Kesher Talk

Yemen, dubious ally: "Up to 100 U.S. troops, including security experts and intelligence officers, will soon be on their way to Yemen. U.S. ... It's the right step. But it is also one to be taken with care."

President Ali Abdullah Saleh cannot be trusted, according to Eric Watkins, an American journalist based in Cyprus, writing in the Wall Street Journal Europe (subscription required). Saleh "is a dubious ally, who allows U.S. troops to Yemen largely in order to avoid an outright U.S. attack."

"Even as he announced the expulsion from Yemen of around 500 foreign students enrolled in Islamist schools, Mr. Saleh said, "We believe that these British and American students belonged to security services who planted them there to gather information." Little wonder one U.S. official has characterized Yemen's help as "grudging and slow."

Yemen backed the mujahadeen fighters in Afghanistan in the eighties out of self-interest - they could also be utilized in the fight against the communist government of South Yemen. After the fall of the Soviet Union, "Mr. Saleh openly allowed mujahideen of all nationalities back into Yemen, providing them with the facilities needed to move freely within his country, as well as abroad. After South Yemen was absorbed, Mr. Saleh employed the mujahideen as mercenaries in the 1994 civil war he launched against political adversaries." Yemeni officials claim that's all history.

"But the past is present in Yemen, where the infrastructure for jihad remains as solid as ever." Of course, "letting in the U.S. troops is the beginning of dealing with the problem. But it is important to bear in mind that until now -- and unlike" the leaders of the Phillipines and Georgia -- "the Yemeni president has consistently denied the presence of al Qaeda elements in his country."

"U.S. officials downplay the idea that an attack on Yemen was ever envisioned. But the Yemeni government clearly thought otherwise. The official Al Thawra newspaper -- no independent source of news -- recently described things as they were by stating that if Yemen did not "undertake the responsibility of hunting terrorism sources, the country's doors would be opened for intervention and our territories would be targeted by more dangerous and destructive action." "

America "has far to go before it can count on the Yemeni president for anything like a genuine partnership in the war on terror."

posted by Howard @ 3/12/2002 11:34:53 AM