into sub-Sahara Africa. The only way America will ever get militarily involved in Africa is when that is the only place Islamic extremist that want to destroy us remain.
Thanks for your continued conversation on the site, Bulletproof Air.
Bulletproof Air,
Thanks for your comment.
I am currently writing a part-two to this article that addresses some of the issues you talk about in your post. I will deal with the situation with Yemen, as it pertains to the overlapping War on Terror, or what have you.
Bin Laden was born in Saudi Arabia, although his family is from Yemen (if you were referring to Usama). Usama Bin Laden is the black-sheep of his legacy. Instead of using his inherited wealth to obtain more wealth he used it in a more religious, or political (depending on which instance you want to talk about) manner.
Jeff