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The Predictable al-Qaeda Advance in Yemen
Al-Qaeda has taken over a major airport and an oil terminal in Yemen. This was predictable, and as odious as it is to say, “I told you so,” I’ll say it, because the point needs making. Anyone with common sense could see this coming, so anyone who says “We had no idea this would happen” has no excuse:
AQAP will be the beneficiary. The focus of our policy in Yemen for years has been counter-terrorism. If AQAP isn’t a real threat, why were we involved there at all? If it is, how could a policy guaranteed to benefit AQAP possibly be in our interest?
The Saudis have succeeded in doing huge damage, but restoring nothing like order. We’re not just hapless bystanders. We’re heavily involved in this:
The U.S. military has begun daily aerial-refueling tanker flights to support the Saudi-led coalition that is intervening in Yemen’s civil war, the latest sign of growing American involvement in the new Middle East conflict.
A U.S. Air Force KC-135 Stratotanker flew the first mission Tuesday night, providing fuel for a Saudi-owned F-15 Eagle and an F-16 Fighting Falcon operated by the United Arab Emirates air force, Army Col. Steve Warren, a Pentagon spokesman, said Wednesday. …
The Pentagon also has approved limited logistical and intelligence support as well as some weapons shipments for the Saudi-led air campaign that is striking at Iran-backed militants in the troubled Arab country.
CENTCOM has assigned about a dozen U.S. service members to a “fusion center” to work alongside Saudis and other allied militaries from the Gulf Cooperation Council and coordinate the limited U.S. support.
How could it possibly serve US interests to pursue a policy that allows al-Qaeda to gain ground? Because that is indeed what we’re doing:
Created through a merger between Saudi and Yemeni branches of al Qaeda in 2009, AQAP has long been perceived as a threat by the United States. In 2013, State Department Spokesperson Jen Psaki described AQAP as “one of the foremost national security challenges faced by the US.” With the support of the Yemeni government, the US has maintained a military and intelligence service presence in the country for more than a decade. Since 2011 a joint operation between the two has launched 88 drone strikes against AQAP, killing more than 482 people.
But now both the Sunni tribes and AQAP, traditionally opposed to the government, suddenly find themselves in a de facto alliance with forces led by Saudi Arabia and backed by the US.
Advanced insanity. We’re doing this with no formal debate or Congressional oversight. Would any normal American back a policy that puts us in a tacit alliance with al-Qaeda? How have we managed to learn absolutely nothing from any of the foreign policy disasters of the past decade?
Photo Credit: Saeed Al-Batati@saeedalBatati After years of relentless drones strikes, #Qaeda in Yemen appears stronger and more defiant. #Yemen, via Vice
Published in General
In other news, if you’re an American stuck in Yemen, Your Government has the answer: http://yemen.usembassy.gov/mobile//em-04112015.html#.VTE36yF-Auo.mailto
“We” do not want a clear winner, because that winner could feasibly prosecute their own agenda rather than ours. Several slightly unstable states are better – so long as they’re not too chaotic – though imho this is a short sighted view that supports narrow interests, and your take that a stable, peaceful Middle East would be far better for the rest of the world as a whole (and the West, as a whole) in the long run is correct.
The most dependable allies, or client states, are the ones that are most dependent. The Saudi state (or the Saudi Kingdom, rather) would not last six months without the West’s support – and that’s pretty much how we like it. Ditto Sissi’s Egypt, probably Iraq, definitely the Gulf, and absolutely what takes shape in Libya.
One of the major reasons Iran is so problematic for the US is that it is not dependent. And what’s worse, it used to be.
[Russia tries the same approach in its Near Abroad – it’s a fairly standard imperial strategy, imo, not a uniquely Western one.]
It is mind boggling what chaos has been unleashed from Boko Haram to Libya to The Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt to Syria to Yemen to Iran having the world’s third largest nuclear arsenal (after China and Russia) in a few years…
The whole nature of these regimes is to intentionally direct outward the rage of the masses and, once directed outward, turbocharge it.
They don’t need our all clear. As you say, their own inability is what’s holding them back. The Royal Saudi Air Force is well trained, well equipped, and well disciplined. The pilots are prepared to go into limited harm’s way. It’s not the same with their ground forces who would face more substantial dangers. There are lower levels of training among both Saudi and mercenary forces. things could fall apart badly.
Claire,
I am sorry but obviously the Saudi’s first concern is stopping Yemen from becoming an Iranian puppet state. We are unwilling to put boots on the ground anywhere in the world. The current bombing is a prelude to a Saudi invasion not a policy in itself. Only western decadents consider bombing campaigns policy.
I frankly am not interested in second guessing exactly how the Saudis accomplish their goals on the ground. If we had taken the terror threat from Al -Qaeda seriously or for that matter fighting Jihadism world wide more seriously we wouldn’t be facing this problem.
Saudi Arabia is our ally. We have aided them with an air campaign. If the World didn’t expect this then it should have told Iran to stay out of the Arabian Peninsula.
Whining about this now won’t help our interests and it certainly won’t help anybody in Yemen. Now that it has gone this far you solve one problem at a time. We should be happy that the problems get solved.
Regards,
Jim
They can’t. And the result will be strengthening al-Qaeda’s most dangerous branch alongside the Bab El Mandab–with al-Shabab on the other side of the strait. No one invades Yemen and wins. Certainly not the Saudis–they couldn’t do it in 2009; there’s no reason to think they can now. Teheran will laugh itself silly as the Saudis get sucked in and dragged down. ISIS has started moving in already. It seems highly likely the Saudis are exaggerating the Iranian influence to play us. This cannot go well.
Let’s not forget that the Saudis and Russians are funding the opponents to the Keystone XL pipeline. The Sierra Club recently called the Saudis their new BFFs. I guess it’s that green flag.
Does this really sound like a problem getting solved to you?
I think that 150,000 Saudi troops will be quite adequate. There are no porous border except for the Saudi border. This isn’t Syria and repeating the talking points from Syria won’t help. We are not going to be sending in any troops. If the Saudis need help Egypt can provide. ISIS can’t get there as Iran can’t get there.
Tehran can laugh all it wants. They will lose in Yemen.
Regards,
Jim
And the good news keeps coming:
It feels like we are reliving the last two years of the Clinton administration.
They were glorious by comparison.
Yep those 9/11 hijackers who doing their flight training at that time sure felt so.
An isolated garrison with no government. No kidding. Apparently Claire you think a war is like going to the doctor and having your appendix removed. Perfect precision. The Saudi invasion hasn’t begun yet. If this news is too much for the cocktail party inside the beltway or on the upper east side here’s an additional piece of news. I don’t care.
Lightly armed troops with no morals usually do well against helpless civilians. They can appear to do well against a government that has no authority. When they come up against anything with more grit they get their teeth knocked out.
Regards,
Jim
So what is the move to achieve stability on terms we can accept. To me it seems that liberalization is the way to do that (ie. the Bush vision). Taking Europe as a model liberal states of varying strength but in alliance and deep economic ties to the US equals a win win for everyone. The US has helped numerous military dictatorships into full democratic liberalism (its not easy and it takes time, granted, but there is precedent).
Iran is not dependent because they are proactively hostile toward us and have been so since their inception. They don’t want to be dependent, but they can’t really afford independence either so they are confrontational. Basically it is impossible to be a modern state with a modern economy and be independent. You need to be part of the international order, an order that America has created and defends. Back in the old Cold War days you could have been part of the Soviet order but that failed. You could try to make your own but the start up costs are massive and of course threatening the current order causes enough disruption that America must act against you to preserve our own well being and that of our affiliates. You could go all North Korea but really who would ever want that?
This is really what we have to acknowledge as the US that we are the majority stake holder in a vast system of trade and interdependence that underpins the peace and prosperity of not only our nation but that of numerous others. This system is not just the product of some mad Imperialistic urge cobbled together by some conquering general like so many Empires of the past. It is the result of fundamental economics of the present day coupled to our evolving sense of morality and human dignity. This is why it is very hard for nations that don’t recognize basic human rights to be full members of this system.
Americas dominance of this system is a matter of circumstance I think more than plan. We are simply the single largest unified entity acting within this order so that gives us the most pull. If Europe ever got its act together they would have a greater say and ultimately I think it would be good for the order to not be so American centric. Likewise if China would liberalize and integrate it could and would have a lot of legitimate pull. Thus really the way to the top is to become more Western at least with in the scope of human rights and then compete for influence under this democratic order. To seek dominance outside the system is to threaten the system and necessitate conflict.
On the surface Empires and government seem to act and behave in similar manners. The means of moving people and leading of course remain solidified by our basic natures. But, that should never be mistaken for parity between all Empires and governments. There is a world of difference between American domination and Russian domination, just ask Eastern Europe.
Claire,
Quite the reverse. It is the Iranians that are playing us. They scream Death to Israel and Death to America on a daily basis and they have always meant it and they mean it now. They are a Jihadist State. They have created the Houthi threat as they have created Hamas and Hezbollah. There is nothing to exaggerate. It is the lack of threat from Tehran that is exaggerated.
The Saudis are rational and they are our ally. Nothing could be more bankrupt than abandoning them. Let me quailify that. Subverting them would be more bankrupt and I am sure that the Obama administration is considering that possibility right now. Why the whole world can go to hell for that ridiculous piece of paper that sort of agreement with Iran.
Can you imagine signing a an agreement after months of negotiation and the translations aren’t even the same much less the interpretations. Within hours Tehran is calling us liars. Tehran does nothing but play us.
Regards,
Jim
“Can you imagine signing a an agreement after months of negotiation and the translations aren’t even the same much less the interpretations. Within hours Tehran is calling us liars.”
Now that would be am interesting poll: “do you believe the Iranians or Obama about the terms of the agreement?”
We also have a national security interest. AQAP is our enemy. Our loyalty to the Saudis does not entail a responsibility to empower AQAP.
AQAP was already empowered. Blaming the bombing campaign for this is crazy. We stumbled around for 2 years while both the AQAP and the Houthi threats were brewing. Now that the Saudis are taking charge I don’t really see what it is we have to complain about.
Well, unless it’s our imaginary deal with Iran that is in jeopardy. The administration only cares about perceptions. Imaginary deals work for them. The rest of us get to live in the real chaos they’ve papered over.
Regards,
Jim
We’ll check in again in a few weeks’ time. I hope you’re right, but see no evidence from any past effort to invade Yemen that suggests any empirical reason to be hopeful.
You misread my comment–not all alliances, just all where some advantage occurs–that is your definition, not mine.
You also do not say, what advantage was obtained by Americans alone.
As for the rationale for the war or its conduct–so much was wrong that we’d have to discuss it at length. But if you want it brief, I am against weird international community wars, I am for killing tyrants & destroying regimes that annoy America.
Without international intervention neither North Vietnam nor Afghan tribes were worth anything.
Don’t worry about insulting me. If you say something that seems to me to show sense, I’ll put up with insults, especially if you have a sense of humor.
I offered several objections, which together seem to me to destroy his argument wholesale. But the big one is this, what was & what could be are different.
Well, smile & move on, sure. But if you want someone who is not just an academic saying more & worse than I do, I recommend Mr. Angelo Codevilla. Let’s see your silly criticism hold up against his work. When you prove your English is better than mine, I might treat such stuff with less contempt. But that other objection, about academia–that is purely contemptible: You know nothing about me, so it’s just a gratuitous calumny. I take a backseat to no one in my attack on the schools, but I also know Mr. Codevilla certainly had a long academic career-
I would tend to think that the oil terminal has more value as a source of bunker fuels since Yemen’s oil production is serious decline to less than 150,000 BPD. There is one refinery there specifically configured to refine crude oil from Kuwait and Qatar in a 75/25 percent combination. It’s a rather simple hydroskimming refinery with a distillate hydrotreater and asphalt blowing unit. the refinery’s capacity is 150,000 BPD.
When you use words so vague as ‘many’ & ‘helped’, you can escape any number of failures & take credit for any number of successes. What does it do for understanding what’s going on, however?
You need to read this sentence again & think about the meaning of the word because. Iran is ruled by people who are dead serious about what they think about politics. It is a remarkably successful rule, unfortunately. Those rulers see some of what you say & reject it wholesale. Practically, they have learned that people who share your opinion, but happen to rule America, are worthless cowards. Nothing shy of destroying the Atomic Ayatollahs would get them to show a bit of respect for decent people.
The moral burden of blood weighs on America. That America allowed its own to be slaughtered like animals in so many places by Iranian terrorism has helped the rulers in Iran to keep treating the people as an animal. That America allowed the Ayatollahs to humiliate America in view of the whole world started things on the way to murder as a form of foreign policy. No talk about human dignity & prosperity can get rid of the blood. Even as you talk about the system, people are terrified & slaughtered, & even civilized countries are bloodied now & then.
The Chinese now, like the Soviets way back when, need the American economy. But they might prefer to sacrifice it all just to get rid of America. People who talk like you make it an easier job for them inasmuch as you all teach whoever is willing to listen that there is no reason to fear war. There is an international order, after all. No, there is not. There is America & there is China, & China is ruled by people who will not accept your international order.
The Germans depended on the world order imposed by Britain, a far more glorious empire than America. But the rulers of Germany decided it did not matter. This may happen again.
Every gangster with ambitions to graduate to tyrant. That is why so many millions have been slaughtered in the hell that is Africa since decolonization.
Let’s see whether Turkey returns to tyranny. I’ll have some more choice words for your international order talk then…
No, what you have to acknowledge is the kind of democratic hysteria, with its religious tones, that led America to slaughter untold millions & emerge victorious in a war it mindlessly avoided for so long. All your talk of international order means nothing without the belief that order is built on the corpses of untold millions. The world wars were not some kind of accidental nuisance on the way to a peaceful international order. Different powers wanted different versions of world peace & that caused, as it always does, war. One power, by virtue & chance, wiped out the others or lived after they wiped each other out. America rules only disarmed peoples. No armed people has accepted American rule–their rulers would not allow it.
See Rome.
& it is that morality & the moralism the added power & comfort engenders that have led America to watch while parts of the world burn, & to treat its allies like vermin, left to be exterminated in the millions by more decisive, less ‘fundamental economics & human dignity’ types. It’s great for Americans to be nice to one another, but it really plays hell with foreign policy.
Every time Americans play nice morality with some tyrant or other, more desperation is added to the terror & suffering of the slaves in this vale of tears.
The origin of America is tied up with a world domination. The Founders knew from the beginning that America would either be destroyed or emerge supreme. This is implied in the political science of the Founding, as the Founders taught it & practiced it. Armed commerce in a free people eventually outlasts or exterminates competition.
This is just a trick. America is not the greatest unified anything except the greatest unified America. You just hide the tautology by saying ‘this order’. America is uniquely well-armed & defended from the rest of mankind, specifically, from the great empires of the past. It’s just luck that Americans did not have to live next to an enormous tyranny or despotism.
Europe is more disarmed now than a generation ago, while its neighbors are far less friendly & more armed. Europeans are perpetual children & Americans absentee parents.
The rulers of China do not want your legitimate pull. They have seen all America has to offer, they have seen the fate of the Soviets, & they have chosen not to make friends with you or obey your order. Now, they are again led by a man who wants to centralize power in a way unseen in at least a generation. Good luck with talk about if you would or if I would or what have you…
Only in America, folks! You heard it here first! Well, this world is full of rulers who like or need what you call conflict. America is a threat to their rule.
Let me impersonate Eastern Europe: Russia is returning & it does not look like America cares or that it is capable of withstanding this change or interested in saving Eastern Europe, now or ever. I’ll tell you what American morality looks like in those parts of the world that have to deal with reality: Weird people who do not seem to understand what it means to have your town exterminated promising all sorts of good things; then, later, hell is unleashed.
Only where American arms wiped out a power without inviting another one is there anything like political freedom or decent gov’t. If you have any sense of decency, how can you not see the terrible injustice that is this world? Why do Germans & Japanese, descendants of the most terrifying war regimes in modern history, get to enjoy such great goods while the races they tried to exterminate have suffered so long, like Eastern Europe, China, &c.? Because America has done far better by its worst enemies than by anyone else, really. There is no justice there, just the prosperity made possible by American arms. Americans did not care about China the way they did about Japan & China has suffered far worse for far longer. American morality is something for Americans to enjoy & the rest of the world to fear. American arms, however, are somewhat more reliable, at least when they are guided by some understanding of war & peace, rather than by the moralism of international order. Do you see now that international order is just a way of saying you’ve rewarded the worst criminals with the best gifts?
I don’t deny that, but at the same time I think there’s something intrinsically corrupting about empire – both for the rulers and for the ruled. No matter how good one’s intentions, it’s human nature to take advantage when advantage is offered.
Iran today is not dependent because that was the point of the Islamic Revolution. It replaced a dependent polity in Iran, and to some extent that’s where it gets its internal legitimacy: the consent of the governed. There was a big class component to the Islamic Revolution, even if it was wrapped up in religiosity.
Wrt being engaged with the rest of the world through commerce – that’s exactly what Iran wants, and what the nuclear deal purports to offer them in exchange for dialling down their military ambitions.
“Stability on terms we can accept” is always a contest and a negotiation. In a dynamic environment, so it’s never quite done. Would what’s being offered now have been acceptable before the advent of ISIS? Or before the sanctions? Or the wars in Iraq? It all depends, doesn’t it?
That is, sadly, true.
Happily, American policy is decided by people who bravely pay no attention to the disasters, people who think people like Mr. Fukuyama are the clear-eyed tough-minded no-nonsense realists people who brilliantly go far beyond his wildest dreams, people who think propriety enjoins the right kind of people to take for granted shocking talk about the world order–we’re not savages, after all. E la nave va-
And perhaps particularly, in America’s case, because Americans for the most part don’t acknowledge that they have an empire–and empire itself is seen as an evil. Thus there’s no codified body of ethical guidance or law for being a responsible imperial power. Foreign policy can and does change with the whim of the electorate, which is perfectly capable of saying, “We don’t want that responsibility anymore.”
I don’t know that any people has been all that successful at running a moral empire, given the nature of the beast, and I don’t think Americans are, on the whole, any less aware of their country’s power in the world than the people of older empires. It does seem as if there is more awareness of the pitfalls of empire on the Left, a greater propensity to question the right of might, but that might just be my perception of it.
That is why I think it should be our goal to establish strong institutions that keep the world together rather than simply fickle American leadership. Institutions created and sustained by nations with similar moral frame works.
?Where you going to find those. We can certainly make that case for Eastern Europe, yet we have consistently and seemingly actively disregarded them. Meanwhile we coddle the islamist.
?Would it not be smarter to simply exclude the islamists from our society of nations.
When push comes to shove nations are ruled by their interests, not their moral frameworks. And all nations have the same core interests: not to be bombed or invaded, trade, the consent of the governed, internal stability.
The rule of law, if you allow the analogy, protects the weak by placing limits on the strong. This isn’t always popular with the strong (see how unpopular the UN is with many Americans) but that’s the only thing that really gets buy in from the weak (who may have critical mass on their side, I don’t know).