Always Judged Guilty

No Party Time in Yemen

2011-02-23T09:00:00.000-06:00

Before I get to this, in a post below I asked what we should be calling the people in the street- demonstrators? protestors? revolutionaires?- and Anonymous responded with this, which I find delightful.

My comrades have been calling them the antis and the pros (especially as the pros are being paid for their demonstrating).

That sounds good to me.

So, then, I want to point you to this article by Nasser Arrabyee, which gives a great outline of what is happening over there- and I think everyone feels we are a day or to away from something very big going down. It is boiling, now, with martyrs. A lot, I think, depends on the tribes. Greg has talked about this- tribes are a lot more important than parties, and it looks like Hamid al-Ahmar, who has been fueding with Saleh, is poised to attempt to take leadership of this. As Nasser says:

Armed tribesmen loyal to President Ali Abdullah Saleh were there to protect the pro-government demonstrators and armed tribesmen loyal to Hamid and Hussein Al Al Ahmar were there to protect the anti-Saleh demonstrators, according to eyewitnesses.

This is an old conflict now spilling into the streets. This is what is most important to keep an eye on. I think the JMP is going to quickly lose a lot of its relevance, even though overlapping loyalties will give it the illusion of control. There is a lot more to say about the tribes, and I want to get to that this afternoon, but right now I am at a high school talking about the Middle East. If anyone reading happens to go to Libertyville High School, feel free to see me 5th period. I will say that some of the questions I got 1st period were considerably more insightful than things I've seen in the media.

Taizz

2011-02-17T11:43:00.000-06:00

In an excellent post, Will at the Yemen Peace Project reminds us of the importance of Taizz.

It’s well worth focusing on one point in the above paragraph: Ta‘iz seems to be, at least in terms of popular support, the real center of this new movement for change. This is not surprising when considered in historical context. Ta‘iz has always been the intellectual center of Yemen (especially in the minds of Ta‘izis), and the heart of nearly every progressive or revolutionary movement in modern history. During the twin revolutions of the 1960s, when the South threw off the yoke of British imperialism and northern republicans overthrew a monarchy, Ta‘iz was a base for both movements and the conduit of fighters who flowed from one war to the other. In fact I would argue that if President Saleh were serious about Yemeni unity, he would move the capital to Ta‘iz, but that’s a topic for another post.

This is a great point. In the west, we tend to focus on the capital (and I include myself firmly in that "we"), but that isn't always how it plays out. This is something some, though not enough, people have been saying. We're kind of viewing these things as if they are on screen, with a reverse teleology: of course they are going to work out! This is happening; it will happen. And we want to fit it into a neat storyline. But it most likely isn't going to shake out that way. Hopefully, the administration will have more patience than I suspect the media will. The lamestream media!

Oh, sorry: I forgot that I'm not aspiring to be a seven-year-old.

Anyway, read Will's whole piece. It makes a lot of interesting and crucial points.

Huthi Support, and the South

2011-02-17T10:18:00.001-06:00

Greg- who's been on a Kerouak-like tear the last 24 hours, though presumably without the uppers- briefly parses Abd al-Malik al-Huthi's declaration of support for the demonstrations around the country.

Does this mean the Huthis, who have generally been good at following the various cease-fire agreements, suddenly break the latest one in the hopes that the combined pressure of different centers can force Salih's regime to crack? I don't know, but I doubt it. So what impact, if any, does moral support from the Huthis count for?

He then says that they are probably waiting to see which way the wind blows (he thinks that there has to be a make or break moment coming soon). While I think this is probably accurate, and I agree that they aren't likely to break a cease-fire, I don't think they have to for the "combined pressure" front to work.

This is a boon for the Huthis. The government cannot have its attention everywhere, and this allows them more time to regroup in case Salih emerges victorious and even more angry than before. Ideally, for the Huthis, the Salih government is toppled and is replaced by either a weak leader in control of San'a and maybe Taizz, or by nothing at all. In either case, they get what they want, which is a return to autonomy (some might argue they want a return to the Imamate; others that they'll just let Iran carve out a piece of the country. Both fun and exciting theories, but probably best left to fantasy-land.) (Edit: the above link is an interesting article; I'm just being needlessly snarky about the Iran connection)

Right now the Huthis don't have to do anything. The South seems like it is on the verge of exploding- the situation is probably far more tense there than in San'a, and maybe in Taizz. There is certainly a longer history and worse memories, as well as a relatively more coherent political program. Between the major cities of the "north" and the Southern Movement, as well as AQAP, who haven't gone away but seem a lot less relevant (for now), there are enough stressors to, if not knock Salih off, at least distract him.

So, then: the South. For years this has been the biggest issue, and still is. It is wrong to say that they are inspired by the Tunisia and Egypt; they have been at this for years. Where the inspiration might come in is the suddenly visible brass ring of success. An emboldened opposition and harried Salih might push Yemen to the breaking point, and the dream of seceding could be within reach. I think right now they are clearly separate from the protests in San'a and Taizz, even if they echo each other, with the calls for democracy and a chance at a decent life. But for now in the South it is still secession.

So, then, this is a question. This is not policy advice or a cocksure guarantee, but a barely-formed thought. Stipulating that if the south goes, Yemen as a centralized state will no longer be viable (which I agree with), and given that it isn't in US interests for that to happen, do we see an opportunity here? Would the Southern Movement be placated, or at least temporarily appeased, if Salih was replaced with a promise of democracy? Is that the only chance to hold the country together? And, if so, should the US and the West throw their weight behind the demonstrators before it is too late? Or is that way too big of a gamble? And even if that is a possible course, do we have the skill or the means to pull it off? I am in the camp that America can't do everything it wants, both morally and practically- there is a limit to our power and influence. Even with aid, I am doubtful that we can ease Salih out, but it isn't impossible. I fear that in this scenario our best way to do so is through the army, whose taking of power, even if it comes with hand-over-the-heart guarantees of just being transitional, won't exactly be met with acceptance in the south. So what should be the play?

More updates from the Ground

2011-02-17T09:50:00.001-06:00

I just found this blog, which is kind of embarrassing*- An American Southerner in the Imam's Mafraj. It is run by Jeb Boone, managing editor at the Yemen Times. The Times, by the way, is decidedly not government-run, or even quasi-regime friendly, like The Observer.

In the current post, Boone talks about what is happening in San'a vs. what the media is reporting, and sees some differences.

Wednesday, Feb. 16: A few colleagues went to both old and new campuses of Sana’a University today and all of them said there were nothing but pro-government demos. Somehow, we end up with this gem form the AP. They claim that THOUSANDS of policemen blocked THOUSANDS of student protesters from Sana’a University from joining THOUSANDS of OTHER student protesters somewhere else in Sana’a. That’s rich…and impossible. This AP article firmly establishes the Yemeni alternate universe, somewhere in a galaxy far, far away. Maybe in that Yemen the Russian Club has reasonably priced drinks? No, impossible.

Keep in mind that this is only in Sana’a. I can confidently say that demonstrations in Taiz and Aden are quite large and the government is probably trying to contain them more violently. What is actually going on in Taiz is a mystery, I don’t know of any journalists at all working in that city. From the pictures I’ve seen and the things I’ve read earlier in the week, I can confidently say that if a revolution is going to take place in Yemen (its still probably won’t) its going to start in Taiz. By all (credible) accounts, the protests in Sana’a are winding down. There are plans for more protests next week. Look to those demonstrations to see if the grassroots movement is really going to take hold in Sana’a.

Now, in his twitter feed today, he says "Thousands riot in Sana'a. Things have changed in the capital." and that the "largest" demo turned into a "riot/all-out battle with Saleh supporters".

So it does look like things are changing, and maybe speeding up. I don't know if Salih really thinks that repression is the way to go, but it is looking like this. I know the spin can be that the counter-demonstrations are just a manifestation of the passion the people have for him, but these are always manipulated (which isn't to say he has zero support, of course).

I would reckon that the lesson Salih took from Egypt is that you can't let these things gain a critical mass; that they have to be broken early. Sadly, from his perspective, at least, this was the correct lesson. But the "fighting back" is the interesting thing here. The demonstrators aren't showing fear, and that could encourage more people to support them. No matter where you are, there are very few who really root for the favorite.

As a side note, something I've been struggling with the last couple of weeks is nomenclature. "Demonstrators" or "protestors" sound weak and awkward. "Revolutionaries" might be a bit huge, and is annoying to type. "Revolters" is right out the window. Anyone have any ideas?

EDIT: In the first paragraph, I meant it is embarrassing that I just found the blog. The blog itself is not embarrassing; it is a great and informative read.

Inside Yemeni Politics

2011-02-15T10:02:00.003-06:00

Nasser, as always, has the scoop. Salih is trying to host a dialogue; the opposition sees it as nothing more than an attempt to circumvent inevitability and justice.

An opposition leader said Monday they refused the President Saleh’s initiative for resuming dialogue.

“We looked at it (Saleh’s initiative) as an attempt to rescue the regime not to rescue the nation,” Said Yasin Saeed Noman, the secretary general of the socialist party, the second largest opposition party after the Islamist party Islah, which leads the coalition.

And I think we are all looking forward to Glenn Beck using this as more proof of an insidious Communist/Jihadist alliance. If anyone hears of him using Yemen as an example, don't send it to me. I beg you not to send it to me. I would spend 11 hours rebutting him in detail, which is a hair-tearingly futile waste of time.

Meanwhile, this paragraph could be pretty ominous.

The tribesmen were the first groups to come to the Presidential Palace. Since Saturday February 12th, 2011, President Saleh has been receiving tribal leaders from the areas around the capital Sana’a, mainly from his tribe, Hashed, the most influential tribe in Yemen.

Now, the Hashid have a lot of political weight, and through their late leader historical ties to Islah, and therefore to the JMP. But as Greg accurately has reminded us, many times, party loyalty isn't a huge factor in Yemen. Personal and tribal ties matter a lot more. And the historical memory of tribesmen loyal to the leader runs marauding their way through a rebellious San'a run deep and fairly recent. History doesn't always repeat itself, but encourages echoes, and it seems Salih is attempting to solidify himself in the ancient ways.

And the cars, and the bars, my Karman!*

2011-02-15T09:00:00.001-06:00

As the violence in Yemen follows its usual pattern- demonstration, regime-oriented counter-demonstration, police violence against one side (guess which one!)- The Washington Post has a nice little article on Tawkul Karman, the 32-yr-old woman who is emerging, against all odds, as the face and leader of Yemen's Egypt-style revolt against the reign of Ali Abdullah Salih. It is hard to say if this is a good strategy, as it might further enrage loyalists and edge traditionalists further into Salih's camp, but those are just speculations, and anyway such calculation shouldn't get in the way of inspiration. If nothing else- and it isn't nothing else- she shows just how different things have gotten in a gobsmackingly short amount of time.

Here's another illustration, a few paragraphs which should be dissected.

Two weeks ago, Karman's brother Tareq approached her. A well-known poet, he personally knew Saleh, and he was carrying a message from him.

This seems strange, but in Yemen this is often how things are done. Family ties are enormously important, and Salih, like all Yemeni leaders beforehand, uses families and personal connections to send messages and to get things done.

"'You have to control your sister. Anyone who doesn't obey me must be killed,' he told my brother," said Karman. "This is the one threat I take seriously."

This part is a little strange, and seems crude, even for Salih. Kidnapping or jailing other family members is usually the way to gain leverage. If this is true- and I am not doubting her- than either Salih is completely losing all patience or else he finds the demonstrators completely beyond the pale, and doesn't think he has to deal with them in the usual way. Either way, a very troubling sign for those wondering how Salih is going to play things.

In interviews, senior Yemeni officials and members of the ruling party said they were unaware of the allegations. They said Saleh would not make such a threat. But they also made clear that they considered Karman a troublemaker.

"She doesn't respect the president, the government or the law," said Sultan al-Barakani, a senior official in the ruling party. "She says bad things about the president."

This is kind of the nub of it, for me. It seems like she respects the law, the spirit of what it is supposed to protect if not its oft-hypocritical letter. But it is interesting what came first in this list and what is at tne end- the President. See, you were allowed to criticize things, but not Ali Abdullah, directly (while that seems outlandishly backwards, it was actually pretty progressive for the neighborhood, another reason why Yemen is so fascinating). Saying bad things about the President is shocking to this senior official, and a few weeks ago I might have joined in his shock, despite the threat to my monocles.

But things have changed. Arab leaders are being laughed at and scorned, openly, by their people. That barrier, the idea that there is a sacred cow you can't slaughter, has been broken. To me this is the first step to real democracy. I think the stunned reaction shows just how quickly things have changed. And in an irreversible way. Sure, the wall can be hastily rebuilt, the dam can be plugged, bandaids can be sloppily applied. But the idea is out there. Tawkul Karman gets it. The greying and wearying and wearied bosses don't.

*Admittedly, this reference to Lolita makes no sense, and given Yemen's child bride problem might be distasteful and even Creepy, but it is what popped into my head, and I must obey the inscrutable exhortations of my soul.

Meanwhile

2011-02-14T18:30:00.000-06:00

I was joking about the art thing, but there are obvious signs that Salih isn't going to stand for unrest, and is willing to employ almost any tactic to quell it. HRW has the scoop.

I think it is clear he is trying to keep the square clean and peaceful, and hopes that pushing the protests away from the periphery will allow him to keep it off the front pages. This is narrowing down the strategy of violently quashing dissent outside of the capital but attempting to deal with it peacefully where all the cameras are. But as the space gets smaller, Salih will get more and more restricted, and that can easily spell disaster.

More US Training for Yemeni Military

2011-02-14T17:57:00.001-06:00

From the AP...

Faced with an increasingly alarming threat from al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, the U.S. military will begin a new training program with Yemen's counterterrorism unit so it can move against militants believed to be plotting attacks on America from safe havens there.

I think, instinctually, this makes a lot of us nervous. No one seriously questions Salih's willingness to use our arms and money and training against the people of Yemen. I understand that CT is our main objective in Yemen, but we also ned to be careful not to let our actions destroy our reputation (further destroy) for another generation.

However, and I know that this article only talks about elite counter-terrorism troops, one thing Egypt has demonstrated it is that military contacts at many levels can be an excellent counterweight to an entrenched and reality-deprived authoritarian. Indeed, one could make the case that it is the threat of withholding friendship, in the form of scrilla, that could make an army say "it's time to go." Its own sense of morality could do so as well, but let's not depend on the kindness of strangers.

This isn't to say that dumping military aid into Yemen is the best thing to do to hedge against our becoming entangled in Salih's potential death-throes; it could easily backfire. Odds are, it will. (And the article's almost comically lonely throwaway paragraph, consisting of one sentence reading "the overall U.S. effort also includes economic and governance assistance" is a perfect illustration of the blinkered nature of our strategy.) But I also think we shouldn't be so quick to jump the gun and getting nervous about these expanded contacts. A professional military is more likely to be loyal to the state, and not just to the guy doling out money.

JMP Barely Riding the Tiger

2011-02-14T17:48:00.000-06:00

One of the biggest questions lingering underneath the "Will Yemen go the way of Egypt and Tunisia" umbrella is the role the opposition, namely the Joint Meetings Party, will play. The JMP (a combination of several parties, notably the Islamic party, Islah, and the Socialists)* organized the original protests a couple of weeks ago, the threat of which forced Salih to make some sizable concessions. This seemed like a good step for many involved- it looked like it brought Salih some breathing room.

But the overthrowing of Mubarak is his nightmare. It is one thing to rattle an autocrat; it is another altogether to depose him. Yemenis who want Salih gone- and this is not all of them, of course, something which needs to be said- see a light in the tunnel. So then: will the JMP be able to harness this? It doesn't look like it. Being a strange amalgamation, they don't have particularly strong leadership. Greg has some more thoughts on this.

But if the pattern follows like it did in Egypt, the political parties will at best try to fasten themselves on the back of the protestors. Right now the demonstrations seem to exist in a political limbo- the JMP is giving their blessing, but it is a reactive one. This is far more spontaneous. Read this statement and this update from Arabist.net for a look at how things are spreading.

I think this will very quickly get out of the hands of the JMP, which is something I think Salih is deeply worried about. When they were the ones organizing things, they represented someone with whom he could deal. After all, they also had a stake in the system. If they are bucked, all bets are off, as far as he is concerned.

But, then again, maybe the art fair tactic will change the dynamic. It's like I have always said: arts and crafts ruin everything.

*As there have been more readers lately, and as I hope there will be more eyes if things heat up, I am going to sometimes explain things that regular readers and other Yemen-watchers know by shorthand.

Art!

2011-02-14T17:31:00.000-06:00

Hat-tip to Will for this.

ECRETARIAT CAPITAL, Feb 12 (Saba) – Minister of State and Mayor of the Secretariat Capital Abdul Rahman al Akwa'a opened on Saturday plastic art and handicraft exhibitions in Tahrir Square.

The exhibitions were organized by the Union of Handicrafts and Small Industries Associations and the offices of the Ministries of Labor and Social Affairs, Culture, Tourism and Youth and Sports in the city.

The month-long fairs aim to introduce handicrafts to investors and businessmen within the efforts of promoting Yemeni products on which many Yemeni families depend as living resources.

Al Akwa'a praised the efforts of organizing such fairs as he stressed encouraging their organization.

This is absolutely brilliant. You guys really want to protest? At the sake of art? And handicrafts? Who is the real monster?

One Very Brief Worry

2011-02-12T00:07:00.000-06:00

In Will's piece linked to below he also talks about violence in Aden, which is kind of par for the course, though no less terrible for it. But there is this brief LATimes blurb about the protests which contains something worrisome.

The protests come after a wave of anti-government rallies spread across Yemen during the past two weeks, inspired by revolts that ousted Tunisia's former president and the uprising in Egypt that threatened President Hosni Mubarak's 30-year rule.

It isn't quite the same. The Southern Movement has been going on for several years, and was not "inspired" by Tunisia or Egypt. They may be more motivated or more persuaded of eventual success; I don't know. I just worry that the media, in the understandable flush of history, will have a hell of a time sussing out the various strands of Yemeni rebellions and revolutions, and the we'll see Peggy Noonan on CNN trying to tell us what Reagan would have done in Abyan and I'll have to turn to the bottle for comfort.

Joy in Yemen Stopped Short

2011-02-11T23:58:00.000-06:00

Human Rights Watch today talks of a pro-Egpyt/anti-regime March in San'a being broken up by armed men in army trucks, followed by riot police with water cannons. Will at Yemen Peace Project declines to pull his punches.

The point is, Saleh’s forces have used excessive violence against civilians in the capital. I was confident, a week ago, that something like this was possible, but given everything that’s happened since then, I really thought Saleh had chosen another path. This was not only brutal and appalling, but politically stupid.

This is spot-on. Salih had already offered a handful of concessions, and seemed to be is a decent spot to bide his time. He may have thought that letting these protests, small as they are (around 1000 people), would be a sign of weakness. That was crazy. Letting people protest, now, is a sign of strength, that you recognize things are different. A major miscalculation.

Two, three weeks ago? Probably not. Intimidate and take the piss out of the people. But this seems like it could do little more than inflame even those who are neutral. I'm still not taking money on a Egypt-style revolution toppling Salih (there are a lot of other things that might first), but if he continues to screw up in such a thumbscrewing manner, it isn't impossible.

Though, to be fair- even if there really isn't a call for it- this must be terrifying. He isn't the only leader shaking right now, which, really, is great. Honestly, I have a feeling he is less-nervous than other leaders right now, because he has been dealing with similar things for a long time. But it might be that lack of nerves that is his downfall.

I don't think things are going to happen as quickly in Yemen. We rebel against the idea of a monolithic Arab world when licensed bloviators try to imagine one. The same goes as for something positive. As Greg said the other day, we have to remember that this isn't going to be on our time-table. But something very important happened. The rules changed, a barrier was broken, and "Egypt" became not just a place but an event, a historical moment. I was thinking earlier today that Salih, as canny as he is, would recognize that the game was different, and even reluctantly, would be forced to change. That he would be giving out half-measures in an attempt to avoid a plane ticket or a bullet, and that it would make change happen. But if he is as stubborn and as insulated as Mubarak, he is doomed.

Until lately, I wouldn't have thought he was. The President of Yemen has to be much, much more in tune with what is going on outside the palace than does the President of Egypt. He has to be more flexible. But Salih has gotten more paranoid and cloistered the last few years. His concessions last week seemed to be a retro move by him. But he has taken a giant leap back.

Joy

2011-02-11T11:55:00.000-06:00

That's all there is to say. I'll leave it to Egypt analysts to tell us what happened, and what happens next, but I know I'll never forget watching al-Jazeera on the computer, and the joy in the crowd when they realized what they had won- what they had earned.

Who couldn't be moved? Who couldn't help but contrast the youth and exuberance and life of the crowd with the gray pallor and ossified phrases of their former leaders, glumly going through the motions, hoping to stop the future. When I studied at the American University of Cairo, I had a professor of Arab politics- one of the best and most interesting men I have ever had the pleasure of learning from- described Cairo as a "tired and tiring city". And he was right- the deliberately slow rhythms of the regime lulled the country into a waking sleep. That was the plan- it wasn't the brutality of Asad or Saddam (though there were elements of it), or the humiliation and dehumanizing tactics of Ceacescu, but a more subtle way of arresting history. It provided sleep without the kindness of dreams.

No more. The Middle East will never be the same. As this is largely a Yemen blog, I think Salih has to be nervous. It was one thing to offer concessions and promise peace when contrasted with last week's violence in Egypt. But now? Now that it worked?

I still don't think that Salih is going to go, at least because of a democracy movement, but if this last month proved anything, it is that predictions are a suckers' game, intellectual three-card monte. You can estimate, and gameplan, but predictions are going to leave you slack-jawed, whiplashed by the tumultuous force of people. Thank you, Egyptians, for reminding us of that. Thank you for everything.

On what is below

2011-02-10T01:05:00.001-06:00

I don't know. I've been reading Poe, and read this story for the first time last night, and it has been rattling around in my brain all day. I don't think it is very good. There is actual analysis, to an extent, inside of the story. But the analysis is smothered by the fiction, and is paradoxically far too obvious. Both Poe and Borges tend to do that- create a story and explain things in large chunks of dialogue, so you can take it as an homage, if you want, but they also have an artistry that more than makes up for it, and I do not. I mean, it clearly is an homage, to both of them, but an awkward and unsuccessful one. I feel that the analysis is both too clunky and also too shallow. But, you know, I really wanted to try something new, and there are phrases with which I am not entirely unhappy. The final paragraph is really the only one that describes how I feel about the present. I probably won't try it again.

Words With Some Mummies

2011-02-10T01:00:00.001-06:00

(Debt and apology to Poe)

With regret, I noticed that there was no rain. It would have been cinematic- an archaic term- to have it slip irregularly past the flickering neon sign vainly attempting to draw crowds into the Museum of Political Oddities. It was just as well: there wasn’t actually any neon. It was a digital light, programmed to give me a bit of atavistic pleasure; the burnouts and flaws were part of the program. If you didn’t think about that part, it could be nice. I was aware that the noir era for which I longed was before my time, but was both melancholy and optimistic enough to recognize that the past was as permeable as the uncertain present. Anyway, no one came here, so no one cared about my silly longings.

Tonight was a big night, though. Tonight was what I had been waiting for, in solitude, all these years. It is early February 2045, a year I picked to pay homage to something no one recognized. Tonight, they were coming back. For once I had company. This did mean something, though after years of comfortable solitude I couldn’t remember exactly what. I’m in my mid sixties, something that doesn’t mean much to other now, but I ache. Ignoring the general present means being acutely aware of your own. I shouldn’t be old, but I am. Surrounding myself with what I have ensured that. There were some regrets, but none of them mean much to this tale. Those regrets may be dead, or may still be young. With a vague sadness, I realize neither option affects me.

But! Getting back to my story, which began only a few hours ago. The minor size of the crowd was offset by its luminous nature. There was Professor Wittstart, the historian, one of our true public intellectuals. He dressed anachronistically, an affectation I resented for being too close to my own. There was the Honorable Representative L----, he of the fierce convictions, though on which side I couldn’t remember. Sadly, Marie couldn’t make it, a fact whose pain was heightened by its own surprising strength. The rest were gray to me. Five, maybe six.

Wine was poured; then it began. There was a crackle of tired bones, and a creak of joints long unaccustomed to use. Some stretching. Two pairs of eyes blinked, then quickly sized up the room, as canny as before. Making sure of what was happening was what these eyes were known for, before. The slowness surprised me. After all, while thirty years was a long time to rule, it wasn’t, I would have thought, a particularly long time to be dead.

Physical reluctance aside, I was impressed. I suppose part of me, remembering cartoons, was expecting a furious self-applied patdown, maybe with eyes goggling, looking at and dropping an imaginary bottle of booze. But these weren’t ordinary men.

There probably isn’t much need to rehash the tumult of events in 2011. Crowds in the streets, autocrats digging in, speeches illuminated by Molotov cocktails, strange faces contorted with anger and joy, the truncheons of riots cops, their shields and anonymous boots, Western politicians scrambling to keep ahead. Then, breakthrough, politically and scientifically. We could offer up a deal: step down now, and we can freeze you. For only a little while. After all, the quest for power is a vicious race against mortality. Every action is to prolong the artificiality of life. A promise of revivification was offered. This also appealed to a sense of metaphor, particularly because Egypt was involved. An idea of embalming. And, since the other leader was also an Arab, it could carry over. Never mind that the ancient Egyptians weren’t Arabs- this created headlines; therefore, it was acceptable. And now, the promised date had come. Very few remembered, and most thought our promises faded with time. But there was still need for an honor guard of sorts, and so a committee, brimming with excitement and reluctance, gathered to see the first moves of those who had once ruled.

Little has changed; we spoke in English.

Representative L--- began. “Welcome…to the future!” he said stupidly. It is impossible to welcome anyone to the future; each desperate and agonizing step leads only to the present. It was a strange relief to look on his crumpling face, though, as both leaders wordlessly dismissed him as a pompous lightweight, recognizing that some things remain constant.

A flurry of mumbling and introductions. Ignoring the need for imaginary piety, we all drank scotch. It warmed even those of us who struggled through the decades, and did wonders for those who passed them without thought.

The one without the mustache, with the cruel jowls and slick vampire hair was the first to speak.

“And was I right”, he asked, with his trademark imperious modesty. In the glancing shiver of hesitation, he guessed that he had been correct. “They took over, didn’t they?” He was looking directly at L---.

L--- couldn’t speak. He was running through his mind which mythology was the correct one to promote, and realized that it was impossible to keep straight. Was he supposed to credit…or was he supposed to diminish…or what policy was the one to take credit for, or blame for…

Scotch might have explained the frisson of amusement I felt. But even as that momentary joy faded, we were surprisingly saved by one of the nameless men piping up at my elbow.

“They did, partly,” he said, as a rictus of triumph snaked up our guest’s face (the other remained impassive, clearly calculating). “But only for a few years, and then again, later. And now.”

Our guest choked a mirthless laugh. In my head, I saw bats leaving a tower. He went into a long diatribe about abandonment and his powers of prophecy, and how loyalty was a trump card. Frankly, I was content to let him go. I didn’t have the heart. Did it matter? My companion, comfortable in the anonymous gloom behind me, interrupted.

“It was dicey for a while, but then, ‘democracy is messy’, right?” (A tinkle of glasses and ironic chuckling, and where have I heard that voice? TV?) “They quickly realized that elections meant something, and implied a certain amount of responsibility. Sure, there was some gaming of the system, but the people who flooded the streets and forced-“ a chill- “persuaded you to leave wouldn’t have any of it. In the end, there was something managed, and a compromise no one liked. The army was persuaded that if they stayed back, and ensured the sprit of treaties, if not the exact letter, popular sentiment could take hold. The convinced had to deal with the skeptical. In short, modernity. Your eventual removal, facilitated but not forced, rushed reality to the stage.”

The guest shrunk. This evoked some pity- crimes are lessened both by time and proximity to the criminal. History, which he had willingly embraced, had treated him poorly. The other guest was leery, but keen to move to him. He knew how the past worked. While all art of a time might be hastily thrown together for the quiet acceptance of museumgoers, there was a difference between artists. No one, even the brightest among us, understood idiosyncrasy and subtlety like he did.

“I was different,” he said, mustache still crinkling stiffly. Everyone had to admit he was. In our joy and in our haste, he was pushed out. After all, in many ways he was worse than his friend. He had no hesitation at turning his guns against those who hung his picture in reluctant doorways.

But history is reluctant to offer easy echoes, even though we long for the homophonic. In his case, the timing wasn’t right. There were too many other issues, and those who followed him were not ready.

“I was ready”, he continued. “Ready to step down. Frankly, I didn’t want to, but I knew I had to. If you had given me enough rope, I would have been able to ease myself out.” (I assumed he was going to say hang himself, which also wasn’t impossible.) “I knew the game was up. I was planning to do anything I could to stay in power, but in my heart, there wasn’t a way. You could have kept me in to deal with the immediate while those who hated me got their act together.” (People don’t still use that phrase. Frankly, I can’t remember if he actually did, and tend to doubt it. The strangeness of the night bent time and memory.)

“I’m going to assume,” he continued, “that a simulation of democracy took place in my absence, and was limited to the major cities. There, also, you probably had a choice. I imagine that after I was forced out, attention waned, and focused only on those with beards and bombs.” This was correct. “See?”- a bit of scorn, heightened by our lack of denial- “this manic attention on the very few was always going to be your downfall. I could easily have been forced out, and not in this condition, had you bothered to look at what was really happening. But the vision of your country was always scattered, and was always looking for the easy way, the binary” (I am positive he didn’t use those words.) You could have forced me out, but only with a commitment to fill the void. Otherwise, I should have stayed. You could have used me. “ There were implied italics to the last verb. He clearly meant it in several ways.

There was more conversation. Most of it was about the decades and their innovations. Despite the participation and curiosity of corpses, I found it tedious. People drifted away, and the men went off with various dignitaries to their dignified housing. I idly wondered what they would do next, and discovered myself unconcerned. I had been staring at them for years, and now they were gone. I flicked a switch, and the neon faded into an imaginary death.

Arrrgh: A Reasoned Statement on Yemen

2011-02-09T22:09:00.000-06:00

New York Republican Peter King is the new chair of the House Committee on Homeland Security. This combines a lot of my favorite things, because the Honorable King is not only a crazy person who is terrified of Muslims, but he is a wild hypocrite who hates Islamic terrorism but has a history of being totally in love with the IRA. I am Irish (American), and vaguely believe in the cause of one Ireland, but despise the IRA, and, when it comes down to it, don't really care. History is the nightmare, and all of that. Anyway, King standing for two things I hate- Islamophobia and the degradation of the Irish- manages to combine with possibly my least favorite thing, the elevation of Anwar al-Awlaki into a Bondian supervillain, in today's committee hearing.

"I actually consider Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula with al-Awlaki as a leader within that organisation probably the most significant risk to the US homeland," National Counterterrorism Centre head Michael Leiter told the committee.

(Note: for some reason this is from as Australian news feed, which explains the wildly anti-American spelling of center.)

I am actually pretty happy he said that al-Awlaki is just "a leader", rather than "the leader", although in his prepared statement Leiter only highlighted al-Awlaki when talking about the group, saying:

Anwar al‐Aulaqi, a dual U.S.‐Yemeni citizen and a leader within AQAP, played a significant role in the attempted airliner attack and was designated in July as a specially designated global terrorist under E.O. 13224 by the US Government and the UN’s 1267 al‐Qa’ida and Taliban Sanctions Committee. Al‐Aulaqi’s familiarity with the West and his operational role in AQAP remain key concerns for us.

As anyone who reads this blog, and really anyone who doesn't, knows, this is: crazy. There are so many more people in AQAP who are a much greater threat than al-Awlaki. I am pretty glad about the rest of what I have read, and plan to do a semi-live blog tomorrow (I was busy today). I think it looks like the admin knows that the franchises are increasing in importance. But whether it is pandering or ignorance, our bloody-minded fixation on the one guy who speaks English might be our biggest stumbling block in establishing a decent and sustainable policy in Yemen.

Salih Gets His Helicopters

2011-02-04T16:04:00.000-06:00

Reminding us that there are always smaller stories still going on during big events...

WASHINGTON, Feb. 4 (UPI) -- The U.S. military has delivered four Bell Helicopter utility aircraft to the Yemeni air force under its 1206 program.

The aircraft were upgraded Huey II helicopters. Spares and associated tools were also delivered.

Section 1206 of the National Defense Authorization Act of 2006 established a new program that allows the U.S. Department of Defense to spend up to $200 million of its own appropriations to train and equip foreign militaries to undertake counter-terrorism or stability operations.

A couple of quick thoughts.

1) These are explicitly to help Salih fight AQAP, but any Yemen watcher would probably be willing to bet Salih might have additional ideas for them. He has never shown a reluctance to use foreign military aid against the Southern Movement or the Houthis. These might be easier to track, but Salih could very easily be willing to use them against other "enemies of stability".

Will this include protestors? It isn't impossible, and it is hard to think of anything worse for our image if that happened.

2) It is really hard to stop things. The article mentions that delivery happened exactly 110 days after a $27 million agreement. Despite all the upheaval, institutional momentum carried this deal forward without a glitch, in an incredibly hectic and chaotic week in Yemen, where one could have plausibly seen a scenario where the government was toppled. Someone who knows more about this than I do could weigh in on wether the political side of Yemen is connected to the procurement side, and if this could have been stopped in a heartbeat, but to me this is a good illustration of why policy is so hard to change. There are a lot of different forces pushing for things, and it isn't easy to turn around- I think the cliche is reversing an aircraft carrier, something I gather is difficult.

With that in mind, it seems even more silly to criticize the administration for not breaking with Mubarak quickly enough, and makes it even more amazing that they actually did, it seems (for now).

3) So what is the wisdom of these arms deals? Obviously, we want a stable Yemen that is capable of fighting AQAP, and this will help (there is more than helicopters in the deal). That gets to the heart of the dilemma- you don't want to be supplying actual weapons to an unstable regime that could use those weapons in unpredictable ways, (or pumping weapons into a chaotic countrty) but without them you might not have a partner. However, and being a dumbass on technical matters, I think the helicopters are a safer bet, as right now, according to the article, there are only six trained pilots in Yemen. This makes it less likely that they can fall into the wrong hands, to use a really pathetic cliche.

Basically, I think the continuation of arms' deals shows that the admin is still sticking with Salih, and has planned to for a while. But as I've been saying, they need to have a contingency plan, or all those fancy weapons will, like our hopes for Yemen, be trunkless legs of stone in the desert.

Kind of on cue...

2011-02-03T12:55:00.001-06:00

Police open fire in al-Mukalla.

Witnesses say police have opened fire to break up an anti-government protest in Yemen, and security officials say one protester has been critically wounded.

It was not immediately clear whether the police were using live ammunition or rubber bullets.

Hat-tip here to Jane Novak's Twitter feed. I know, right? Wherever we might disagree on analysis, she does a great job as an activist for the Yemeni people.

Here's a map of Yemen in case you were wondering where al-Mukalla is. About 3/5 up the southern coast. It is in eastern Yemen, but the often-misleading political shorthand there is "the South".

(Not pictured: guns)

Fearing a Crackdown

2011-02-03T12:38:00.000-06:00

Will at the Yemen Peace Project, who has been blogging throughout the day, fears a crackdown in cities outside of the capital.

Ta’iz especially is home to strong anti-regime and anti-northern sentiments. New tweets are claiming much larger crowds there than in the capital, perhaps as many as 200,000. If that’s the case, we might still expect a response from security forces.

For that matter, what about demos in the south? In ‘Aden, Abyan, and Hadhramawt, state violence is almost commonplace. I’ll still be surprised if those places avoid a crackdown today.

I think he is right to be leery, especially when it comes to the south. Salih has shown little tolerance for the Southern Movement, and even if the protests are in union with the ones in the capital, it will be easy for him to dismiss them as people trying to tear apart the state. The protestors asking for political reforms are something he can deal with; not so those asking to split the Yemen state in two.

What will be interesting is if he manages to conflate the two, which is something that he surely sees as an option. If these protests do continue on a weekly basis, or more, and if this happens in conjunction with his cutting deals with opposition politicians (as opposed to regular people), he can paint them as dangerous agents of chaos, and keep the status quo largely unchanged.

I would also imagine he feels less constrained in the south, as well as in Ta'iz and Ibb. San'a is a strange enough place for foreign journalists and analysts; these cities with Star Wars' names might as well be on the moon. Explaining regional dynamics in a country such as Egypt, which everyone knows, has been a bewildering and almost unmade journey. Salih is probably pretty sure it won't happen in Yemen, so he might feel he has more of a free hand.

From the Ground in Cairo

2011-02-03T10:21:00.000-06:00

Greg- who is currently in Cairo- gives an on-the-ground look at his experiences of the last week or so. He avoids analysis in favor of personal reporting, which is a solid choice (even though he is a great analyst). Greg isn't at the center of the action, which is another reason I think this is an important read. Things are happening throughout the city, radiating from the center, and the experiences of those not involved in the protests can influence things as much as those doing the fighting.

Follow-up

2011-02-03T08:51:00.000-06:00

I mentioned below that we need to push Salih down the right path, now that it looks like he is staying. In a very interesting article for The Hill, Yemen expert (and regular reader of this blog) James King lays out what that means, including this.

Push the Salih government to pursue extensive systemic reform and political sacrifice. Many Yemenis blame the regime’s incompetence, corruption and principle commitment to the interests of a handful of elites for their economic troubles and diminishing political freedoms. Without addressing these grievances, which resonate across Yemeni society, AQAP will remain able to compete for Yemenis’ loyalties. The administration must exhort its ally to devolve power and build a more representative political system. It must pressure Salih to permit free and fair elections, to recommit to a comprehensive national dialogue with friends and foes alike, and to dismantle patronage networks that drain already diminutive national coffers.

Prioritize Yemen’s socio-economic, structural and environmental problems through increased development and humanitarian aid. The stability of Yemen is directly tied to the resolution or mitigation of these crises. The U.S. must commit more resources to issues of poverty, malnutrition and economic development (in FY2010, it gave just over $90 million in non-security assistance, compared to roughly $175 million in security aid). American policy in Yemen must strike a balance between short-term security and humanitarian assistance, medium-range development aid, and the resolve to achieve long-term political and economic structural durability.

I don't want to do the disservice of summary- you really should read this. King does an excellent job of showing what our opportunities are, and what the risks are. This line, which I really wish I had written, sums it up: "President Salih will not live forever, though the collective memory of Yemenis will. "

AQAP

2011-02-03T08:39:00.000-06:00

Remember those guys? This short post is going to be speculative, and based on very little. But I have to think these democracy movements might also undercut AQAP, who just seem so reactionary and small compared to a genuine drive toward freedom. In just a matter of weeks they have managed to make huge gains from Salih, while AQAP just makes more enemies. Who needs a caliphate of the pure when you have rights and the ability to change things?

Of course, AQAP still has an incredibly smart leadership and the flexibility to adapt to new circumstances, and they still remain dangerous. I am not saying they are collapsing into dust. But I also think it is silly to pretend that a fallen Salih- under these new circumstances- is automatically a boon for AQAP. It might help them in the sort-term, but not in the long run.

Which is a main reason why the US can't be satisfied that Salih has made a few moves to maintain the current state of relative stability. If he renegs, or moves backwards, or really cracks down, that gives another opening to AQAP. Increased instability will help them in way we've talked about, but it will also give them a propaganda coup. So the US has to use its leverage so that Salih's words meet actions. Not only is it the right thing to do, but it is in our strategic interest to do so.

This has to be combined with, as we talked about in the comments, a real outreach to other power centers, specifically the tribes. Whatever comes after Salih, whether it is in 2013 or a week from Friday, will be weaker. We now have an opportunity to help stave off collapse, usher in real reform which might fundamentally change Yemen, but also expand our contact with power brokers outside the usual sphere of state relations. So this is a real opportunity for the states.

I still maintain, though, that is Salih backslides or cracks down we have to be ready to cut him off, and he has to know that we are ready, so that we can push him along, no matter how reluctant he might be. This is the best way to combat al-Qaeda, both now and in the future.

So...did Salih win?

2011-02-03T08:28:00.000-06:00

Tens of thousands of people came out in San'a today to call for the ouster of President Ali Abdullah Salih, meeting, symbolically, in Tahrir Square, and- no, that's not exactly right. They were supposed to, but the square was filled with Salih supporters, so the anti-regime rally was moved to San'a University. According to reports, both protests dispersed peacefully in the mid-afternoon, one assumes right around the qat time, which is perfectly and wonderfully Yemeni.

I don't really mean to sound flippant; this isn't over. The opposition plans to march every Thursday until they get what they want, which is a mix of those who wants concessions (which Salih is theoretically giving) and those who want him to step down immediately (which he isn't). Whether these remain peaceful and relatively respectful depends on a combination of Salih's actions, and whether they at least have the appearance of sincerity, and if the JMP and other political groups can control the protests, or whether they will become a reflection of inchoate but very real dissatisfaction and rage.

(On a personal note, I got kind of giddy at writing "relatively respectful"- this is relative to what might be a new Arab world, where the speeches of leaders can be met with derisive snarls and laughter, rather than a police-enforced somnolent nod and hollow applause. This might just be a moment, and can easily be reversed, but for now carries a whiplashing excitement.)

But for right now Salih has managed this with the kind of dexterity and stagecraft he is famous for, but which many, myself included, had thought he lost, as his circle closed and he became locked in a paranoid labyrinth largely of his own making.* He has managed to undercut the protestors by announcing his intentions to reform the system, and coming out against hereditary rule. The next few weeks are crucial, and we can see how sincere he really is, and that will largely guide what will happen.

What I would imagine he is going to do is find a way to share some spheres of power with the opposition, hoping he can co-opt them and they can in turn dampen the passion of their supporters. This is what he has always done; this is his way- the Yemeni way- to smooth over differences. And it might work. 2013 is a long way away though- for those who want change now it could seem like an eternity, and they might not listen to the JMP. After all, if you have already broken the psychological barrier of listening to the President, who has been in charge for the entire lives of many of the protestors, it will be easy to turn on the weak and divided leaders of the opposition, especially when they can be easily accused of selling out.

So is Salih sincere? Probably to an extent; it is in his interest not to let the country fall apart, and he has always shown an incredible ideological flexibility to fit his own interests. Like I said yesterday, he bought himself some breathing room, and isn't really thinking about 2013 yet. Gun to my head, I'd say he won't run again, but that is based on what is happening at this moment, and that is flexible. If these movements collapse in on themselves, he might try to change things again.

Of course, and this should have been said all week, even if the status quo reasserts itself to some degree- and nothing will ever be completely the same; you can't erase a taste of freedom- Salih will still have all the problems he has been dealing with beforehand, and which threatened to break apart him and his country. So, to answer the title of this post- yes. For now, tentatively, and with a million battles ahead.

Sorry- I've been reading a lot of Borges these last couple of days. It is impossible not to want to shoehorn "labyrinth" in somewhere.

Everything or Nothing

2011-02-02T16:19:00.000-06:00

Sorry for the late post- we've had a HISTORIC BLIZZARD over here, as the local news has been breathlessly repeating. But, clearly, kind of a big day in Yemen.

President Ali Abdullah Salih, leader of northern Yemen since 1978, leader of a unified Yemen since 1990, has announced that, in the face of mounting protests and a new, vibrant and explosive morning in the Middle East, he will immediately resign the Presidency. In 2013, when his term is up, I mean. So, not really immediately. Salih has also announced that his son will not be the next President, and that he is scrapping new electoral laws that were considered unfair to the opposition parties, including an amendment that would allow him to run again (after 32 years, he's being term-limited out), and is delaying the Parliamentary elections in the spring to allow the opposition to better organize themselves.

So, now there are a couple of questions. One is: is this sincere? Is he really planning to only stay for another two years, and then take up golf? Or is this typical Salih, where he will announce one thing but manipulate the situation for the next couple of years so that he can come back with the acclaim of the people, a reluctant hero for a troubled nation.

I won't pretend to know what is in his heart. I would imagine that, in typical fashion, he isn't really thinking about 2013- he's thinking about right now. These steps were absolutely crucial if he wants to hang on- I've been arguing that he needs to make huge concessions, and he made them all (all but the big one, and we'll get to that). Salih is concerned for the day, and he thinks this will help him win it, or at least survive it. I am sure that somewhere in the back of his head he thinks there is a way to get to 2013 and beyond, but in between there he'll have about 3700 other crisis to deal with.

But can he survive the day? That is the big question. As Nasser reports, this isn't going to stop the protests.

The Yemeni opposition said they would take to the streets tomorrow Thursday despite a declared promise by President Saleh that he would not stand for elections and he would not pass power to his son.

“The President Saleh’s call for dialogue is something and the demonstrations are something else,” said Mohammed Al Mutawakel, the chairman of the supreme council of the collation of the opposition parties.

“The opposition would take to the street tomorrow with the people, and the ruling party should not link the call for dialogue to the demonstrations.”

The opposition is mulling over a response to the initiatives, but I would think they are acceptable. The JMP is part of the system, after all, and they aren't going to want to upset it too much. But as I argued the other day, I don't think the JMP is really leading these marches, even though they are nominally in charge. This is a reflection of the passion in Tunisia and Egypt, and there will be a sizable number of people who will want Salih out right now- not 2013.

But I think he took some of the wind out of their sails, which of course was his intention all along. It will be much easier for him to make the case that he was elected, he has the right and the obligation to finish out his term, and that these are agitators. He gave legitimate opposition groups everything they wanted, so why are these troublemakers asking more?

Will it work? I answer this with my analyst cap, and as someone who has spent a long time thinking about it: I don't have the first goddamn clue. It is impossible to tell what is going to happen. I do think that there will be people agitating for his departure, but unless it gets really big I don't think Salih will crack down- in a strange way, he bought himself a lot of space in which he can simply ignore their demands. This might have been a masterstroke, or we might one day look back at it as the desperate moves of an end-of-his-days tyrant. I'll try to blog frequently tomorrow- should be a hell of a day, and we can just hope it doesn't resemble what we're seeing in Cairo right now.

JMP OK with Salih- for now

2011-02-01T16:44:00.000-06:00

Nasser has an article at his site on how the JMP isn't asking Salih to step down if he offers meaningful reforms.

“The opposition has not arrived its final stage, and it is still demanding serious and genuine reforms,” said Mohammed Al Mutawakel, chairman of the supreme council of the Joint Meeting Parties, the coalition of the main opposition parties.

“When people become hopeless of genuine reforms, then demands for removal of the regime will be used like Egypt and Tunisia.”

This kind of gets to James' points in the comment section below- I don't think that the JMP is going to be able to hold a grip on events for very long. They are negotiating within a certain framework, and I have a feeling that most people in the streets on Thursday want a whole new framework.

Of course, if they are able to really force Salih into making legitimate concessions and immediate reforms, they might be able to tamp down the protestors, and perhaps even paint them as radicals way outside the mainstream. Salih is going to have to do something huge if he wants to avoid his own Cairo. But the problem is one of trust- a lot of the people against him won't believe a pledge not to run again, or not to maneuver his spoiled and detested son into office. And nor, frankly, should they. Salih has played the "I'm stepping down" card before, to his advantage. And 2013 is a long, long time from now.

So, if tomorrow after a series of meetings they announce that there will be real reform, it comes down to people being willing to place their faith in the good offices of the JMP. And I don't see that happening. The psychological wall between ruler and ruled has been broken in the Middle East. You might see a crackdown, but that will just be a bloody bandaid. I don't really think people are going to be satisfied with minor alterations to the status quo.

Quick Reactions to Mubarak's Speech

2011-02-01T15:24:00.000-06:00

Looters. Arsonists. Will maintain security. Political forces manipulating protestors. Will stay until the elections. Protecting his dignity.

Really, I don't know if Mubarak could have given a speech less likely to spark the crowd. Maybe he could have said Gamal was now the President, or called the protestors Israeli agents might have done more, but it was still a pretty big thumb in the eye to the broad cross-section of Egyptians on the streets.

I understand his endgame, and get it to an extent- he doesn't want to die in Saudi Arabia and be remembered in history as just another tyrant. I even feel bad for him, in a small way. But I don't think he has that option anymore. That's the price of power- you can't hang onto it forever, and if you do, there's a good chance you'll end up at the end of a rope or in lonely, bitter exile.

So, yeah: this isn't over, by a long shot. I guess I didn't really think he'd go on TV an announce that he was leaving, but there was that slight spark of hope that we were about to see something amazing. We still are- since when do crowds mock their tyrants in public, as al-Jazeera just asked. It seems that he has done nothing more except to inflame the crowds even further. So I guess we're still waiting.

I wonder if Salih watched it and said "yeah, that's a good strategy- position myself as the weary leader who has always tried to do what is best, and is now tired but still dignified, and firm in staying." If so, he's wrong. Hopefully the message he got is: ballgame.

CNAS on Yemen

2011-02-01T13:21:00.001-06:00

At Abu Muquwama, Andrew Exum asked CNAS intern Dana Stuster for some thoughts on Yemen, with good results (he was also nice enough to mention this blog). The whole thing is worth a read, but I am going to past a paragraph that I both agree and disagree with.

To begin with, Yemen is not on the cusp of a revolution. It’s easy to get caught up in the heady events in Tunisia and Egypt, but Yemen just does not have the socio-economic preconditions for the types of revolts seen in the past two weeks. Even if something were to take hold, the opposition movement in Yemen is incredibly fragmented. It’s unclear just what the mix of ideologies has been in the protests in Yemen these last few weeks, but even if the movement could depose Salih, there’s no clear outcome. If anything follows, it will begin with a motley assortment of groups jockeying for influence – a volatile cocktail of religious and political factions. In all likelihood, though, they won’t get that far.

I completely agree that Yemen doesn't have the same "socio-economic preconditions" of Tunisia and even Egypt- at least the positive preconditions. It is way advanced at poverty. And so the conclusion, that we won't have a liberal revolution is very likely. Or, more precisely, the liberal part will only be part of the revolution.

To me, Yemen is not on the cusp of a revolution because it is already in one- several, actually. The Southern Movement is clearly one, and I consider both the Houthi movement and even AQAP to be revolutions as well. I have no idea if this is outside the norm, but I haven't heard it phrased that way. I think all three movements are essentially revolutions against the idea of a unified, centrally-controlled state. They are not tied in any real sense- see the AQAP declaration of war against the Houthis, which I really need to address in its own post, because it is pretty mind-blowing- but they have the same emotional underpinning, which is that this particular moment in political history is temporary. As Stuster says at the end of his post, "The tribes are a constant in Yemen; the government, after a 30-some year hiatus, is about to be a lot less so."

This is why I think the movement which has been brewing all month, and which might really explode into force on Thursday, is so interesting: it is not the same kind of rebellion. It seems to want a state, just a decent honest one in which people are given a chance to actually live their lives without oppression or the crushing chains of poverty. It is most similar to the Southern Movement, which is also largely secular and liberal, but it isn't trying to tear the country apart.

This is why I think we need to be behind it. President Salih has very few friends left, and while he might be able to stay in power, it will be even more degraded and illusory than before. And since our biggest fear is a collapsed Yemen, it is important to throw our weight behind the one thing that might keep it from implosion. Stuster is absolutely right that on the streets there will be a hodge-podge of movements without a center, but there does need to be a push to find one, even a symbolic one that can kind of hold things together. I am not under the illusion that a replacement for Salih will fix everything, because in some ways he is just the frontman for a system that goes against Yemeni history. I've said before that we do need to devolve the center, because it is an uncomfortable graft on older forms of rule. But a new leader, even a transitional one, might be able to ease tensions with the north and the south (unless it is Brig. General Ali Mushin al-Ahmar, who is seen by all competing groups as having blood-stained hands).

I realize this is all somewhat incoherent, but that is because the situation is so volatile and unpredictable and shifting. Basically, I think that this movement has a chance at holding the country together, even in a very fragile way, and I don't think Salih has that ability anymore. The chances of success are small, but the chances of success in Yemen have always been small, even non-existent. February 3rd gives us- and more importantly, Yemenis- a crack.

Anyway, read the whole piece I linked to. Even if- especially if- I disagree with a few things, it is well worth the read.

(NOTE: Edited so pronouns reflect actual gender of author. I always guess wrong. Sorry, Dana)

Suleiman The Something

2011-01-31T12:41:00.000-06:00

I just got off the phone with my friend in Cairo, who says that things on the streets are still very rough, and that his neighborhood watch group has formed a checkpoint to inspect the trunks of cars going through. This is a scene that is not unique to his area, either, as citizens are filling the vacuum of the police (who might be better in their absence than presence).

His sense- and this is someone I trust implicitly as an analyst and a friend- is that if Mubarak goes away and turns things over to the new Veep Omar Suleiman, with Constitutionally-mandated promises to have elections in 60 days, the protestors will be appeased (assuming he keeps his promise). My sense was that Suleiman is too tied to to present to even be a transition to the future, but I am coming around. This isn't all about Mubarak, but he is the main symbol.

I think in some ways this would be the best option, and is probably the one that the administration is pushing (and my friend says they better be pushing something, soon, without Mubarak, as opinion is turning against America). Suleiman is old and might not want to win an election, and probably couldn't, either, without the game being rigged. And a rigged game would start this all up again. I think it might be troubling for Mohamed elBaradei to take over as transitional president and have to run an election campaign. I think he is personally honest, but those dual roles in a time of crisis management might be too much to handle. If he is just a transition figure, that hurts future politics, and if he is running for office, it hurts the present.

So overall, at least abstractly, Suleiman might be the best option. But things aren't abstract, and I don't want to speculate too much on Egypt. Third World Goes Forth has a post on Suleiman today, where he is called "...Hosni Mubarak’s right hand man: head of intelligence service, runner of secret prisons, compiler of blacklists, torturer-in-chief (although I’m not sure he ever got his own hands dirty; the first rule of succesful tyranny, at all levels, is that the really bad shit must always be delegated)."

So I turn the questions over thataway- 1) Would Suleiman be a decent transition figure that could at least calm the protestors, or are they so jazzed up at the power of freedom that they want to wipe away the old guard entirely, and 2) Would Suleiman be willing to be that intermediary? I honestly don't know, and would love to hear the analysis of others.

Salih's Options

2011-01-30T13:12:00.002-06:00

Tastefully-named regular comment contributor oneilluiuc, who may or may not be closely related to your blogger (hint: may) asks this, regarding my "time for Mubarak to go" post:

oneilluiuc said...

Wow. Bold assessment. But reading your next post, you DON'T want the same thing in Yemen (yet?). I know the situations are different, but can you see a situation where you feel the same about Salih?

I am not sure I'm there yet, but am very close. As I said below, Salih is obviously watching Egypt very closely, and the government of Yemen is firmly behind Mubarak right now, for easily-divinable reasons. Sure, they talk about stability and constitutions and other shaded lies, but in truth they are terrified of what is happening. Tunisia was one thing; the heart of the Arab world is an entirely different matter. They see these movements as a dread contagion that threatens everything they have worked for.

But right now Salih has an opportunity to change Yemen for the better. On Thursday he can either crack down and attempt to crush the protests, or he can use the time between then and now to offer legitimate concessions, including a pledge to not run again and to open up the process. I know that is dreamy, since he has done so before, and there isn't much chance that people will believe him. But the way I see it he has three options.

1) Crack down. This might work in the short term, but as has been observed, this genie is not going back in the bottle. Any softly-held illusion of consensual government will be rent. This matters everywhere, but in Yemen, with its history and traditions of negotiations and mediations, it is vitally important. His circle will shrink, and there will be blood in the water. He will be even more weakened, and it will just be a matter of time before another movement sweeps him away, or an ambitious general, promising to restore democracy, will greet him with a plane ticket or a bullet.

2) Find a middle ground. Cling to power by letting it go, with no chance at re-election. Expand the government to include opposition leaders. Concede on JMP demands for the parliamentary elections; bend over backwards to ensure that they are relatively free. This way he can go out on what can be spun on his own terms, and bequeath to the country a legacy of democracy, something no Arab leader has been able to do. Of course, the power structure around him will be resistant to this. The pie in Yemen is shrinking, so there is less will to share it. This is one of the most dangerous situations in the world- an entrenched and fat power structure growing thinner and being forced to divide the bounty into more and smaller slices. But I think Salih can still control events, especially if he maneuvers himself to be behind- not leading, but following- the "will of the masses".

3) This isn't really an option, but a possibility. Be toppled by events spinning rapidly out of his control. The question is: is this a good thing or a bad thing? A Washington Examiner article looks at this question through the prism of AQAP. Both experts they talk to, Bruce Reidel and AJG buddy Chris Boucek seem to agree that a toppled government would aid AQAP, and I also agree with that. But it seems to me that Boucek has it correct when he talks about the need to "look beyond the al Qaeda presence in Yemen and focus on the 'bigger issues' of economic reform, corruption and malcontent among the civilian population in the Arab world."

As I've argued, stopping this generation of al-Qaeda is important, but focusing only on them ensures their successors. It is a paradox, but if we want to have a long-term victory against violent extremism we sort of have to ignore them for this historical moment. If we want to win in Yemen, we absolutely cannot be on the wrong side of history. We can't fear his being toppled so much that we see Option 1 as a healthy outcome. If a democratic revolution is suppressed, is there any question of who will get stronger? Is it that surprising the Brotherhood is the strongest opposition group in Egypt?

So, to answer your question, oneill: We're not quite there yet, but we have to be close. We have to be willing to dump Salih if pulls a Mubarak. I think encouraging option 2 is our safest move in the short and long-term, but that also doesn't come with any guarantees. I do worry about what will happen in his absence, but we have to be willing to sacrifice the short-term.

This is only political, and really only deals with the north. Needless to say, this is shortsighted. To talk about the future, you have to talk about the Southern Movement, the Houthi Rebellion, AQAP, the poverty, water, oil, and everything else. I don't think though that anyone wanted to read a 25,000 word piece on a Sunday, and, also, I don't know what I think about all of this yet. We'll be working on that throughout the week, leading up to Thursday. In the meantime, I'd love to hear the thoughts of readers on all of this.

Mubarak Going Fourth

2011-01-30T11:44:00.000-06:00

Third World Goes Forth is back to blogging, and has a sharp take on why Mubarak might not leave in the fairly swift way that Ben Ali left in Tunisia. Basically, he says that the power structure in Egypt is way too tied to Mubarak to let him leave, as they would all be swept away with him.

The people closest to him stand almost no chance of continuing in his absence, for they are too closely associated with the figurehead. And so whereas the Tunisian elite were happy to see Ben Ali go – well not happy, perhaps, but in a bad situation for them it was the best option – the Egyptian elite cannot afford to be without Mubarak, for then they too will lose everything. They have no option but to stand and fight, and I imagine they aren’t going to allow Mubarak to escape to a desert holiday home while they take all his flak.

I'm a big fan of this blog, and while it would a little hypocritical of me to criticize unexplained absence from blogging, I will say I'm glad it is back.

Yemen readies for "Day of Rage"

2011-01-29T14:25:00.000-06:00

Meanwhile, back in Yemen...

Dozens of activists calling for the ouster of Ali Abdullah Saleh, Yemen's president, have clashed with government supporters in Sanaa, the country's capital.

Plainclothes police also attacked the demonstrators, who marched to the Egyptian embassy in Sanaa on Saturday chanting "Ali, leave leave" and "Tunisia left, Egypt after it and Yemen in the coming future".

Small potatoes now, compared with Egypt, but Thursday the 3rd is shaping up to be a big day of protests. The question is whether Salih will still try to respond peacefully and hope that he can outlast the anger until it dissipates- which I think would be a losing bet anyway- or if he will respond like Mubarak. This is of course more dangerous in Yemen, where there are a lot of guns, as you may have heard. This might be a clue.

Tawakel Karman, a female activist who has led several protests in Sanaa during the past week, said that a member of the security forces in civilian clothes tried to attack her with a dagger and a shoe but was stopped by other protesters.

Of course, that is just one guy who might not have been following orders (and also, if you have a dagger wielding a shoe with the other hand just seems clumsy and superfluous. I know the degrading aspect of it, but come on). Things are happening so quickly in Cairo that Salih should be able to learn some lessons before Thursday.

I would imagine he is going to spend the next 4 days offering to make huge concessions to attempt to take the steam out of any movement. Nothing like resigning (though he might feint that way), but what he will see as enough. If these are rejected, and their sincerity should of course be taken lightly, he will move to classify the protestors as enemies of "democracy and the state". In that case, he might feel he has a free hand to break them.

But if he is canny, he'll let them march and chant, and let them make the first move toward violence- or at least make it seem that way. Salih doesn't want a day of rage to turn into days and nights of violence and fire, so he'll be wise not to overplay his hand. But he isn't as nimble as he used to be, and is far more paranoid and closed off than before. This will sound like shoddy analysis, but right now nothing will surprise me. There are no guarantees.

This is where the US can come in. If we move against Mubarak, Salih will know that he is in a similar bind and that he can't count on us. This will tie his hands even tighter, and maybe force him to offer concessions far greater than he would like. See, I think that as much as Salih wants to be boss, and feels only he can run Yemen, I've always felt like there was a part of him who would love a legacy of being the first Arab leader in modern times to step down peacefully. He still has that chance, even if it isn't entirely of his own volition. That is what the US needs to urge him to do, appeal to that side, while keeping the stick of aid reduction in the forefront.

I don't love the idea of Salih being gone. I don't think that what comes next will be up to the insane challenges facing Yemen. But times are different now. Things have changed. And while I've always felt his government being toppled would be a disaster, if there is a hint of democracy and inclusion even a weak government would be bolstered by legitimacy. We do have an opportunity in Yemen that I don't think anyone honestly saw coming. There were people who had more faith than I did, and I respect that, but I don't think the conditions were there. The revolt that has wildfired across the region has created a new situation and new opportunities. The US doesn't have the ability to control things, nor should it try, for both practical and moral reasons but it can use its influence to create a positive and almost unimaginable outcome. Things won't be perfect, but for the first time in memory, there is space.

Message from Cairo- Mubarak Strategy Endangering Americans; Time for Obama To Cut Him Off

2011-01-29T13:47:00.000-06:00

I just got a call from a good friend of mine who is currently living in Cairo. I'm omitting details for obvious reasons, but he lives in a somewhat upscale neighborhood with a large population of foreigners, especially Americans.

His building is being guarded by essentially a neighborhood watch, men with clubs. He himself just has a stick with nails in it. He feels somewhat safe because he thinks he can keep people from coming upstairs, but the people on the ground, Egyptians, who are courageously protecting the building and the more vulnerable foreigners, are exposed to gunfire, which he says has come from across the street.

This chaos is not the afterbirth of revolution; it is the direct result of Mubarak's last-gasp and desperately brutal plan to remain in power. According to my friend, it is clear on the ground that Mubarak has pulled the police off the ground and has released criminals and thugs on the population, hoping that the violence will cause people to clamor for a police state.

This isn't going to work, I don't think, but its success doesn't matter. It makes it clear that the US can no longer maintain neutrality. This plan clearly is taking a hideous toll on the Egyptians, but it is also endangering the lives of US civilians. We don't give a government 1.4 billion bones a year to put the lives of our citizens at risk. It is time for the administration to move Mubarak out.

Neither I nor my friend want to make it seem like this is bad only because it is hurting Americans, potentially. That is not the case. Mubarak is acting like a savage and feral animal, and continuing to destroy the dreams and the lives of his people. He has to go for that. But this new strategy- this cruel and cynical and bloody strategy- has to be the final straw. This is unendurable action for anyone. Mubarak is no longer an ally. That he is an enemy of his own people has been clear for a long time. He is an enemy of what we stand for, and now an enemy of our people.

The time for neutrality is over. The US has to do what it can to help remove Mubarak (ok, not anything). I think that the strategy of neutrality was a reasonable one for a while, but now, at the endgame, things are too dangerous. It is far past time for Mubarak to go.

Inside the mind of power

2011-01-28T12:09:00.000-06:00

I don't want to comment very much on Egypt, other than that it is damn exciting and scary. I haven't really studied Egypt in a while, and can't offer the insight that others can. But a few quick comments, which also apply obliquely to Yemen.

Power is a strange thing. Obviously, it corrupts, as the fella said, but not just monetarily or even morally. Too much power engenders an intellectual corruption, in the sense of decay, like a body in the weeds. It leads to strange acts of rationality. One of our problems with analysis is that we either expect people to behave by our rationale or expect them to be loony. That's a mistake- people act in a rational manner, but only in one that makes sense to themselves. It's like a drunk driver- he doesn't usually say "screw it! I'm loaded- give me my keys so I can blow through some red lights!" He more likely thinks "come on, I've only had 11 drinks, over like four hours, and I chewed on some ice for a minute. I've driven far more drunk than this. I can do it." It is completely rational in his mind.

Mubarak right now is kind of like that drunk, and that is what makes him so dangerous. What he is doing seems to him to make sense, even if for us it is crazy. To illustrate that kind of insane rationality I've written a short play.

Protestors: Mubarak has too much power! We want freedom and democracy and to be part of the modern world!

Mubarak: OK, how about I cut off your internet and shut you off from the world, with like three fucking phone calls? Will that shut you up? Will that make you stop saying I have too much power?

Protestors: We're not sure you understand.

Fin

That move made sense to him. People using the Twitters and the Facebooks and maybe the Googles to meet up? Let's shut everything off. Even J-Date. But there is no way- no way at all- that wouldn't inflame people even more. It solidifies exactly what they were thinking.

Basically, when those in power forever are cornered, they will act like the wounded beasts they are. And we cannot expect them to act in a way that comports with any reality other than their own. If the US is going to play a positive role, it has to provide inducements for these leaders that fits their mindset, not just a call for freedom and the right to gather (though that has to be the public side of it).

This isn't to say I am totally on board right now with Salih being deposed. I have no idea what will come next, and neither does anyone, if they are being honest. But I can see a point in the very near future where we might have to accept some chaos inside of Yemen rather than being on the wrong side of history. We've argued for a some time that Yemen policy has to be a long-term thing, and standing by a doomed regime will lose the future.

Some contrarianism on Yemen protests; or: No, Daily Dish- not "NOW YEMEN?!?!"

2011-01-27T11:43:00.000-06:00

I like Andrew Sullivan. I like the way his sharp intellect blends with his outsized passions, even when that leads him down strange and uncomfortable paths. And while I know he is sick this week, and not blogging at The Daily Dish , it sill matches his personality. And they are very excited about the Arab youth in revolt, having covered Tunisia and now devoting a lot of coverage to Egypt. I was wondering when they were going to get to Yemen, and they have today, starting with a post titled "Now Yemen?!". The gobsmacked punctuation is, of course, sic.

This is going to sound needlessly mulish given my blogging the last couple of days, but I think the shock and surprise, and, most importantly, the "now" is misleading. There is no doubt that the protests in the capital are inspired by Tunisia and Egypt, and they are exciting and breathtaking. They fit the narrative, as I was saying below. It is impossible to unlink them from what is happening elsewhere.

But it is also important not to link them too closely. This isn't just a wave of millenials standing up together, it is separate waves of youth standing up against similar, but very different things. I am aware that sounds patronizingly obvious, but sometimes that needs to be pointed out when things are exciting.

It is like this: if I want to start a movement to get the Bears' coach fired (which I don't), and you want to start a movement to get the Redskins coach fired (which: I don't care), we can talk and commiserate and feel the intoxicating rush of fan power- we have the same goals and dreams. But we're not actually connected. We're going up against different power structures* and have to use different tactics to achieve similar but disparate dreams.

Mubarak falling would be different than Salih falling, and both are different than Ben Ali. Conflation here is dangerous. Here's why: it tries to create a new historical situation instead of a continuation of old and separate histories. I am aware that we like to lump these things together, and they are emotively similar, but even 1989 had vast differences. The revolutions were wildly different in Poland and Germany, to say nothing of Romania. Every country has to be treated individually, or else we can make some very bad decisions.

That's where the "now" comes in. The protests in San'a are new- though have of course been brewing (not that anyone is claiming otherwise)- but protests in Yemen are not. The rush of university students in the street is an undeniable drug, but breathless coverage runs the risk of ignoring or even completely conflating them with the Southern Movement. These are different protests. I have said that it would be great if we could tie them together, but it can't be an artificial process. It would have to come from finding common ground and enormous amounts of compromise. I do believe that just as language creates action, coverage influences policy. We have to be sure that in hoping for another year of miracles, we don't push things down the wrong path, something that would be easy to do. The Southern Movement is calling for secession, and, whether you think that is a good idea or not, that makes them literally the enemies of the state (which in this context is not a moral judgement). If we tie the movements together, it could make it easy for Salih to "other" them (to borrow Will's neat verbing).

This isn't easy to write. Like Sullivan, I like to get excited. And this is exciting. But caution needs to be the buzzword, or else those brave kids could have something far worse than their heads shattered- their dreams demolished.

*I would say my Bears are like the Arab autocracies- old and tired with occasional fits of passion. The Skins are a North Korean-esque loonocracy.

More on Protests

2011-01-27T10:45:00.000-06:00

Nasser Arrabyee (who is also quoted in today's Times) gives the lowdown on the today's rallies, both pro-and-anti Salih. Nasser talks about how there hasn't been much in the way of violence, with security forces showing both strength and restraint- a good sign that could be interpreted many different ways, depending on how you lean. He also wryly points out that the two sides have chants that are almost diametrically opposed to each other- yes/no on elections, constitutional "reform", and Salih- but found a meeting point on "yes to dialogue". So far this has: not happened.

In the comment section in the post below, our buddy Will at the Yemen Peace Project made some interesting points, so I am going to rescue them from that ghetto and yank 'em up here. One important question he asked was, essentially, why would I think that the military would be reluctant to shoot the protestors, when they haven't shown that reluctance in the north or the south? I meekly responded that it might be different in the capital, that at some point Salih won't be able to say the entire state is an enemy of the state. Here is part of the response:

A sizable portion of the university population comes from elsewhere, especially Ta'iz (where there is and long has been plenty of anti-government animosity). It's quite possible that Salih can rhetorically "other" these treasonous students just as he does the Zaydi sadah (not that he invented anti-sayyid racism, but you get the idea). As you point out above, Yemen doesn't have Tunisia's educated middle class. If "Huthis"--many of whose families have been a part of the social fabric of the rural highlands for centuries--can be transformed in the state's propaganda into foreign agents, how hard could it be to turn poor, simple soldiers against uppity, westernized university brats?

I think this makes sense, but I think that regardless of who they are, there would be a psychic shock to seeing a police riot in the streets. Not for much of the country, perhaps, but for the residents of San'a, the capital of the soul. And I think Salih knows that. This kind of dovetails with a point also made by Will. "There may be hundreds rallying with Tawakul Karman, but there are hundreds of thousands minding their shops, shopping in the markets, cooking bread, driving cabs, going to school, and, of course, unemployed, who still have no interest in revolution."

This is correct, of course. "People power" revolutions are always exciting and heady, but they also contain only a small percentage of the people. Maybe the represent the hopes and dreams of many more, but those many more are just minding their own business, so how can we say what is in their hearts? It is not always accurate to say that the passion of the streets is representative, or that "the people have spoken" when a small but loud group comes in. Being in the middle of that group, and surrounded by thousands of people who think the exact same way, is intoxicating, and you come to believe that there are only a small, entrenched few against you. You can see this in everything from the awesome puppet-wielding Iraq-war protestors to the Constitutionally-confused Tea Party.*

And that is where police restraint comes in. A dozen or so kids being mown down, beaten, dying in the streets, can have a way of making the rallies grow. Truncheon-wielding riot cops right out of a Radiohead nightmare hitting students yelling slogans about elections has the possibility of turning fence-sitters one way. I don't want to romanticize it; many will think they got what was coming to them. But I think Salih is going to want to let this play out and hope a series of grand gestures can placate the mob, and then call the remaining protestors dead-enders.

And this is where the US can sort of come in. Part of me wishes we could stand entirely with the students, but that can, of course, help their enemies. I like the admin's strategy of standing with their rights, if not their goal of toppling Salih. This puts Salih, like Mubarak, in a bind, and can help to force his hand. He might have to give up some power and make large concessions in order to remain in the Presidential palace, or even alive. One could see the an ambitious general thinking Salih has lost control and inducing him to leave, and while I don't think he would be killed, that possibility doesn't exactly go against the grain of Yemeni history. So we have a possibility to help manuver Salih into letting go of some power while still being able to fight al-Qaeda, opening up in the near future the path toward an actual peaceful transfer of power (Mark Lynch thinks it will come out that the US played a behind-the-scene role in Tunisia).

I also don't want to overstate these protests- these fit the exciting new trend in the Middle East, and work nicely with the current narrative. But what is happening in the South is still more important and explosive. However, for the first time, some of Salih's enemies have similar rhetoric about democracy. Linking the "three rebellions"- Houthi, Southern, and Qaeda- was a paranoid game. These protests aren't really linked, but they aren't that far off either. And here is a chance to institute real reforms that can also at least partially bring the restive south back into the fold, avoiding the chaos of total collapse. This is about as likely as the Bears still winning the Super Bowl, but not impossible, either. The next few weeks are crucial. There is a chance for reform, for change, but a return to the status quo will be brief, and the next time it shatters will be even more violent.

*That seems like my best attempt at Broderian middle-splitting, but really, I just don't like loud people who think America is a police state.

Will he stay or will he go?

2011-01-25T10:34:00.000-06:00

Obviously, the biggest question in Yemen right now is: will the protests work? Will Ali Abdullah Salih, who so recently seemed to be ensuring the permanent continuation of his regime, go the way of Tunisia? These are heady times in Yemen, and I don't think it is wise in such a fluid situation to make predictions. So, a couple of thoughts.

1) Salih has shown himself in the past to be a master of manipulating discontent in order to deflect blame. But I think this time he is reacting in a pretty clumsy and transparent matter. The arrest of Tawkul Kamran, and her release, seemed pretty ham-handed. Greg calls it a kidnapping, which shows again why he is the best. Salih was playing by ancient rules, hoping an arrest could force negotiations. He seemed to not understand they way she could easily turn into a martyr rather than a bargaining chip.

2) Salih has intoned several times that "Yemen is not Tunisia", probably a way of saying that Yemenis are more peaceful and won't overturn a leader outside of the ballot box, a strange take on history. In doing this, he is trying to appeal to a sense of justice. This is clever, but also a little blind- Tunisia is an inspiration, not a cautionary example (it could be the latter, depending on how things turn out, but revolutionary times are heady ones, and changing the present is more important than a potential messy future).

3) But then again, Yemen is not Tunisia. Yemen doesn't have the same middle class or educational system of Tunisia (relatively speaking). These are key ingredients in a successful revolution, or at least one that won't be followed by blood and the domination of a strongman.

4) Greg also pointed this out, in mentioning that Salih has increased the pay for civil servants. "Although one has to ask: if the important thing in Yemen is - as so many including myself believe - jobs, then how will raising the salaries of those with jobs satisfy those with no jobs?" It won't, but I humbly don't think that is the point. It isn't about appeasing the protestors. As much as we like to believe that a concerted wave of protests can alone topple the government, it doesn't work that way. The single key ingredient is the loyalty of the security forces. These salary raises are a way of trying to buy that loyalty- indeed, he is raising the pay of the forces around $23 a month- not insignificant.

This will bring up the big question, assuming the protests continue (a big, but reasonable assumption): how much loyalty will this buy? Money is important, but there will come a time when Salih might ask his men to really open fire on kids in the street. The world has turned on whether or not soldiers can do this- one commander who refuses is enough to change everything. And that is the most unpredictable factor in the world. There are a million models and even more hypothesis about how this can go, but in the end Salih's survival will come down to the conscience of people whose names we might never learn.

Morality

2011-01-13T12:59:00.000-06:00

This Economist article has a brief little overview of recent AQAP attacks. They are clearly stepping up, but so far, and somewhat to my surprise, they have yet to overstep their bounds. These sentences kind of get at the heart of it.

But recent hit-and-run attacks on government forces and the greater care it is taking to avoid civilian casualties suggest cannier tactics, with lessons learnt from the experience of al-Qaeda branches in Iraq and Afghanistan. Like them it is trying to weaken resolve by targeting the security forces on which the government depends.

While I agree with the second sentence, I think it also goes a little but further than that- they learned the lessons of Iraq and are avoiding the kind of mindless carnage that led to their eventual downfall. We tend to bandy about words like "nihilism" and "psychopathic" when discussing al-Qaeda, or any other terrorist outfit. To an extent these words work, at least in certain cases. Zarqawi in Iraq was a bloodhungry criminal who used jihad to slake his urges. But it is a mistake to think that all jihadis are like this. In his excellent book, Talking to the Enemy, Scott Atran frequently uses the term "moral" to describe people who sign up for jihad, whether through Qaeda or independently. This is a strange word, and strikes the ear as off, but it works. There are principals, and a goal to be had, and something to fight for. It is of course a backwards, atavistic goal, but it is there. The more professional jihadis are moral in this sense, and that is what separates them from the merely criminal. This is what we have in Yemen, with Nasir al-Wuhayshi. And that is what makes him so damn dangerous.

Think "moral" in the sense that Woody Harrelson's character uses it to describe Chighur's character in No Country for Old Men. I can't find a video that shows it, but you all remember, right?

There is a lot more to say about this, and is something I am working on.

In the meantime! I'll be on the Peter Dominick show this afternoon at 5EST talking about the chance for reform in Yemen, dovetailing off the Secretary's remarks.

2011-01-04T14:04:00.000-06:00

I mentioned below an article on Zaydi revivalism, but there was no working link. With the author's permission, printed below the jump is the text of James R. King's "A Marginalized Religious Community in Yemen Enjoys a Revival", printed in the Jan/Feb issue of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs.

A sophisticated and increasingly aggressive al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) has propelled the Republic of Yemen to the top of the Obama administration’s war on terror priority list. Yet amid this news-catching and billion- dollar geopolitical struggle against religious extremism, Yemen is experiencing another important religious phenomenon.

Zaydism is a branch of Shi’i Islam distinct from its counterparts in Lebanon, Iraq, Iran or elsewhere. The story of Yemen’s Zaydi community begins in the late 9th century, when the Zaydi scholar Al-Hadi was invited by tribes in Yemen’s northern highlands to resolve their intractable disputes. Accepting Al-Hadi’s governance, these tribesmen ultimately were absorbed into a Zaydi universe, embracing Zaydi political authority, theology and law, in addition to their local tribal customs. In this part of Yemen, temporal power and religious doctrine were united in a uniquely Zaydi form of theocratic rule known as the Imamate. Though never per- manent and rarely stable, at its pinnacle the Imamate’s influence extended from present-day Saudi Arabia in the northwest, to the Gulf of Aden in the south, to west- ern Oman in the east. Particularly in Yemen’s northern highlands, history was defined by the activities of Zaydi rulers, judges, scholars and tribesmen.

For over a millennium, the Zaydis of Yemen enjoyed an unparalleled history of political rule, intellectual production and pious devotion.

This all changed dramatically with the Sept. 26, 1962 Republican Revolution. This decisive moment in Yemen’s modern history unleashed an eight-year civil war in North Yemen—South Yemen remaining under British control until 1967—between “nationalists” supported by Gamal Abdel Nasser’s Egypt who sought a new direction for the country, and “royalists” who con- tinued to back the ruling Imam, supported by Saudi Arabia. Ultimately, it led to the Zaydi Imamate being replaced with a dis- tinctly Republican and nationalist govern- ment, complete with modern bureaucratic institutions and a pronounced antagonism toward the former ruling Zaydi tradition.

The Revolution inaugurated a volatile era for Zaydi adherents in Yemen, and today this community sits on the fringes of Yemen’s public arenas of culture, religion and politics. For a tradition that once dom- inated large parts of Yemen, its present-day

irrelevance is remarkable. This marginalization has coincided and

been reinforced by the “Sunnification” of Yemen. Over the last 40 years, the country has seen the growth of a loose but powerful alliance of political parties and ideological groups that share a commitment to Republi- can nationalism and Sunni-based reform. With roots in the Imamate period, this movement has promoted anti-Shi’i attitudes and built a potent wave of opposition to Zaydi thought and adherence throughout Yemen. Unlike al-Qaeda, these groups oper- ate within the mainstream of the country’s religious, social and political spheres.

The most dramatic consequence of this phenomenon is the turning of large num- bers of individuals and communities in his- torically Zaydi regions toward Sunni Islam. These range from what might be called “Zaydis in name only”—nominal Zaydis with minimal commitment to Zaydi Islam’s tenets and history (President Ali Abdullah Saleh being one example)—to aggressive opponents of Zaydi thought and practice. Significantly, this retreat from Zaydism has been part and parcel of the official state- building effort in Yemen, as the new Re- publican government sought to weaken the former ruling group and foster a na- tional religious identity that transcended traditional boundaries and identifications. In doing so, it has consistently promoted alternative religious and political visions, while pushing the Zaydi tradition to the periphery of Yemeni society.

Whether in schools, media or the politi- cal sphere, this process continues today.

In fact, the very future of Zaydi Islam in Yemen is in question. The urgency is not lost on the Zaydis themselves, and in re- sponse their leaders are advocating for their community and religious tradition in several important ways.

The “Huthi conflict” is the most promi- nent example (see “Is Yemen Breaking Apart?” by Patrick Seale, November 2009 Washington Report, p. 31). The Huthis are a group of Zaydi sayyids (descendants of the Prophet Muhammad), supported by a wide range of tribal allies, who have been embroiled in escalating violence with the Yemeni government since 2004. The sixth round is now in the midst of a highly ten- uous cease-fire. Although this crisis was sparked in the province of Sa’dah, histori- cal capital of the Zaydi Imamate, the Huthis and their supporters have now formed a quasi-government in several of Yemen’s northern provinces. The conflict has severely drained the country’s national economy and produced large numbers of internally displaced people, although it only captured mainstream media attention last winter, when violence spilled into neighboring Saudi Arabia.

A Complex Crisis

Often mischaracterized as a religious strug- gle between a pro-Sunni regime and Shi’i separatists, this complex crisis cannot be pigeonholed into one of pure sectarian in- terests. It was stoked—and is main- tained—by several interrelated factors, in- cluding longstanding historical grievances, tribal loyalties, access to government ser- vices and the political legitimacy of the Saleh regime. Furthermore, the Huthis’ stated goals continue to evolve and have ranged from the right to express religious slogans, to application of the Yemeni con- stitution, to basic self-defense.

Viewing the relationship between Zaydis and the Yemeni state through the lens of the Huthi conflict would be a mistake, as the Huthis represent a political-religious move- ment that emerged in the specific context of Sa’dah and its vicinity. Still, the situation does allude to a much broader struggle since 1962: one over Zaydis’ communal identity and rights in the Republic of Yemen. In many ways, this crisis is charac- teristic of the challenges confronting the Zaydi community in Yemen today. On the one hand, it has led to intensified repression and further marginalization in both official and popular spheres. Yet it also reflects a broader pattern of renewed advocacy for Zaydi thought, history and identity.

Zaydi adherents point to a “Zaydi re- vival” since Yemen’s Unification in 1990, emerging in the context of a nationwide loosening of restrictions on diverse ideolo- gies, whether Zaydi, socialist or otherwise.

The lion’s share of this advocacy reflects a political quietism. These efforts focus on educational outreach and publishing Zaydi texts, especially as dwindling knowledge of Zaydi Islam has coincided with the rapid spread of anti-Zaydi thought. For example, at the Imam Zayd bin Ali Cultural Founda- tion in the Yemeni capital of Sana’a, thou- sands of Zaydi manuscripts have been dig- itized and catalogued in an effort to make these seminal texts accessible to the Yemeni public and beyond.

Key Zaydi scholars are also reinterpret- ing core Zaydi doctrines to reflect contem- porary realities and sensibilities, and, ulti- mately, to make their tradition more rele- vant in Yemen today. One example is the classical Zaydi concept of khuruj, which refers to the imam’s “rising up” in rebellion against an unjust government—a doctrine frequently cited to demonstrate the Zaydi threat. A number of Zaydi scholars now speak of a “constitutional khuruj.” Stress- ing Zaydism’s unequivocal commitment to political justice, they have transformed the means for undertaking khuruj from physi- cal seizure of power to nonviolent and de- mocratic change.

Regardless, entering the realm of Yemeni politics is precarious, especially for Zaydis labeled as “strict,” or those with a more pronounced ideological commitment to their tradition. Politically active Zaydis are forced to walk a treacherous tightrope of criticizing the Saleh regime’s behavior on the one hand and expressing allegiance to the Yemeni state on the other. While that may hardly seem revolutionary (particu- larly considering the high levels of nation- wide opposition), for the Zaydi community accusations of disloyalty or sectarian fa- naticism are inevitable.

Many Zaydis blame the regime for ex- ploiting an unfair choice: demonstrate your allegiance to the Republic and sup- port this particular regime, including its controversial actions in Sa’dah; or, alterna- tively, criticize it, meaning your loyalty lies with your community alone or even out- side the state. The Huthi conflict has only heightened the government’s paranoia of Zaydi activism.

Zaydi advocates are breaking down that choice. As loyal Yemenis and committed Zaydis, they assert their individual rights as Yemeni citizens and their collective rights as members of the Zaydi community. Not only do they seek to remind Yemenis of Zaydism’s decisive role in the country’s history, ancient and modern, they also in- sist that the contemporary Republic is more than simply an anti-Imamate or anti- Zaydi state. Instead, they are adamant that it must embody the Islamic (including Zaydi) and Republican principles of jus- tice, democracy and development. While they may object to the 1962 Revolution’s ultimate course, epitomized in Zaydism’s present-day marginalization, they defend the transformations it wrought as a pro- gression toward ideals they embrace but that remain unrealized.

In doing so, these activists represent the repression of Zaydism as a national issue— rather than a communal one—that reflects the ongoing struggle of all Yemenis to build a country defined by equality, freedom of belief, security and prosperity. Although the Zaydi community’s disenfranchisement has a distinct ideological tenor, this story of conflict, underdevelopment and political manipulation is indeed a national one in Yemen today. Essentially, these Zaydis have placed their community and their country on a parallel trajectory toward democracy and justice. Some even depict the divisive Huthi insurgency, which has cost the Zaydi community dearly in terms of public image and reputation, as an essential part of this larger Yemeni struggle.

These Zaydi leaders are advocating for what they believe are Zaydism’s singular solutions to Yemen’s political and social crises. (As one example, they contend that its spread will provide a significant elixir to Yemen’s religious extremism problem.) If successful, they will take the question “is Zaydism disappearing in Yemen today?” and redefine it as “are the ideals of the Revolution disappearing in Yemen today?” Whether through political and human rights advocacy or educational outreach, they are working to ensure that the answer to both questions is “No.” ❑

James R. King is an independent analyst, specializing in Zaydism, Yemen and the broader Middle East. A former Fulbright Fellow in Jordan, he lived in Yemen in 2007 as part of an American Institute for Yemeni Studies fellowship, where he conducted inter- views with leading Zaydis on the Zaydi com- munity in Yemen.

Salih Goes All-In

2011-01-04T11:15:00.000-06:00

I'm still muddling through President Salih's endgame in essentially announcing a bid to be President For Life (abolishing term limits). Greg has all the specifics of the recent election moves.

Obviously, the immediate game is to remain in power. Let's not overthink this. But why, exactly? And don't just say "because power is fucking awesome", even though it is. I think that might be underthinking it. What are Salih's goals, and how will this help accomplish them? Those are the questions we need to ask.

I was initially writing a list of different interpretations- "Cynical" "Idealistic" "Pragmatic" etc, but found that the categories kept sliding into each other. Salih is neither misguided but benevolent statesman nor is he a bloodlust-filled tyrannical monster. His biggest achievement in office, what he wanted his legacy to be, was the unification of North and South Yemen. That was a longtime dream, and in his mind, and to a large extent in truth, he accomplished it. He absorbed a chaotic and crumbling south, and when the traitorous southern leadership maneuvered to back out, he was the one who saved the country. Sure, he had to bring in some unsavory elements, and some eggs go broken, but that is what leaders do. Right?

Lincoln-esque, one might say. Not me, but someone.

So, then: unity must be preserved. And if there is an election with his unpopular son or murderous generals against maybe Hamid al-Ahmar and a disorganized crew of Southerners, with boycotts and bombings everywhere, unity doesn't have a chance. Elections are the end result of democracy, not the beginning. For Salih, in his mind, he is the only one who can really win decisively- the old master of alliance-building and survival is going to give it one last go. He is tinkering with the Constitution at the same time there have been a raft of prisoner releases, both in the north and the south. I think Salih sees an opening to maintain his rule and settle things down over the next term, so that he can pass it on as planned.

Like I said, this is pretty muddled. But everything is muddled, mixed up. I've argued before that Salih sees himself as the one man who can deliver peace and unity, no matter the cost. This is megalomania, but there is an element of sadness and even blinkered decency to it, much like Yoweri Museveni or even old Paul Kagame. Thinking you are the only one who can hold the country together shows vast egotism, but it also can't exist without the desire to hold the country together. And, to be fair, unless things change radically, very quickly, I do think elections will be a disaster, a hardening of schisms.

That said, I still don't know exactly what I make of this move, or what I think the US response should be. I am getting a little tired of saying "well, we can't interfere with everything, perfect enemy of good, etc", but my weariness doesn't make it untrue. Does anyone have any thoughts on this?

Zaydis and Boats for Hire

2011-01-04T10:55:00.001-06:00

James King has an interesting article on the historic roots of Zaydi revivalism and their forays into politics. It is a good look at who the Zaydis are outside of the Huthi rebellion, which understandably but unfortunately takes up all the analytical oxygen. The rebellion has, of course, its roots in history, both near and distant, and King does a fine job of elucidating them. A link will hopefully be forthcoming. Sorry for the tease. If I can't get a link I'll try to break it down more.

A big story today will be Margaret Coker's WSJ piece about how Yemeni officials are leasing their (largely US-trained and funded) Coast Guard as private security for shipping firms. I had previously talked about this when Ellen Knickmeyer wrote about it for Foreign Policy in November (link also contains a further link to a Ginny Hill/Sally Healy piece). Here is what I wrote about it then, in a bit of contrariness seemingly designed to make Slate pay attention.

This is a pretty good revenue stream for Yemen, and it isn't as if they are distributing their navy to far-flung shores while ignoring home: piracy and smuggling are issues in Yemen, and this can help the navy become more professional and better-trained. As Knickmeyer points out, there is a lot of potential for corruption here, of course, but I don't have much of a problem with that. For one thing, this isn't money that would otherwise be going elsewhere- it isn't aid that is being funneled into the pockets of well-connected cousins. It is an outside and independent revenue-generating operation. Yes, it would be better if one thought the money raised could dig wells and irrigation channels, but that is letting the perfect be the enemy of the good.

I still believe that, although "revenue stream for Yemen" is probably a little naive. "For very specific Yemenis" would probably be closer, especially if you're not into the whole brevity thing. Still, I don't think this in and of itself should be enough to make the US re-evaluate aid. In any aid endeavor, there are going to be people making money. That sucks, but it is inevitable. The important thing is to make sure that most of the money goes where it should, and that aid distribution doesn't backfire and make things worse. It will get worse if our money and weapons are used, as they have been, to fight the Huthis or the Southern Movement. It won't get worse if they are used to fight pirates and smugglers, even if the mechanism for them doing so is a bit shady.

Basically, pirates and smugglers (and terrorists) help to make insurance rates in Aden exorbitant, and this deprives Yemen of money. If there is going to be any kind of solution, a revitalized and viable Port of Aden is an absolute necessity. Obviously, I wish that there would be more professionalism, but even if there isn't, building confidence for shipping companies can only help Yemen in the long-run. All corruption is bad, but stamping all of it out is a fool's errand, and if the end result is positive we shouldn't faint dead away at its smell.

Today in Links!

2010-12-22T09:49:00.000-06:00

Yeah, it is a lazy post. I'm finishing up an academic-style paper, which I haven't done in like 10 years. Bear with me.

First, of course, is the blogshocking news that Waq al-Waq is leaving the safe confines of blogspot in order to go to The Big Think. You can access it here. Hopefully, this will get more people reading Greg, which is always a good thing. It goes without saying that his always-amazing analysis has survived the mood.

Carnegie has video up of last week's talk about Yemen by John Brennan, assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism. He talks about a comprehensive strategy that isn't just CT, but we'll believe that when we see more tangible evidence. Again, I think CT is the most immediately important step, but it has to be done in tandem with other things, to alter impressions. And also to do good, but I'm speaking from a strict policy standpoint.

Alex in Jordan was kind enough to send out this AFP story about the Holder interview (and I like to have wire stories in unusual places). This is my favorite line.

"He's on the same list with Ben Laden," said US Attorney General Eric Holder, speaking on US television.

"He's up there - one, two, three, four. I don't know. He's on the list of people that worry me the most," Holder told ABC television news.

I like Holder, and the charitable interpretation is that he is just saying what people want to hear, but in reality al-Awlaki is number 100. But I doubt that is the case.

Although, to be perfectly fair, the AG is far more concerned with things that are going on inside his country. Holder is not in charge of the CIA. Al-Awlaki has American citizenship and seems tasked with getting dummies in the US to blow shit up. These actions fall far more under Holder's writ than CT inside Yemen. That said, this seems to pretty much reflect the mentality of the political and media class about al-Awlaki's importance.

Finally, here's a press release out of Darien, CT. Darien is having a lecture series in Jan/Feb about the Arabian Peninsula, featuring heavyweights like Chris Boucek, Barbara Bodine, Isobel Coleman and David Ottaway. Your blogger will be there on the 20th, talking about how AQAP multiplies the rest of the threats inside Yemen. Darien is very close to NYC, so make your plans now. Now!

Editorial

2010-12-20T14:54:00.000-06:00

I've got a piece up in The National about Wikileaks and AQAP/Houthi violence. I'm not sure how my predictions or reactions have played out since I wrote it a few weeks ago, but luckily I wasn't saying anything short-term.

Elections and democracy

2010-12-15T10:50:00.000-06:00

I'm working on a project that is time-eating (though rewarding), but I am going to dip my toes into some dangerous and uncertain water here.

Next year's parliamentary elections have been uncertain for a while now. This isn't terribly surprising, given the political and security chaos inside of Yemen. Elections are always difficult when a large part of the country wants to secede (for some perspective, read the Times' fascinating blog about what was happening in the US in 1860). And, clearly, despite attempts to democratize in the late 90s and early 00s, President Salih has gotten increasingly paranoid and authoritarian, as he seeks to hang on to and perpetuate his rule in one form or the other. Add to this the fragmentary and uneasy alliance between the two main opposition parties- the Yemeni Socialist Party and Islah, joined in the Joint Meeting Party (JMP)- and you have a perfect electoral mess.

Next year's elections were supposed to be a re-do of ones previously canceled due to a JMP boycott. I think Salih looked things over, and decided that it was better for him to elongate a term rather than have an election more tainted than usual. But it is also clear that he wasn't going to leave things up to chance, and this has led to more uncertainty. A recently-passed law shifts electoral oversight from the parties to judges. Now, in theory, this is a good deal. Judges, right- but who selected the judges? The law was passed by a GPC (ruling party) dominated Parliament, and seems to ensure that any and all oversight will be in the hands of one party. Needless to say, this is precipitating another boycott.

But this time the GPC is saying the show must go on. In a vacuum, this would be a canny move. Oversight was shifted to the august judiciary, but it still wasn't enough for the rapacious JMP, who want to see sacred elections tainted by party politics, and, failing in that, will take their ball and go home. But who needs them? We're going to have an election, because, by gum, this is a democracy. But we aren't in a vacuum- Salih's government is badly delegitimized, and I really don't think people are going to fall for this.

Now, here is where it gets a little dangerous. I think I'm in the "elections don't make democracy; democracy makes elections" camp. It is an uncomfortable place to be, because it goes against a lot of gut instincts and deeply-held emotional beliefs. It also can tend toward being at best patronizing, at worst insulting ("These wogs just aren't ready for democracy, my good man!"). But in an unstable society, elections have the ability to bring out the worst in people and to heighten divisions, as people tend to vote for the alliance that will protect them, and that often falls along tribal/ethnic lines.

I think there are some things which mitigate that in Yemen- namely, the unlikely alliance, no matter how frail, of a religious party and socialists, who in the last Presidential elections put up an incorruptible (and alas, unelectable) candidate. But of course, the JMP can't influence the system unless it takes enough seats from the GPC, and the GPC will use all their influence to keep the JMP from getting seats.

In this atmosphere of disunion and violence, where the GPC is certain to do everything it takes to continue winning, is an election wise or even desirable? I honestly think that having a tainted election will provoke even more unrest than not having one at all. But that is rewarding Salih with very bad behavior. I honestly don't know, and am looking forward to having some time next week to think about all of this, which is how I usually spend my Christmastime. But in the meantime I am looking forward to comments.

Yes, this is a weasel ending, but I don't have a solid opinion yet, and have been trying to avoid the bloggy tendencies toward strident opinions on everything.

A few outside words about soccer

2010-12-09T10:16:00.000-06:00

Ok, about football. Irredeemably American, I suppose.

The Gulf Cup just took place, and the lead-up to it was the fear that there would be attacks from AQAP or the Southern Movement in an attempt the discredit the government or just to sew chaos. Security was very tight- this is something that I regret not talking about, but I couldn't find an angle other than "FEAR THIS" and so for once wanted to avoid it. Anyway, it went off smashingly, as this Robert Worth article shows.

We also have comments from reader Dozival, on the ground in Aden, printed in full.

Not really about your latest post but - 'Aden Felix' - hardly a bean from anyone about how brilliant the 20th Gulf Cup has been for Aden/ Abyan - and Yemen's reputation in general! The atmosphere's been brilliant, the security immense (I've never been helped across the road with a buggy by a Kalashnikov-wielding soldier before), the participation by families and women particularly noteworthy. Football crowds and no alcohol - would be a dream for British police! They were just so enthusiastic and I get the impression people from the other (much richer) Gulf states that they were really impressed, have made new friends, experienced Yemeni hospitality and have gone away with a different view of Yemen (which was, let's face it, frankly despised by wealthier Arab states). I just got home from Aden tonight. The final fireworks were something else! Buildings have been painted, railings and lamp-posts ditto, there are illuminated artificial trees on all the roundabouts, all the fountains are working and all the people I've met with have been really positive. Which doesn't mean they are ardent Saleh supporters - just that they've really appreciated this opportunity to be the focus of an important Arab nation football competition.

In an email, Dozival also mentioned how the painting projects were spearheaded by females, which lead to possibly unusual and bright color choices. This is great, because after the civil war, Aden was plagued by a spate of what I irritatingly would call "northern realism"- the concrete-drab repetition of urban expansion.

The question, of course, is whether this success is a respite or a new start. Sports can bring people together, as much as tear them apart, and the major source of discontent in Yemen is the feeling that the regime is as unable to get things done as it is corrupt and authoritarian. I don't think a successful tournament can chance all of that, but I think it also proves what we've been saying all along- there is national pride in Yemen; the idea of the nation isn't an invented one. If this, in and of itself, is fleeting, it does go some ways into disproving the idea that anarchy is the natural state of being.

Paranoia, cont.

2010-12-07T10:39:00.000-06:00

Will at the Yemen Peace Project has AQAP's latest statement on the bombing, which he calls "absolutely gleeful." In it, AQAP indicates that the CIA and the Mossad are helping the Huthis- which is interesting, for those keeping score, because it means the CIA is using both AQAP and the Huthis in order to fight a proxy war against itself. I don't want to get all domestic, but this seems to be a waste of my tax dollars. Or someone's tax dollars, anyway.

It is hard to say if this is paranoia or posturing. Posturing would make more sense- AQAP is still positioning itself as the defender of the faithful and of all Yemenis against foreign interference, when, really, they were just waging reinvented battles. This is smart posturing by them, but in this case I doubt it will work. After all, Yemenis have heard that it is Iran helping the Huthis- now suddenly America is there?

Of course, America did work with Shi'ites against the Sunnis in Iraq (until it worked with some Sunnis against others). It isn't beyond the pale that America would team up with Iran to fight AQAP while also teaming up with the apostate Salih, who is opposed to Iran except when he isn't. Also, the Jews are probably doing something.

It is fun to think like this, and it is important to know that many people, especially those with messianic complexes, are deeply paranoid, but again: it isn't necessary to need grand conspiracies to explain things in Yemen. AQAP is believing in its own hype, and, after years of patience, might be willing to open it up and take their battle to the next level. That isn't paranoid- it is exactly what we need to be looking for.

Paranoia Even Goya Couldn't Draw Ya

2010-12-06T10:47:00.000-06:00

So, it probably isn't too surprising that the Huthis blame the US, by way of AQAP, for the murderous funereal bombing that threatens to open up a new front of violence inside Yemen. There is a thick atmosphere of paranoia inside the country's politics. President Salih lumps together the three threats of AQAP, Huthis and the Southern Movement- this is part cynical but part a logical extension of his belief that only he can hold the country together, an apres moi, le deluge mentality. (though one would have to ask: how much worse the flood?) Everybody also blames Iran for the Huthis, despite lack of any evidence. The Huthis and AQAP see the government as a pawn of the US and Israel, a notion that is being reinforced by the Wikileaks revelations. Basically, you have the US and Iran fighting each other via al-Qaeda and the Huthis, respectively. Israel fits in somewhere, probably supporting al-Qaeda (although, as I blogged about in April, AQAP was supposedly teaming up with anti-Hamas extremists in Gaza to attack Jews in both Israel and Yemen, so this isn't a perfect marriage).

This is the kind of thinking that comes from a poisoned and poisoning politics. Despite the proliferation of NGOs, there is not an adequate public space inside of Yemen for politics to be hashed out. Qat chews are a helpful outlet, and a wonderful part of life, but with the crackdown on press it is terribly surprising that the wildest conspiracy theories are ones that gain traction. This is a mess of Salih's making.

I don't want to imply that paranoia is a strictly Yemeni or Arab phenomena. There is plenty of paranoia in American politics as well- it is deeply a part of both the far left and mainstream, Tea Party right (who are not really "conservative", by any real definition). I think it is part of human nature to see events as controlled and not left to chance and capriciousness and folly and short-sighted thinking. While paranoids tend to be freaked out a lot, there is comfort there; paranoia is a safety blanket warmly shielding one from randomness. In Yemen, where things are falling apart, and there is a history of outside interference, it is better to conjure a grand narrative than being buffeted by a series of ad hoc decisions.

In a strange way, I suppose it is almost reassuring that the Huthis blame the US for AQAP's attack. Maybe there is a strong strain of thought preventing them from thinking fellow Yemenis could do such a thing. Optimistic paranoia. Maybe a happier Pynchon could do something with that.

The best of all possible worlds

2010-12-02T09:52:00.000-06:00

I'm working on a piece about sectarian violence and the possible influence of foreign fighters in Yemen, and how they can expand, distort and possibly ultimately destroy AQAP's missions, but in the meantime I'd like to give you this year's most ridiculous, optimistic, half faux-tough half dreamily Panglossian spin, found thanks to the LATimes. Bob Drogin has a fine article about Inspire, though I think the article and the analysts might give it too much credit by half. Here are some examples.

"It's like the Vanity Fair of jihadi publications," said Bruce Hoffman, director of security studies at Georgetown University. "It's glossy and snarky, and is designed to appeal to Generation Z."

"It's Madison Avenue, terrorist style," agreed Yonah Alexander, terrorism specialist at the nonpartisan Potomac Institute for Policy Studies in Arlington, Va. "It's much more sophisticated than what we've seen before."

It might be my fault, having no real conception of what Generation Z is, other than some term used to describes kids who tweet or something (and won't get off my goddamn lawn!). But appealing to computer-paled slackers isn't the same as marshaling them into an effective jihadi force. I don't doubt its technical sophistication- it is one of the finer looking pamphlets I have ever seen, and cousin, I've seen em all. But here's the thing- glossy, snarky, Generation Z, hip, fun, jam-packed with cold disses- these are all well and good, but who are they going to recruit? The cream of the crop, or people who are easily susceptible to snark and sarcasm and who, let's be honest, aren't exactly going to smuggle weapons-grade plutonium across the Rio Grande?

The "Madison Avenue, terrorist style" is accidentally more instructive than it is intended. Who the hell trusts Madison Avenue? It is a byword for dishonesty and artifice. Be yourself, and drink Coke. I don't doubt that Inspire might push some already-teetering loner into an act of jihad, which, but for motivation, we would have labeled a crime. The kind of people who will fall for this slick emptiness are not going to be a serious force for jihad. It might be a threat, but a small one, and dressing it up with awesome buzzwords needlessly inflates the danger and gives Inspire the publicity it shouldn't have.

And yet these aren't the wort quotes of the article- indeed, they aren't wrong, just kind of misleading. The worst comes from the opposite spectrum, strangely. In full.

Larry Johnson, a former CIA analyst, said the latest magazine mostly shows that Al Qaeda is a spent force that is trying to make the best of a failed attack.

"This is spin worthy of a Washington pundit," he said. "I think they're trying to maintain their image of being a ferocious, deadly organization. But at the end of the day, they just showed they were incompetent."

Looking at this charitably, one could say Johnson's first sentence was just setting up his second as an example, what someone might say if they were trying to spin. But, pretending it is not self-aware, this is absolutely ridiculous. I've seen this formulation here and there- an attack wasn't successful, this shows they are dead, over-reaching in an attempt to promote a false image of relevance. And then we see it after the next attack.

The incompetence thing is extraordinary. No, nothing blew up, but as many have said we are reacting and spending in exactly the same way we would if the planes did go down. And it was cheap, for them. The idea that they are incompetent is incredibly self-cenetered, ignoring everything AQAP has done inside Yemen. It is wishful thinking, a candyland of analysis. This is the kind of statement that one should run away from.

A rhetorical question on Awlaki

2010-12-01T16:08:00.000-06:00

Greg has a lengthy and worthwhile counter in the "how important is al-Awlaki debate". I agree largely with his points, although I am beginning to stray from the "he's a nothing" camp very, very slightly- though through no particular skill of his own. I've said before that he is basically a reality show jihadi, someone who is famous largely for being famous. That said, of course, public relations is a huge part of international terrorism, and his fame, however unearned, is not entirely irrelevant.

I'm going to quote something from Greg's piece, which is not the thrust of the excellent analysis, but is important to what I want to talk about.

Also, isn’t it possible that knowing what we know AQAP and its development that as the Obama administration talks about al-Awlaki and as the media focuses on him, AQAP continues to push him forward, hoping to take advantage of all the free advertising? Basically, hoping that his name and association with AQAP can bring them more western recruits.

This would explain his “poorly veiled coming out” and the reason AQAP didn’t talk about him prior to the attempt on Muhammad bin Nayyif and the Christmas Day plot, because he wasn’t integral to either one, including the one on the US. But as the Obama Administration focused on him, AQAP kept pushing him more and more to the front and now, after the parcel bomb plot we have a “Foreign Operations Unit” that he may or may not be the head of.

Greg and I agree on this- the admin and the media have pushed him forward, possibly transforming him from a fairly obscure cleric about for whom one would have to twist and torture loose connections to make into a major figure to someone who "may or may not be the head of" a new unit in AQAP. My take on the unit is that it is a sideshow for the leadership, a cheap way to do things on the side, but not part of their major plans. Regardless, there is the potential for al-Awlaki to "inspire" people to do bad things in the US.

I agree that right now taking him out would only make things worse. He isn't important enough to waste time and resources on, and because he is still largely unknown in Yemen, it would look punitive and reactionary and totally unnecessary to the people we need to court. Ideally, we would stop focusing on this guy and his immature violence-junkie sidekick Samir Khan and they could recede from the foreground. But I am not expecting the media to let go their hold on a charismatic English-speaker who is part American.

So, and here is the rhetorical- will there be a point when, given the trends, al-Awlaki will become important enough to take out, if not by arrest than by assassination? Can anyone foresee that day, or is it ludicrous? It is partly philosophical, partly tactical- can our incessant pimping of his importance make him important? I don't have an answer- I lean toward "no", but some other events which I need to write about could persuade me otherwise. Do any of you have any thoughts?

AQAP v Huthi: This time, its personal

2010-11-29T11:17:00.000-06:00

This might be a largely reactive day or two on the blog- I am waiting for Greg to release his rebuttal to Thomas Hegghammer's answer to the al-Awlaki debate. I am not sure if I'll have anything interesting to add to it. I know- since when has that stopped me? Right now I am enjoying two top analysts duking it out. Clint has also been doing excellent work on this over at Selected Wisdom. This is much better than the old days, when we basically only had Jane Novak to argue with.

As for the probable AQAP attack on the Huthis, Will at the Yemen Peace Project has the statement and some good analysis. I think he is right when he says that this probably isn't going to play particularly well among Yemenis. As has been mentioned, there isn't exactly a deep theological divide between Zaydi Shi'ism and Sunni philosophy. The difference is largely political, though it has been wrapped with more of a schismatic cloth in the war years- but that is still just the wrapping.

I'm not sure if this attack is a push for more volunteers or a reaction to their arrival. Foreign fighters generally don't have much respect for the lay of the land, and can push movements in more extreme directions. After all, I didn't bust my hump across the Eurasian wilds just to take out some damned police officer. That is for chumps and local teens. Let's go after the real apostates. It could also be a combination of the two, of course.

It is also possible that the attack is a result of a steeply-increasing sense of destiny. AQAP hasn't been flawless, but it is human nature to look back on success with the feeling of inevitability- especially if you've convinced yourself you have a divine mandate. This would be out of character for AQAP, where caution has been the rule, but it wouldn't be totally out of character for any successful revolutionary group. You begin to believe your own clippings. I am not yet ready to say this is probably the case; this is the smallest possible sample-size to analyze.

The most clever thing about this attack is how it undercuts propaganda. What the hell is Salih going to say? Stop attacking innocent Huthis? Even US condemnation rings hollow; we haven't lifted a finger to stop scorched earth. There is an opportunity here to slide into the role of honest broker, but it is a very small window and would require a lot more nuance than our strategy has provided. I don't doubt all of this crossed the mind of the leadership, if not before the attack than shortly thereafter (they are excellent retroactive propagandists), but I still think this might be a case of bloody over-reach, the kind they have heretofore avoided.

Very quick thoughts on al-Jawf

2010-11-27T11:07:00.000-06:00

I am traveling for the holiday and stealing a few minutes on a computer. Basically, I feel that if the attack in al-Jawf is indeed the work of AQAP- and frankly, it might be; I haven't had time to do anything, so I apologize if this is outdated- this marks a very new and dangerous but morbidly positive step. For years we've been arguing that AQAP has managed to avoid the schismatic violence that has marked much of Qaeda's existence. In doing so, they have avoided the kind of backlash you saw in Iraq. If this was them, then there are a couple of possible reasons.

1- They are increasingly emboldened, and feel that they can expand their circle of enemies. Fight the government, fight the West, now they can take on more ancient and dogmatic enemies- Shi'ites (even though Zaydi's aren't anything close to Twelvers).

2- Command and control is splintering. This doesn't have the hallmark of the low-risk/high-reward mentality we've seen heretofore. This could have wild and unpredictable, splintering consequences. It is possible that newer recruits have un-Yemeni ideas of how to do things, and are more aggressive and less patient.

(Of course, it is in AQAP's interest to create more chaos in the country, so it could be argued that this is a smart move, but it seems to go against their norm.)

Both of these could open up a scary chapter, but a less-disciplined, less-patient AQAP is one that isn't as scary in the long run. Who knows? AQAP showed a terrifying learning curve; maybe their decline will be just as steep. It is way too early to tell, of course- this is all just idle speculation, fueld by three straight Thanksgiving dinners at three different places, with one more to go.

Competition

2010-11-22T12:53:00.000-06:00

Clint had a good little post late last week about AQIM stepping up their attacks. He asks if AQAP and AQIM are coordinating their efforts or if they are essentially in competition with each other. I tend to think it is the latter, and agree with Clint that it will make them even more dangerous. Ambition mixed with need is a dangerous cocktail, and they both need top talent. I tend to think that if there is a competition, AQAP will come out ahead, but that could be a product of my bias and the fact that no one ever pays me to talk about AQIM- and rightfully so, for that matter. It seems like they are getting better and more organized, but if I recall correctly a few years ago there were disputes over local matters vs broader regional goals, and this led to some fracturing. This is inevitable in any terrorist organization- or any organization, I imagine- but the multi-national nature of AQIM led to even more tension. While AQAP is a two-state operation, they have more a surety of purpose. This might be changing with AQIM, but due to that I would imagine AQAP has more staying power.

Of course, I also think that the attraction of talent will make the group harder to control, as ambitious and war-ready jihadis might question why there aren't more attacks and why, exactly, it is important to kill this police officer or that one, and why they aren't putting bombs in markets, etc. If AQAP loses some control, that might help turn the population against them. At a terrible price, of course, which is why as Greg argues we need to start a propaganda war now.

OK, I missed something

2010-11-22T12:44:00.000-06:00

Page 13 of Inspire has a huge picture of President Salih scratching his head. The caption above reads "What Should Ali Abdullah Salih Do About His Failed State?" Then, underneath the picture, it says, "Yeah, Keep Scratching Your Head". This is awesome enough, until the bottom, in very small font, which says "This ad brought to you by A Cold Diss." This, reader, is enough to keep me happy for the rest of the week. I can't begin to tell you how deliriously excited I was to see that. A cold diss, indeed. This is appealing straight to the potential American recruit who isn't sure where the Quran stands on saying "aw snap!" because it is no longer 1997. Rest assured- a cold diss earns the disser even more virgins.

Operation: Hemorrhage

2010-11-22T12:13:00.001-06:00

That is what AQAP has titled their new wave of assaults, as told by the latest issue of Inspire, everyone's favorite magazine. (It was also the name of my prom. Ba-dum ching!) The issue is a gloating one, somewhat hastily thrown together, and based entirely on what they call the success of the cargo bomb plots. It goes into somewhat remarkable detail on how the bombs came together and on how they managed to avoid security, while also taking credit for the Sept. 3rd downing of a UPS plane. It mostly avoids the cartoonish absurdity of the last issue, though it does devote a couple of pages to a fake bulletin board with quotes "from friend and foe." AJG friend and Yemen expert Chris Boucek made the cut, with a quote and picture. Chris, I imagine this is a highlight. There is also a section of rhyming couplets called "Leverage", which seems to be mostly culled from Inspiration posters- "Shooting high for the skies/is greater than living a life of lies", except for the one in the middle about Israeli massacres and American crimes, which actually might be Ezra Pound.

But the silly stuff isn't what I want to talk about here. I think it is rare that a terrorist group not only exactly divines, but also trumpets, exactly how they can hurt us. There is some throat-clearing about how maybe there will be another 9/11, but the name itself implies knowledge of our security hysteria. For a very, very small cost they have managed to send us into a tizzy, costing us billions and furthering their stature. Our outrage has propelled them into the center-stage of jihad, which will help them in their near-term goals of getting rid of Salih and then beginning to work on the Saudi royals (I don't think the latter is realistic, but the attempt to get there could be painful and bloody).

Our greatest weakness is over-reacting; we seem to think that nothing should go wrong ever. Any time AQAP, or any AQ branch, manages something, there is breathless round-the-clock fear-mongering, with fiery exhortations about whose head should roll. Terrorism and counter-terrorism are often just tools in the political horse-race, with both parties climbing over each other to prove who is more serious (though, in an attempt not to be David Broder, the claim of "weak on terrorism" is an almost exclusively Republican tactic, but the Dems match that by trying to be overly muscular).

It is somewhat disconcerting to think how much AQAP understands the American mentality, although it isn't exactly hard to divine. For every action, recently anyway, there is a wildly disproportionate reaction. It is decent of them, though, to give us a backward blueprint outlining exactly what we should do. On their own, AQAP can't hemorrhage us. They can feint and strike and have mild, even strong, successes. But while it seems like they are puppeting us, it is possible to cut the strings. The triumphant tone of this Inspire is a little hyperbolic, and with an air of protesting too much, it is a difference of degree, not type.

EDIT

There was also a line in there about how this is a war of information and technology. It would be nice if the political class had as much understanding about the battle we are in as our enemies do.

Some Op-Ed

2010-11-20T12:01:00.000-06:00

So, Greg has an editorial in the New York Times this morning arguing the case against our relentless and idiotic focus on Anwar al-Awlaki. Most regular readers of this blog and Waq al-Waq already know this- hopefully Greg's editorial will shift the conversation, so that we don't waste time on resources on this mid-level nothing. Of course, then we won't get to act so smug, but I suppose that is an ok price to pay.

On a personal note, I know Greg doesn't want to engage in a lot of horn-tootery, so it is up to me. I've known Greg for 10, almost 11 years, since our AUC days. Throughout the years we've talked about what would be one of the coolest, most exciting thing, and "an article in the Times" was always one of them. I can't begin to say how proud I am of Greg, and how, as cool as it is to see his name in that by-line, there is also a sense of justice. Greg is one of the very best analysts out there, in any field- his dedication and knowledge are matched only by his willingness to fully explore an idea, rather than cling dogmatically to anything. This is a rare trait. In terms of Yemen he is unmatched, and I am constantly in awe. It is good for everyone involved that his voice is out there.

The Long Run (eventually a Yemen post, so be patient)

2010-11-17T12:50:00.000-06:00

A week or so ago I was at the library and was thinking how I didn't really know much at all about American expansion into the west- the outlines, sure, and I was a big fan of John Wayne movies, but I know vanishingly little about the details. So I grabbed a couple of books more or less at random- thinking I can go for big and broad to start with, and if this obsession lasts beyond a couple of weeks then dig deeper. The books I grabbed were Into The West by Walter Nugent (which is not the basis for the Spielberg mini-series) and Blood and Thunder by Hampton Sides (which is not Blood And Thunder, the "all-girls roller-derby magazine", though I know you all thought it was.)

I've read through Into the West and just started Blood and Thunder last night. Into the West was amazing- it sort of disdained the so-called "heroic era" of cowboys and injuns, cattle drives and gunfights, rootin and tootin. Instead, it focused some 500 years of European conquest and population displacement- looking at the big picture of migration, habitation, irrigation and farming. It talked about the cities that were growing even as the west was "still being won." (In something that blew my mind, he mentioned that the University of California had been having classes for ten years before the Shootout at OK Corral). Mostly, though, it is the story of people- how they changed the land, how the land changed them, how generations of different cultures met and adjusted and created reality. It showed how the world works outside of myths- even while showing the role that myths play.

Blood and Thunder seems a little different- it looks like it is tracing the "heroic era" through the story of Kit Carson. I'm enjoying it, and it is an important story, but strikes me as one of those books that focuses obsessively on a little thing that might make a good story but doesn't reveal much of the whole- in this case, a short time frame and a relatively narrow geographical space (if the book doesn't turn out this way, I apologize, but you all know the kind of book I am talking about). Of course, the Indian Wars were hugely important (morally neutral statement), but they were a small slice of what we really mean when talking about the story of the west.

I was thinking about this when reading this Reuters story, linked to through Nasser Arrabyee's blog.

BEIT AL-MASAJIDI, Yemen
As men and women pick corn and roll up the withered stalks in the fields of their tiny village near Sanaa, Humeid al-Masajidi says goodbye to a way of life his family will abandon forever.

"Starting next year there won't be any farmland here. This is the last time this land will be harvested. We've all sold the land," the 35-year-old farmer said, pointing to the fields around the village of Beit al-Masajidi, nestled beneath mountain peaks and dotted with scraggy sheep.

Yemen is grappling with an increasingly dry climate and a booming population. Harvests are shrinking as rainfall declines and groundwater dries up.

Farmers, 70 percent of the population, can no longer subsist on their own crops. Youths are flocking from the countryside to the cities in search of jobs to provide for their families.

This is one of those seemingly human-interest stories that, in the long run, plays a far bigger role in shaping Yemen's destiny than the fate of Anwar al-Awlaki or the next election. Droughts, and the mismanagement of resources, have a way of making politics seem ephemeral- which in a very real sense they are. This is far more than a sad story about farmers losing their way of life; we might be seeing a fundamental shift from a rural populace (currently about 70%) to an increasingly urban one. Even if there is a solution to the water problem these are trends that are very difficult to reverse.

Overcrowding and the creation of slums- violent places full of the world's most dangerous resource, unemployed and desperate young men- are a huge problem all over the third world (and many parts of the first, so no nose-looking-downing). But even aside from that, a shift like this changes the very nature of a country in ways that are incredibly difficult, if not impossible, to predict. If Yemen survives the next 50 or 100 years (which in one form or another it will, barring the unpredictability of water), it could be united and untied a dozen times, but and increasing urban nature will be the most important thing. Migration patterns matter, but they are often too slow to be appreciated, especially these days. Looking at the history of the world, the moving of people, the destruction and creation of farmland, the handling of resources, are what eventually drives things. Of course, leadership matters, especially in resource management, but the slow population trends will affect its politics far more than any one president or jihadist ever could.

I guess I don't really have a point. Maybe it is just fascinating to think that while we ponder statesmenship and parse statements and agonize about drones, the factors that really affect long-term destiny are slowly grinding under our feet, and this first draft of history will be barely noticeable when papered over humanity's palimpsest.

(Incidentally, at some point I'd like to post my scatter-shot thoughts on the Homesteader and Newlands Reclamation Acts, which were the might of the federal government creating the land for farmers, and what that means for today's politics- essentially, the myth of the "real Americans who don't need the government" and how liberalism can work with and help independent, hard-working industrious people. If you guys will indulge me.)

Non Yemen-y Thought For Today

2010-11-17T12:04:00.000-06:00

I'm allowed these every once in a while, right?

So, because it is unavoidable, and because I am a rageaholic, I've seen/read a lot about the royal engagement. I'm not English, so I don't have any emotional or historic ties to royalty, and so certainly won't begrudge anyone who is engaged by something that is silly and anachronistic, if ultimately harmless (although obscenely expensive- but again, no real dog in this fight). Indeed, I don't even mind the main royals, who don't seem bad. Especially Charles, who strikes me as a decent, well-meaning sort of guy smart enough to be aware of the crushing uselessness of his life. Lots of sympathy for the guy, honestly.

But.

In nearly every report, there is a kind of breathless tone that William is marrying a commoner, and large dollops of self-congratulatory bullshit about how this isn't a scandal. That last part is great, I suppose, but it also begs the question: why, in the 21st century, in a modern, dynamic nation, is anyone able to use the word "commoner" without a frisson of disgust? Is there a more tawdry, dated, weighted word out there? Of course, there are more heavily-weighted words, but none that can be thrown out so casually and without fear of approbation. I would say that the daughter of self-made millionaires is someone less common, if common is meant to be the opposite of important, than the son of someone whose chief duties since WWII has been waving.

Again, the happy couple doesn't seem to be particularly freighted with the royal/commoner distinction, and both of the sons have been fully engaged in the military, which I admire. And the Queen has done a lot to devolve hereditary titles and the cost of the monarchy. It is the use of that word by reporters that I hate, and the fact that it can be used demonstrates just how worthless and insulting is the very idea of kings and queens.

Saving Yemen?

2010-11-17T09:44:00.000-06:00

I'll get back to drones, but my thoughts are still a little jumbled, as every time I think about them I argue with myself and contradict what I just thought. But for the moment I want to talk about this Marisa Porges article in Foreign Affairs, titled "Saving Yemen". The title is a bit grandiose, but I don't blame the author for that, as never once have I come up with a decent title (if I had my druthers, any published work would be titled "Yemen: Holy Shit.")

The thrust of her article is that counter-terrorism, or COIN or whatever method you use, is not enough to save Yemen, even if combined with an aggressive human rights/structural solutions aspect. What needs to happen, she argues, is political reconciliation, and for us to push Salih to share power, stop being so damned corrupt, and work to get the south and the north back into the process. This is persuasive, and noble, and has long been a US goal, but I am not sure it is workable. There are a few things in the article I take issue with, specifically this sentence, which follows the list of violent political problems.

With threats on all sides, the regime moved to curtail political freedoms and civil liberties and began relying more heavily on tribes and patronage to hold the country together, fueling growing resentment among Yemeni citizens.

The first part is surely true, and undeniably an exacerbating factor in Salih's increasing unpopularity. But the regime isn't just now turning to tribes and patronage to hold things together- this is the way things have always been done in Yemen, whether it is through the imam or any of the Republican rulers. Indeed, the slipping patronage network and Salih's growing detachment from many tribes are part of what is causing the country to fall apart. Far from being an unwelcome outcome of dissolution, tribal relations are the underpinning of Yemeni political life. She is right, and importantly so, to point out that the shrinking circle of a paranoid regime fules more discontent as it shuts people out of the body politic, but is approaching the issue from a slightly askew angle.

And this isn't meant to pick on one phrase just to be a jerk- being a computer-protected jerk is just an ancillary benefit of blogging- but because I think that askew angle informs the piece. This isn't a specific fault of Porges, but rather a product of American thinking. Everyone views things from their cultural prism, but it can be dangerous.

I am not sold on political reconciliation. I think it is important, and would be ideal, but I don't know if you can fully reconcile the country to a central government, at least not in the short term. It would take a lot for the Huthis to become involved in a government structure that has some 40 years of existence, as opposed to the 1000-year Zaydi rule, especially given the enormous violence directed at them by the center. The South has been unified with the north for only 20 years, and those decades have been marked by murder, war and occupation.

See, the problem, and I might be over-stating a little, isn't just that Salih is unliked, it is that the idea of a strong central government is at best tolerated, at worst despised and thought of as a blood-shedding nuisance. I think that trying to mold San'a into Washington ignores a lot of Yemeni history and culture. It isn't that they are lawless, pre-political children or anything- far from it. There is a complex system operating just underneath post-Westphalian structures.

We need to work within that system, which is in its own way considerably more democratic and egalitarian than Salih's rule. Again, I think we need Salih, but we also need to work to devolve his power and to cut off streams of corruption, working directly with tribes and local leaders and even NGOs (Porges' piece does an admirable job of talking about the vast civil society that has blossomed in Yemen, and is worth the read if just for the way she deepens our knowledge and adds nuance to a place that many dismiss as irredeemably savage). I think in time, and with a host of other things talked about on this blog and elsewhere, the stigma of central rule might wear off, and then there might be a stronger government with more power to the people. But that is in the distant future, and trying to rush it can make things worse.

As always, authors criticized by me are invited to respond. In comments is fine, but if you would like email me and a response will have its own post, in full and unedited.

Yemen's Clever New Monetary Source

2010-11-17T09:10:00.000-06:00

Ellen Knickmeyer has a good piece in Foreign Policy about how Yemen is essentially outsourcing their navy to guard ships trying to make it through the pirate-infused waters around the Red Sea and Aden. The sub-headline, which I don't think she wrote, calls it a "gun for hire" strategy, which while accurate is a bit unfair. This is a pretty good revenue stream for Yemen, and it isn't as if they are distributing their navy to far-flung shores while ignoring home: piracy and smuggling are issues in Yemen, and this can help the navy become more professional and better-trained. As Knickmeyer points out, there is a lot of potential for corruption here, of course, but I don't have much of a problem with that. For one thing, this isn't money that would otherwise be going elsewhere- it isn't aid that is being funneled into the pockets of well-connected cousins. It is an outside and independent revenue-generating operation. Yes, it would be better if one thought the money raised could dig wells and irrigation channels, but that is letting the perfect be the enemy of the good.

And I do think this can be good: one of the most important areas of income for Yemen is the Port of Aden- once great, now dangerous and dilapidated. Insurance rates are exorbitant, and shipping companies are wise to avoid it. This is crippling for Yemen. If they can work to make the area safer, and develop an effective navy/coast guard (and this is one of the areas where the US has a long-term interest, and has been helping, albeit with a wax/wane kind of intensity), it can help revitalize the port. Granted, that brings up a whole magilla about sharing the money, which gets to the heart of the southern issue, but it is better to be arguing about a whole pie than fighting over scraps.

Anyway, the article is well worth reading.

How to avoid using drones

2010-11-17T08:54:00.000-06:00

Greg already highlighted the most important story of the day- the Yemeni beach volleyball team being distracted by bikini girls at the Asian Games. What he failed to do, however, was point out the vast importance of this story, and its CT implications. Drones are expensive and carry a lot of risks, but America is full of babes (he said, patriotism swelling). All we have to do is airlift select Bikini Squadrons into AQAP areas. It is nearly impossible to wage jihad when you are turned into a Tex Avery wolf.

Jihad: solved.

Drone Reax

2010-11-13T11:00:00.000-06:00

It seems I have a prior engagement to go shopping downtown today- which is totally awesome, right?- so I won't be able to get to some more response on the drone thing this morning. There are some excellent and thoughtful comments which I want to address in a real post, rather than the comment section.

Additionally, Clint has a great response, continuing to look at it from a broader CT perspective, including trying to figure out the line between civilian and combatant- specifically: if you are sheltering AQAP, are you still "innocent collateral"? It is probably the single most difficult question we've faced over the last decade, and one that needs to be addressed. He doesn't ask it in the abstract, either, but in the context of Yemeni relationships. There is a lot more there, too, so read it.

Aaron attacks the drone issue as well, in a must-read post. One of the more important things he brings up, among others, is the unintended consequences of drone strikes- specifically how it might create allies where there weren't before (e.g. AQAP and the Southern Movement). There is a lot to unpack here.

Finally, Gareth Porter comes from a different angle, looking at the internal politics and intelligence side of the drone debate. I'm looking forward to talking about all of these in length- I really enjoy this. Instead, for now, I'll be trying on shoes or something. The say every girl is crazy for a sharp-dressed man, but probably not when he is thinking about drones.

Drones and Yemen ( Really long post)

2010-11-12T08:01:00.000-06:00

(The original title of this post was "Send in the Drones", which I liked, until I remembered I was actually riffing off the not-so-classic Simpson's Halloween episode "Send in the Clones", itself a play on "Send in the Clowns". "Clowns" does not rhyme with "drones". Damn you, pop culture!)

Over at Selected Wisdom, which has rapidly become one of my favorite blogs, Clint Watts has a series of posts about drones, Yemen, and a Yemen/drone combo. The first post is an excellent look at how drones have disrupted al Qaeda in the Af/Pak region. As he states, drones have:

Disrupted AQ’s strategic planning by eliminating AQ leaders or isolating them in protective positions.

Caused AQ to exhaust additional resources to maintain operational security.

Largely eliminated large-scale conventional training venues. Hanif used to train formally at camps, but now he and his fellow recruits are confined to rooms in shacks.

Forced AQ to use less experienced and poorly trained individuals. These new recruits are less likely to be successful operationally and will also be unlikely to carry out terrorism for future generations.

They have been able to do this while not, in his estimate, racking up many more civilian casualities than a COIN operation would (obviously, this is a bit of counter-factual guesswork, but non-drone operations do kill civilians, regardless of the great care our fighters take).

Then, moving into Yemen, Clint argues against Robert Worth, who criticized the idea of using drones to hunt Anwar al-Awlaki.   For what it is worth, I agree with Worth on this very narrow point: hunting al-Awlaki and going for the kill is probably extra-judicial, most likely needlessly inflammatory, and an absolute waste of resources. Readers of this blog know that al-Awlaki is a sideshow. He presents some danger, but he is not the theologian, strategist, mastermind, and certainly not the leader of AQAP. Any time spent hunting him is time not spent hunting down the real threats. It will give us all the negatives of using drones with very little in return, save for what would be a brief and entirely domestic PR victory.

So then let's talk about drone use in general, assuming we would be using them against the real baddies. The question is: should drones be used in Yemen? I admit that I am kind of on the fence with this; I go back and forth almost hourly, like a whiny metronome. I think the broader CT perspective provided by Selected Wisdom is very helpful, as a lot of us who write about Yemen tend not to focus on a wider picture. I know I am cloistered and perhaps over-protective: a petulant teenager (No one understands Yemen! We're in love!). So let's look at some of the arguments.

What drones do best, or rather as a product of what they do best (killing), is disrupting networks and sewing paranoia. This will become more and more important in Yemen as foreign fighters see it as a profitable place to wage jihad (creating this image is a major short-term goal for AQAP). Drone strikes, even if they don't end up taking out the leadership, will force it to be on the move and less able to plan operations- though they have shown a remarkable ability to learn and maneuver on the fly.   If drone strikes are reasonably successful- and these arguments have to be taken in a vacuum right now, before I get into the negatives- AQAP operations will slow down, and foreign fighters, battle-hardened jihadis who can augment AQAP's operation prowess, might stay in Af/Pak or Kashmir or Indonesia. Depriving recruits of a reason to go to Yemen would be a success.

But drone strikes wouldn't just deny a reason, they would make it harder to bring in more pros. Hooking up with the leadership would become difficult, and in a country as proudly xenophobic as Yemen a bunch of foreign fighters waging jihad all willy-nilly would go a long way toward discrediting AQAP, even without standard hearts-and-minds ops by the US (though obviously those should go on). The paranoia is a key element here as well. AQAP has managed to be extremely successful while comprised almost entirely of Yemenis and Saudis. Foreigners coming in while there are killers in the air could make it more difficult for AQAP to accept their help, to trust them. The jihadi networks go a long way, so this would probably just be a slight benefit, but any little bit helps.

Obviously there are benefits beyond what it will do to the foreign fighter networks, but I think those are going to be a huge deal as AQAP continues to evolve. Domestically, if the leadership were to be incapacitated it wouldn't destroy the group, but would hamper them, and perhaps provide us with some breathing room to deal with other structural issues. And Clint makes a good point that drones, while terrifying, leave considerably less of a military footprint than do soldiers. But that brings us to the negatives.

What is frequently lost in discussing Yemen is that future drone strikes wouldn't be new in the country- in 2002 the US took out AQ's leader in one of the first successful drone attacks. This was an operation agreed to by both Yemen and the US, with the understanding that it would be presented as an accident, that al-Hirithi and those in the car with him at the time of death were transporting a bomb that went off. This was supposed to be a fingerprint-free operation. But the US was understandably excited by their success, and publicized it. This was dumb. Pesident Salih felt burned, as that opened up a vulnerable flank to charges of lapdogism. Right now, Salih is facing a massive crisis of legitimacy- drone strikes are a painful reminder of a recent past, and will allow not just al-Qaeda but other domestic enemies to charge him with being a puppet who lets Americans kill Yemenis. While Salih is far from an ideal ally, he is currently our best bet, and it is probable that even a successful drone attack will undercut another plank of our policy.

Hurting Salih isn't the only plank that will be undercut. Even if you take out morality, even if you take out standard propaganda/recruitment arguments, collateral damage isn't just a matter of numbers. Even if the terrorist-to-civilian kill ratio is 40-1, that one person could turn a potential tribal ally into a certain enemy. Our best hope in Yemen, to me, is to maintain Salih's power while devolving it and working with the tribes, both for security and structural reasons- working directly with them not only helps us keep contact with real power brokers, it also closes off avenues of corruption. Clint argues that using soft power will " will slowly win over some of the Yemeni people and will cost the U.S. billions. Around 2020, we might actually get one AQAP member turned over to security forces thanks to our niceness. Ohh, that’s right, Yemen has already run out of water at this point, and most likely AQAP has conducted a thousand additional attacks and grown considerably due to the ripe recruiting conditions created by water resource shortage."   He makes a good point that soft power will be a slow process, but I think he underestimates what creating personal relationship will do. Having tribal allies will speed up the process of apprehending AQAP and denying them tribal havens- it won't be absolute, but it will be better than what we have now. Killing with drones hurts our chances to establish these crucial relationships, and these relationships are the best way to get things done in Yemen. Salih depends on them, AQAP needs them, we shouldn't ignore them.

Now, all that said (is this post still going on?), any operations we enact will involve the hideous death of innocent people, unless we only rely on soft power- and I don't think that is an option. One of the reasons it isn't an option is because AQAP wants to destroy the center, and they aren't going to step up and dig irrigation channels. While AQAP is around, there is a vanishingly small chance of providing any relief. I think an important argument is that even if we merely train Yemeni soldiers and arm the government, and even if the government doesn't use our arms against other foes, like the southern movement (which is: not a realistic hope), Salih will still be painted as a puppet of the US, and anger at his tactics will redound upon us as well.

Which is why I am very reluctantly, and surprisingly to me, signing off on drone use. The Yemeni army is not known for restraint, and while most operations need to be run through them, if we can have successful strikes without local sloppiness and aggression we can minimize PR losses. If the US is going to take the heat anyway, it is better to have a few deaths than to have a village razed in our name. But these drone strikes have to come with excellent local intelligence collected through a cultivation of tribal relationships- these will both help the chances of a successful strike and partially mitigate the chances of a blood feud. We have to be smart so we aren't used by one tribe to take revenge against another. And we have to make sure that these are necessary and important, and not just an attack on a charismatic nobody who happens to speak English, or, god forbid, some tiny foot soldier doing it to put food on his families plate. I understand this distinction can't often be made, but trying to destroy the entire group rather than just its leadership will have severely negative consequences.

Obviously, this has to be combined with aggressive soft-power remedies. A civilian's death can overwhelm the news of one good deed, or ten or 100, but these good deeds have to be so prominent they cannot be ignored. We also have to have an anti-AQAP PR blitz, in Arabic. Without these things, drone strikes are nothing more than a militant sop. These last strident point aren't meant to be arguing against Clint, who didn't argue them. But they are a must.

OK- that seems long enough. I reserve the right to change my mind after breakfast or something, or when Greg argues differently. I welcome all comments and arguments. This is really important, and I want to know what all of you, who know a lot more than I do, think about this.

A light touch of ugly regional parochialism

2010-11-09T11:07:00.000-06:00

In Homage to Catalonia, George Orwell expressed some frustration with at the Spaniards ineffeciency and lack of punctuality. He says "In theory I rather admire the Spaniards for not sharing our Northern time-neurosis, but unfortunately I share it myself."   I pretty much feel the same way when it comes to the mentality of my Chicago home- I admire people who don't have the "second city" chip on their shoulder, but I have it, and as much as I may try to pretend differently, it is huge.

Which is why I have a mix of sympathy and amusement over our local media trying to figure out why the Yemen cargo bombs were addressed to Chicago. There is a sort of sober glee in the stories; a strange kind of boosterism- see, New York, we can be attacked as well!   The stories all come with a mention that the packages were meant to blow up in mid-air (presumably), but that Chicago is still a target. In this Tribune piece, there is a bit of subtle puffery about the last issue of Inspire.

A few weeks earlier, al-Qaida's online magazine had published a photograph of Chicago's skyline, with the nation's tallest building, the Willis Tower, front and center.

That's right- front and center. And did we mention it was the nation's tallest building?

Now, I think Chicago could be a target. It is a major city, and one of the world's most important cities for international business (there's my boosterism, Rahm). As Evan Kohlmann points out in the Trib story, "'I think the primary interest in Chicago is that it is the power base of President (Barack) Obama.'" I think the "power base" line might be overstating the case- it is doubtful that AQAP thinks they can bring down the President by attacking Chicago, as an attack on a power base normally can (and that probably isn't what Kohlmann means; I just wanted to clarify). But the symbolism is hugely important. Additionally, Chicago is in the heartland, more or less, and an attack there could show a greater reach than "merely" attack cities on the coast.

In the article, Kohlmann was also paraphrased saying "At the same time, blowing up a plane near or over Chicago would likely cause more collateral damage on the ground because, unlike New York or Los Angeles, the city is not near an ocean, he said." I hesitate to point out that Chicago is on a lake, a really big one, of which if you are close enough is virtually indistinguishable from the ocean (you can't see across either). I am not totally sure what this means- I guess that the NY airports are on the ocean, so the route of the plane might be more over water than land, and therefore when it explodes it has a better chance of crashing into the sea. O'Hare and Midway or more inland. So this makes some sense, although no flight pattern is direct (when I've flown back from DC or NY or Philly lately, I've always been entirely over water at some point).

This isn't at all to pick on Kohlmann, whose analysis I admire. He was asked a question to which we really don't have an answer- all is speculation.   There isn't anything really inherently special about Chicago as a target, at least not more or less than other major cities (even though it is the best one- yeah!). The main thing to take away is that terrorism is about body count and panic. There is only so much we can do about the former. The latter, though, is entirely in our control.

As if on cue... (edit at bottom)

2010-11-09T10:23:00.001-06:00

I said yesterday that I was hoping to get a little bit into what the elections might mean for Yemen policy, and, as if on cue, albeit by a tangential way, Lindsey Graham provides a white hot dose of strident militancy.

If President Barack Obama "decides to be tough with Iran beyond sanctions, I think he is going to feel a lot of Republican support for the idea that we cannot let Iran develop a nuclear weapon," he told the Halifax International Security Forum.
"The last thing America wants is another military conflict, but the last thing the world needs is a nuclear-armed Iran... Containment is off the table."
The South Carolina Republican saw the United States going to war with the Islamic republic "not to just neutralize their nuclear program, but to sink their navy, destroy their air force and deliver a decisive blow to the Revolutionary Guard, in other words neuter that regime."

I've always kind of had a soft spot for Graham- he seems like he is a funny guy, and was pretty much the only Republican grown-up during the Supreme Court nomination hearings (you mean Sotomayor isn't a racist brainless affirmative action baby?), but this is nuts. I don't know enough about Iran to say that we might have to accept containment as a strategy, and so would be reluctant to take an option off the table (or to leave a cliche unmined), but I don't know anyone in the world who advocates this kind of nonsense. Tactical strikes to take out nuclear capabilities are dangerous and possibly impossible, but they seem to be an option if things really go south. A full-out war is an incredible idea.

It is kind of like he, and others like him, forget the entire last decade. Now that combat operations in Iraq are "over" and we've won (well, that's what I've heard), the horror and muck and impossibility of that war can recede into the distant past, and invading a larger and better-armed country is going to be a walk in the park. We might be met with flowers, even.

I don't want to get too much into Iran qua Iran, as much as the underlying message in Graham's statement. It is the first part that I think can give us a clue to post-election thinking. In saying that if Obama wants to be more militant, he can expect Republican support. This is sort of a twisted olive branch. There are going to be huge legislative battles, with an eye toward 2012, over health care and any form of regulation. Given Democratic control of the Senate and the veto pen, health care won't be overturned, but there will be constant attempts in order to force the Dems to seem out of touch and uncaring and arrogant and dismissive of the public. Gridlock, investigations and accusations are the only things on the domestic menu for the next two years.   But in foreign policy- well, maybe we can find some middle ground, if the middle shifts violently to the right.

What this means for Yemen is, of course, money. The President controls foreign policy, but Congress controls the purse, and a long-time Republican talking point is non-military foreign aid. Cutting aid is a pet project. Eric Cantor, incoming speaking John Boehner's best buddy, has talked about cutting aid to countries that don't share US interests (but exempting Israel from normal aid channels so its money can't be touched). One can clearly see a path where Yemen is painted a country without aligning interests- even though, in the real world, it is a childish fantasy to assume that any two nations will have perfect harmony in their goals; the grown-up thing to do is work out where common interests exist. The cumulative message is that if the President doesn't want to spend his entire time fighting Congress, he has to be considerably more militant and focus entirely on things that go boom.

This is wildly dangerous. One of our most important goals in Yemen has to be to reduce our military footprint, and replace it with something more benign. This doesn't mean coddling terrorists or just letting them be, it means being smart and playing the PR game to sap some support from AQAP (Greg talks about op-eds in Arabic combating AQAP's theology and justifications. I assume those who read this blog read Waq al-Waq, but if you don't make sure you read the whole piece I linked to there. It shows again, as if any proof was still needed, why Greg is the best analyst out there).   An empowered Republican Party is offering Obama a terrible way out- become more militant, less "squishy" about food and water, and you can have some victories. Of course, accepting this option means losing in Yemen, and that is not an option.

It is a little strange that those who proclaim the loudest and proudest that America is the greatest- maybe the only- force for for goodness and decency in the world recoil when that generosity is divorced from the barrel of a gun. But I should be too old to be stunned by intellectual incoherence. Gibberish is the new reason.

Strangely, a modicum of sanity might come from the Tea Party branch, at least those who have thought through their philosophy beyond the flag-pin stage. Rand Paul, for instance, is basically opposed to foreign adventurism, and he is a star. If he can stick to his guns and get his voice out, there might be less pressure to bomb anyone we want. Granted, Paul is also against non-military aid, but I will take a tiny relief of pressure from where I can get it.

EDIT

In a brief post about how Rand Paul seems more in favor of earmarks than he did during the campaign, Jonathan Chait at TNR links to this Salon article about Paul seeming a bit more ideologically flexible in the foreign policy world (which itself is a link to a GQ profile by Jason Zengerle, formerly of TNR- thus completing the internet circle).   Paul tells AIPAC he is "more reasonable" than his father, and impress Bill Kristol and Dan Senor by meeting them in "learning mode". So perhaps Paul isn't going to be in the semi-reasonable wing- or, rather, like nearly all politicians, he'll have to decide between his principles and his ambition.   It would be nice if the Republican Party had a prominent voice inside the party objecting to the "all war all the time" platform, if not from a strict security position than at least form an economic one.

National Editorial

2010-11-08T11:39:00.000-06:00

I have a short-ish piece up in The National today. Readers of the blog won't find too terribly much that is new, but there is a brief discussion at the end about the ramifications of the mid-terms. I'd like to go into that in more detail, though, and am working on a few things that do so.

Disease and Antidote

2010-11-03T11:19:00.000-05:00

The Wall Street Journal has an op-ed piece by Con Coughlin chastising the West for its naivete regarding several key AQAP players, most importantly Anwar al-Awlaki. It does not, of course, offer other tactics that could have been used, just shame and fear. Since this article is as stupid and as guilty of over-blowing Awlaki as anything, this is a good time to link to this: Aaron's takedown of the Awlaki hype. My kind of writing- both angry and informed. Hold on to this and read it anytime you see the words "AQAP mastermind" or "the new bin Laden."

We'll see who wins this battle: the weight of popular opinion or a few ill-tempered and unshaven (presumably) bloggers? I'm guessing the former.

Deferring to Readers

2010-11-02T16:27:00.000-05:00

Reader CharlieCarp left a comment below which I think is pretty important and am going to reproduce in full.

I commented on Waq yesterday, and will add to that a bit here today. I'm not actually sure that this attack 'failed.' Is AQAP really trying to kill a few anonymous strangers? Or is it looking to cut off Western civil engagement in Yemen, force greater involvement by the US (and consequent closer identification among Yemenis of Saleh and the US military)?

If the latter, there might even be greater propaganda to be had from an attack that didn't even hurt anyone -- one can assume that the US/Yemeni counterstrike causes collateral damage, which would be 'revenge' for a strike that didn't hurt anyone.

I'm no scholar of AQ, but I've always thought we make a big mistake when we think that their attacks are about us, rather than communicating/marketing to its prospects/constituents.

I would argue that you are correct in the main- it wasn't really a failure, as it generated all the response a successful (read: actually exploding) attack would- at least in the short term. I think it might fade though. After the flurry of Yemen excitement in January, temperatures cooled for a while, waxing and waning and not really picking up much steam again until this week. Had the bombs gone off- had they even been able to- it would have been a longer-term media sensation (today's elections are going to push it away for all but us obsessives). Of course, if it was probing mission, something I now doubt, it was a wild success. And in terms of tilting the balance of civil/military engagement, it will probably achieve its goals, as you very helpfully point out.

As for the last paragraph, yes, and well put, although I don't think it is entirely either/or. There is an incredible amount of parochialism when discussing AQ motivations/tactics/reason for being, and this hurts analysis and policy. But America and the West still are an enemy, even if they are far and largely unreachable. Both tactics- hurting us and growing- are intertwined, but you do offer a very useful correction to the navel-gazing hand-wringing that accompanies most discussions.

And yes: you can navel-gaze and hand-wring at the same time, both metaphorically and physically. Unless you are really uncoordinated.

Declining Capability?

2010-11-02T11:11:00.000-05:00

At Wired, Spencer Ackerman has a nice little article about whether or not AQAP could have managed to detonate the bombs on the cargo planes- it is tech-y, as you would expect, and provides a cool window into the logistics of terrorism, something as important as the politics behind it, and something you won't really find here. I can hardly work my own cell phone, and it is one of those giant ones from the early 90s. But there is something in it that I found unsettling (above and beyond the unsettling nature of terrorism).

U.S. officials have been cautious about attributing responsibility for the plot to al-Qaeda. But if al-Qaeda is the culprit, the Pentagon adviser says, the terror group is showing “declining capability.” Hijacking multiple aircraft on 9/11 is much more complex than trying — unsuccessfully — to blow up a pair of passenger or cargo planes.

This only is true if you assume an unbroken continuity between the al-Qaeda that attacked on September 11th and AQAP, and you shouldn't assume that. While AQAP (and its previous names) didn't start from scratch in 2006, they also were not just an offshoot of the Af/Pak branch. They had to build up their organization, and have done so at a remarkable rate. And hijaking planes is no longer a viable option for terrorism- they have to find new ways to exploit vulnerabilities. They seem to be learning from every success and failure. While this was less of a success than the Christmas Day attempt- it was interdicted; the failure didn't come from bad luck- it still gave AQAP what they really want: attention and fear, which translate into a recruitment bonanza.

Initially I thought that this was kind of a weak-sauce terror plot, and had hoped that it might mean the leadership was losing some command and control as the organization got bigger. But subsequent revelations showed that the plot was mature, although far from perfect. This doesn't strike me as declining capabilities as much as an ability to adapt. We should be glad that terrorism might not have the spectacular potential it did 10 years ago, but it is troubling if that is cause for relaxation.

There is also this.

The logistical difficulties in setting off the bomb might strengthen the theory that the printer-bomb plot was a terrorist test run. Then again, the chief bombmaker for al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, Ibrahim Hassan al-Asiri, has failed to kill anyone in his two previous high-profile bombing attempts: the thwarted Christmas Day attack, which failed to detonate; and the near-miss 2009 attempt on the life of Saudi Arabia’s intelligence chief.

I think the first sentence is correct- if it wasn't intentionally a test run, it might be seen that way by the leadership, who are very flexible. The second part is kind of funny, but a little too dismissively snarky- the Christmas attempt came damn close to catastrophe, and the attempt on bin Nayif was essentially a success operationally- it was only an accident of positioning that saved his life. So let's not write them off. I don't think that is what Ackerman was doing, of course, but I don't want it to be read that way.

Checking in on cargo bombs.

2010-11-02T08:51:00.001-05:00

Am working on an editorial about the bombing attempt, and so am reluctant to discuss much here, out of respect for the people who are paying me (cows, milk, etc). I'm somewhat glad that I didn't, as I was initially not terribly impressed with the plot, and said so to the local Chicago media- goodbye, career in punditry.

The one thing I don't get, and have gone back and forth on, is why they were addressed to synagogues. Of course, it came out that they were most likely to be intended to explode midair, but there still had to be some thought as to what address to put on the packages. To me, there seems to be no better way to set off alarm bells then to send something from Yemen to Jewish buildings in Chicago, if just for the sheer incongruity. One train of thought could be the impression that the ZOG would be less likely to inspect these out of respect for our Jewish masters, though that is probably a stretch. A slightly more likely, though only slightly, explanation is that this could be seen as a win/win for AQAP. Like in the Christmas attempt, they got all the publicity in the world even with a failed operation, and now have seen the strengths/weaknesses of the cargo system. This is a worrisome thing when dealing with an organization as flexible and as able to learn lessons as AQAP. The sophistication of the bombs gives some lie to the idea of a dummy operation, but even in failure AQAP achieved some important goals.

Finally, I've been asked several times "why Chicago?"- the local media is of course obsessed with it. My answer has been: I don't know. At least in my head. But, in true pundit form, I can't answer that. Best guesses are that it is the most major American city to have not had a serious attempted or successful attack, and a strike in the heartland might help scare people who think terrorism is a coastal phenomenon, though I don't know who that would be. The other guess has something vague to do with Barack Obama and the symbolic importance of attacking his hometown. My dad thinks they are Packers' fans- and, honestly, that is as good as anything I have (and confirms my ill feelings toward AQAP).

I've read in a couple of places the speculation that this reflects animus toward cargo planes, the kind used to transport people to Gitmo. Please ignore anywhere you read that. By that theory, it is a damn good thing we didn't transport prisoners via nuclear submarine, lest our entire maritime defense system be threatened.

I'll let you know about the editorial, and continue to update around the edges, all the while lamenting today's electoral bloodbath. Given my true passion for US politics, don't be surprised to see 15,000 slurred words go up tonight on the election, which can be safely ignored.

Inspire Roundup and a Slight Disagreement

2010-10-13T11:50:00.000-05:00

Good reviews of Inspire at Jihadica, Selected Wisdom, Internet Haganah, and Jarrett Brachman. Most seem to be on roughly the same page as me (or rather I'm on their page)- this is pretty childish and not worth getting all worked up over.

Thomas Hegghammer makes this excellent point: "He (Samir Khan) must have some kind of communication link with the AQAP organization, because the magazine includes pictures from the field and interviews with AQAP members. At the same time, Inspire contains less original material than AQAP’s Arabic-language magazine Sada al-Malahim, which suggests he is further removed from the organization than his colleagues over at Sada al-Malahim."

Here is Clint Watts making a good point, but it is one where I have a very slight disagreement.

Khan’s strategy provides a diluted strategic vision for AQAP and AQ as a whole. I imagine Abu Musab al-Suri, AQ’s noteworthy strategist, would be extremely frustrated by such a weak plan of action. Shooting sprees and mowing down of pedestrians on crowded streets; these are not the attacks of strategic vision. Khan’s suggested strategy is more similar to the approach of anarchist groups. Khan’s “get your jihad on at home” approach:
1) points to no apparent strategic goal; how would this support the formation of a caliphate, promote Islamic law, deface a symbolic American target, or weaken the U.S.?

He's absolutely right; this is kiddie-terrorism, disgruntled mailman nonsense. I went over that in the last post (which while perhaps not as erudite as those above, has more gratuitous swearing). Where I slightly diverge is that there is a bit of a strategic goal here for AQAP, or at the very least an ancillary benefit. Samir Khan is nothing to the leadership, if he got taken out by a drone or (more likely) shot himself in the face while posing in a tough-guy picture, they wouldn't miss a beat. As Thomas pointed out, there is little direct contact. But what the hell- he doesn't cost a lot, if anything, and if someone in America takes out an intersection or mows down a Pier 1 while shouting in Arabic, there will be breathless media hype. AQAP is still consistently establishing their bona-fides, and if America can go nuts over something that cost them nothing it furthers their goal as appearing to traveling jihadis as the primary Qaeda group.

Yes, a lot of this will be the fault of an instant-react media and what Clint terms "ePundits". Would that I could make them stop reacting to nonsense- but that isn't going to happen. Overall, broadly, these attacks wouldn't do anything. Their impact would only be based on our reaction. But our reaction will be disproportionate. And for an AQAP that is looking to form an army, continuing to have their name out there is a victory.

Super-Lawnmower Death Cars and the Banal Petulance Of American Jihadis

2010-10-12T15:02:00.000-05:00

So the new Inspire is out (Aaron has it easily accessed at Jihadology), and the biggest story that seems to be coming out of it is of the American jihadi Samir Khan, who seems to be more important to the magazine than even Anwar al-Awlaki. Most stories I have seen focus on him, and how he escaped the FBI and was able to travel easily to Yemen even though he had been writing about jihad for some time. I agree that it is a failure, and one for which people need to be held to account, even though I have a feeling he is inflating his own derring-do.

What I want to focus own though is not how he did it, but who is is, and do so by looking at his writing and the magazine. There is no doubt that the magazine is technically sophisticated and shiny and an appealing, easy read. There are a lot of exciting pictures of explosions and short articles and little nuggets of infotainment*, which can suck in an internet-addled mind. I think that is the point of this: despite its sophistication, it is childish and patronizing and seductive to people who desire to be told what to think.

There is a little picture, for example, of President Obama, clipped and ragged to look like it was cut out of a magazine, with a quote by him saying "Our enemies are al-Qaeda who are trying to kill us but who have killed more Muslims than just about anybody on earth", followed by a parenthetical comment that he is "(speaking as if America hasn't killed more than a million Muslims in Iraq (before the invasion) and don't have blood on their hands from Afghanistan, Palestine, Sudan and elsewhere.)" Underneath that, looking like it was tacked on, in what looks to be like a psuedo-Arabic comic font, is the addition of "JUST RIDICULOUS!" The whole page smacks of a combination of office bulletin board and irritating, shrill political blog.

This is the point, though- it isn't for sophisticated jihadists, or even for people with particularily well-developed minds. They aren't the potential recruits in America or the West. The recruits are people who are bored, pathetic, juvenile, and lonely. The kind of people who watch Fight Club and see themselves in it, desperate for some excitement. They blame society for rejecting them, and take their outsider status as proof of greatness, even though they generally lack any ability or inspiration that creates real, artistic or political outcasts.

You can see this pretty clearly in Khan's writing. There is a lot of inflated self-importance mixed with classic teenage-like, petty-reactionary bullshit. There is a railing against people who work 9-5 jobs, who define themselves by what they buy or what they do. There is a pervasive feeling of "I'm better than you", which you can find in all sorts of unformed and scared minds, whether they take solace in Atlas Shrugged or On the Road (though the people who take only that message from On the Road are reading it wrong- as I did the first time, and as millions do. Khan's take is Kerouak as read by Qutb). I understand the appeal of this kind of thinking. I was 17 once as well. We live in strange times, and people want to latch onto something.

There is an easy correlation between these thoughts and violence. The desperate mind looks to violence as a way of making yourself greater and finally shaking off the shackles imposed on you by the norms and the Rotary Club and all those fucking jocks. I'm going to quote some of Khan's writing, which I think goes a long way of showing the child-like infatuation with violence that is inherent in most radicals, and particularly jihadis.

I am acutely aware that body parts have to be torn apart, skulls have to be crushed, and blood has to be spilled in order for this (a caliphate) to be a reality. Anyone who says otherwise is not prepared to make sacrifices that heroes and champions make.

One has to say: come on. Skulls have to be crushed? This is not a serious person, but rather one with deep-seated issues and a desire to be remembered no matter what. Heroes and champions? Please. Throughout the article he uses the a language mashed-up from comic books and revolutionary tracts, with talk of blood-suckers and parasites and the glory of violence. Of course these people are dangerous, but they are not super-terrorists.

This is also illustrated in what has been a much-discussed section of Inspire, the Open-Source Jihad, which gives tips to people in America who want to act on their own. The tip this issue? I wish I was joking when I said it was for "The Ultimate Mowing Machine". The picture is of a huge Ford pickup roaring through a storm, awesomely lit by lightning and looking for the world like it is just going to burst through your screen and drink your beer and take your woman, you Vespa-riding pansy. I am willing to bet it was taken directly from Ford- death to America, indeed.

Anyway, the tip is to attach some kind of blades to the front and just plow right the fuck into a crowd of people, mowing them down. No doubt this would be scary if someone could get it to work. But come on: this isn't how to sneak plutonium in though Canada. This is something a 9th-grader doodles while thinking about gym class. This is just stupid violence-porn, the kind of thing that Dylan Kliebold and Eric Harris might dream up. It is sick and twisted and simple enough to work, maybe (I don't know how exactly, but then I feel a sense of pride when successfully changing a tire, so what the hell do I know?). But we really can't afford to spend too much time worrying about al-Awlaki or Khan or Inspire helping people bring us down from the inside. Fighters and real jihadists are far more worrisome than the sugar-high ravings of outcasts. Just give them some time and they'll find out about The Doors, and their minds will be open, man.

(Note: there is of course a real threat, particularly from disaffected Muslims, especially in this strange time of Muslim-baiting by the right, but for terrorism to work you have to be terrified, and Inspire is more ridiculous than anything.)

*It is strange to me that spell-check accepts "infotainment" but rejects "derring-do". There is a broader point here, but it mostly makes me sad as an old-timey kind of guy.

Aden-Abyan Army

2010-10-12T12:34:00.000-05:00

In his tape, Qasim al-Raymi announced the formation of an "Aden-Abyan Army" to directly fight against the government. This will remind Yemen-watchers of the old-school Aden-Abyan Islamic Army, or the AAIA, in English shorthand. I suppose, for a strategist like al-Raymi, there is no "I" in "Aden-Abyan Army."

I really apologize for that, and will now get to the important part of this.

Announcing the formation of an army is a lot different than having one, of course. But AQAP has never been much for idle threats or cheap bluster. A question that a lot of people might have is: how is this any different than what they had? The answer, glibly, is this: an army consists of foot-soldiers who have more talents than merely exploding.

Here is a good quick read on this phenomenon- a post by Clint Watts over at Selected Wisdom called "Foreign Fighter Terrorism: Worry More About 'Fighters' Than 'Martyrs'". Basically, when people move over to al-Qaeda, they are asked if they want to be fighters or martyrs- martyrs are going to do suicide-bombings, for fighters, however, "the message morphs to something more complicated: “I’ll fight the infidel, but if I survive, I’ll probably head home or to another safe haven and ultimately fight again somewhere else.” While ‘Martyr’ recruits are tactically devastating, ‘Fighter’ recruits have far greater strategic impact. Only poor performing ‘Martyr’ recruits survive the battlefield but high performing ‘Fighter’ recruits are more likely to head back home (equipped with skills and combat experience) and become the thread for future jihadi campaigns at home or in the West." Clint also points out that, in the Sinjar records, Yemenis were behind only Algerians in choosing fighter over martyr- a full 61% choose to do something more long-term than strapping a bomb to their chest.

With this possible new army in Yemen, you have some of the fruits of fighterdom and the roots for other battles. Yemen will increasingly have a foreign fighter problem, and these people can be trained and dispersed. But you also have an immediate problem. It isn't well-known, because suicide bombings make for a more exciting newscast, and grasp our attention with an almost alien violence, but actual fighting forces have been a larger part of Qaeda's goal, particularly in Afghanistan, where in the 90s they helped the Taliban fight against the Northern Alliance. And while it is true that it was a martyr who killed Ahamd Shah Masood, the Qaeda fighting forces kept him forever on his toes. An army can continue to apply concerted pressure in tandem with the horrifying and random shocks of the martyrs.

This would make sense for AQAP to do- a two-pronged attack inside Yemen while still putting their message out to the English-speaking world and hoping to inspire more lone-wolf attacks (incidentally, I am working on my thoughts on the new Inspire, and will get to them after lunch). This continues to show that AQAP is able to take lessons from jihadi venues all over the world and integrate them into Yemen. It would be a nice to have dumb as they are barbaric, but in Yemen we don't have that luxury.

Anniversaries and Justice

2010-10-12T11:46:00.000-05:00

Anniversaries don't mean too much to me, at least analytically. We have a tendency to grasp at round numbers, imbuing them with a significance they don't really possess. There is an emotional importance to them, of course- and I am an emotional guy- but we always tend to put meaning on certain days, and get excited in the lead-up to them, and then ignore any lessons the day after. After all, there is no longer a definite magic to a ten-year, two-day memory.

I bring this up because, as you know, today is the 10-year mark of the attack on the USS Cole in the port of Aden, a major early blow by al-Qaeda. Today is good to remember those who were killed, to honor their memory, and to stand in humble awe at their sacrifice. Before that day, we didn't really know we were at war, and it wasn't until almost a year later that we as a nation really grasped that. After all, there was an intense and annoying election coming up. In popular memory, the tumult of the last decade started with the Florida debacle, but the roots of the waste can be tracked back to those beautiful, then red-tided waters.

There is both good and bad in the emotion of an anniversary. There is a clarification of time, and in this case it provides an outlet for sick horror and shock at the idea of a decade going by without the instigators of this massacre being brought to justice. This is the thrust of former FBI agent Ali Soufan's NYTimes editorial today, "Closing the Case on the Cole". In this wretched decade, Soufan was consistently one of the good guys, maybe one of the heroes. His investigation of the Cole attack, his doggedness in chasing actual justice, and his courageous stance against torture make him a figure to admire. Soufan points out the Yemeni idea of justice, and then has some ideas of what we should do with Yemen.

For example, Fahd al-Quso, who had confessed to his role in the Cole attack and was sent to prison, is now out; earlier this year he gave press interviews and was featured in a Qaeda video threatening the United States. Jamal al-Badawi, who confessed to being Mr. Quso’s boss and received a death sentence, has gone through a cycle of “escaping” from prison, receiving clemency and allegedly being rearrested. (blogger's note: there is controversy about Qusa's whereabouts and his status among the living; Greg continues to look at it over at Waq al-Waq.)
Meanwhile, the security situation in Yemen has deteriorated. Freed operatives and the availability of safe havens arguably make Yemen an even better base for Al Qaeda than Afghanistan or Pakistan, as does the fact that the government is distracted by a rebellion in the north and a secessionist movement in the south. Not surprisingly, Al Qaeda’s Saudi branch recently moved to Yemen and merged with the local faction to form Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.

In response, Washington is considering increasing military aid to Yemen, to as much as $1.2 billion over six years, up from $155 million in 2010. But it should do so only if it wins from Yemen a guarantee that it will be consistent in its fight against Al Qaeda.
An important test of that commitment should be how Yemen responds to a long-overdue request that Mr. Badawi and Mr. Quso be handed over to American officials to be properly prosecuted. Extraditing the two men would also help with another problem connected to the Cole attack: the case against Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, the plot’s alleged mastermind, who has been in American custody for almost eight years.

It is at the end that I begin to (very respectfully) disagree, though I don't feel particularly good doing so. Ignoring that al-Qusa may not be in Yemen, or even be alive, extradition might not be the best way to help with Yemen's stability. If these men aren't exactly heroes, they have protection, and their protection is something Salih can't afford to mess with, nor to tamper with any deals he might have made (although it is clear one way or the other that al-Qusa is still involved with jihad).

As this blog has irritatingly, and others have more eloquently, argued, so much in Yemen is negotiation. It is frustrating, but for people to be peeled off AQAP there needs to be an element of trust, and being turned over to the US would violate that trust. Bad people need to be let go- provided there isn't recidivism- in order to convince other bad people to stop being terrorists. It clearly isn't a fool-proof system, and it fails as often not, but 50% is still a better percentage than zero. Even 5% is.

So then the question is: which is more important: justice? Or victory? I would love to see these men in jail, sitting idly in a federal supermax for the rest of their stunted and brutal lives. But forcing Salih to choose between appeasing the US and local needs will destroy even our tentative and unreliable relationship, and make it much harder to help produce a relatively good outcome in Yemen. Of course, the odds of that outcome being good are small, so why sacrifice justice for that?

I don't have an answer; even the question makes my head hurt. But these are the questions we need to ask ourselves. These wars, or this war, or this action, or whatever it is, do not allow for easy and comforting answers. Right or wrong are silly and unrealistic options. Ten years on, I don't think we've figured out the ugly truths of this struggle.

FPRI Video

2010-10-08T20:43:00.000-05:00

Here is video and audio (and both at the same time!) of Chris Boucek, Barak Salmoni and me at the FPRI conference last week. I am linking to the Yemen panel (NSFW!), but you can navigate yourself around and watch the whole thing, if you have the time. Or spread it out over a few days. Make it a treat for yourself after a day well spent.

Warning: I apparently say "um" about a million times more than I had thought.

Waq al-Waq

2010-10-07T11:03:00.000-05:00

For those that didn't see, Greg blogged up a storm yesterday at Waq al-Waq- the little fella just can't stay away. This included live-blogging the al-Hurra Open Hour that I was on. Live-blogging isn't easy, and he did an admirable job. The other two pieces are more noteworthy, but one I will talk about in another post, coming shortly. Go to Waq al-Waq- Greg is just reminding us why we miss his blogging. But, then, it is hard to get much computer time in a Federal Supermax, so we should be grateful for what we get.

AQAP's Threat

2010-10-06T12:36:00.002-05:00

Nasser Arrabyee reports US Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs William Burns saying that, in Yemen, terrorism is "a real challenge". This is correct, if pretty damn clear. He didn't mean it as a revelation, but as a commitment, while still talking about the need for social and economic development.

In light of this, and especially with the backdrop of the attacks on British diplomats and a French worker for an Austrian oil and gas facility, I think it is important to highlight what the real threat, and real challenge of AQAP is. (Note: as of writing, it isn't confirmed that AQAP was behind either of these, but it bears their hallmarks, as we'll discuss. And even if they didn't do these specific attacks, they've done plenty of others like them, so the point stands.)

AQAP cannot take over Yemen- I don't think they would even want to (would you? I mean, really). We aren't looking at a potential Taliban situation here, where atavistic militants grab the wheel of state. And, as has been argued here and elsewhere, they aren't Yemen's biggest problem- certainly the Southern Movement and possibly the Houthi rebellion pose a greater threat to Yemen's viability as even a semi-centralized state. This is without mentioning the huge demographic, economic and ecological catastrophes which aren't so much looming as busy breaking down the gates.

I think you can best sum up AQAP as a "threat multiplier". They are able to both take advantage of and exacerbate existing problems. Dependent on tourist dollars? Attack tourists. Hoping to spur new investment in oil and gas? Attack oil and gas facilities. Chaos in the south? Move operations there, forcing the government to attack, create more IDPs, and further alienate the population from San'a. And, if the British government is taking the lead in providing aid and assistance, make it deeply uncomfortable for them to be there.

None of this is new, nor is any of this unusual for a terrorist group. But I think it puts AQAP in context. They have shown themselves to be masters of the kind of asymmetric warfare that is perfectly suited for Yemen. I can't tell you if it would work elsewhere, or who might have been better than them, but I also don't really care (I mean, I would be interested, but when talking about Yemen it doesn't matter). They are giving a plate-spinning government a constant sense of whiplash, and their ability to move and regroup ensures constant reaction instead of action.

This poses a serious challenge- only going after AQAP makes it impossible to tackle the other, more legitimately important issues, but not going after them allows space for further disruptions. Nothing major, perhaps, but when you are as on the edge as Yemen, nothing is really minor.

Incidentally, I'll be on al-Hurra today from 4-5 EST discussing these things, if anyone is flipping through channels and decides I'm a lot more interesting than playoff baseball. I would politely disagree.

EDIT

Nasser is also reporting that the British government "would redouble its determination to help Yemen overcome its challenges after a British diplomat was slightly injured in a terrorist attack..." So this might backfire on AQAP, but I would have to guess they are also going to redouble their efforts.

Also, thanks to Haroun al-Amriki: Sabanet is saying the government has apprehended the shooter of the Frenchman, and that he is a security employee at OMV, the energy firm. So who knows? Might not have been AQAP; could have been just a dispute or something else (which is no comfort to the victim, obviously). Regardless, AQAP does target oil and gas facilities, so the above points are no less kosher.

Rare Pop Culture Post

2010-10-05T10:34:00.000-05:00

This is indulgent. Over at the AVClub, Steven Hyden is beginning a new series on music in the 90s, and the rise and fall of the "alt-rock" era. I like it because he seems a lot like me- someone who liked music, but didn't closely follow it until that time, so when Nirvana came out it was a shot from out of the blue. These two paragraphs do an incredible job of capturing what that was like without over-stating the case. It is silly to say Nirvana changed the world; it isn't silly to say it changed the world for some individuals.

Nevermind probably would not have impacted me in quite the same way had I been aware of the context it came out of; had I been a little older and a fan of college radio, I’m sure it would’ve just been another record that I liked about as much as Bandwagonesque or Green Mind. But Nirvana was not a band I had to discover; it came right into my world, and discovered me. This is something Nirvana still doesn’t get enough credit for: Kurt Cobain turned himself into a radio star at a time when somebody like him becoming a radio star seemed unfathomable. So, yeah, it’s worth noting that “Smells Like Teen Spirit” sounds like Pixies, and that “Come As You Are” is a direct lift from Killing Joke’s “Eighties.” But Pixies and Killing Joke never got played on the radio in places like Appleton. Nirvana did, and this fact alone makes that band more important than any of Cobain’s underground precursors, who only started to matter on a macro level because they were Nirvana reference points.

It’s hard to convey today how revelatory it was hearing “Smells Like Teen Spirit” come out of your parents’ car stereo for the first time, but this was a bona-fide, according-to-Hoyle, head-slapping pop-culture surprise of the highest order. By the time I started 7th grade, I had already absorbed enough bad TV and cut-rate pop music to get a sense that culture unfolded in a predictable series of fads and trends; nothing ever came along to upset the applecart. But Nirvana clearly was not part of that. It didn’t matter that the band was on a major label; that was just underground-rock semantics and I didn’t speak that language yet. These guys were not supposed to be here, on MTV, sandwiched between Jane Child and Lisa Stanfield videos at 1 p.m. on a Tuesday. Nirvana finding you was like being sucked into a whole new reality tucked inside the simpler, grayer world you’d always known. All of a sudden it was just there. If something this incredible could exist in the world right under your nose until it streaked in seemingly out of nowhere and smacked you repeatedly across the face, what in the hell else was out there?

The whole article is really well-written and insightful, and I am looking forward to the rest of the series. I think this kind of hit me because we were drunkenly listening to Unplugged on Friday night, and although I have heard it a million times before, I was still stunned by just how gripping and powerful and sad and beautiful an album that was- a quieter Kurt at the height of his powers. As the years have gone by I've tempered, somewhat, my over-the-top love for Cobain, and have for the most part left Nirvana off my current playlist. But whenever they come on, especially the Unplugged version of "In the Pines", the great Leadbelly song, I'm always moved and surprised- because great talent should never stop surprising. In Kurt, immense talent, passion and pain existed, flourished briefly, and then disappeared.

Holy shit, I feel old.

Awlaki Not to Be Extraditied From Yemen?

2010-10-05T09:51:00.000-05:00

Foreign Minister Abu Bakq al-Qirbi seems to say so.

Minister of Foreign Affairs Abu Bakr al-Qirbi said that Yemen will not extradite the US Scholar from Yemeni origins Anwar al-Awlaqi to the United States. He affirmed that the scholar accused of links with al-Qaeda is now in the area where security forces are chasing al-Qada elements.

This probably isn't going to go over very well, but Yemen has to play a dangerous game here- pleasing the US without alienating its own citizens, who still remember the kidnapping and trumped-up charges against Sheik Moyyad by the United States (for those who don't remember, the Sheik was arrested in Germany and brought to the US, where all accusations of helping Qaeda vanished. He was eventually convicted of supporting Hamas, which is not a crime in Yemen. Regardless of your feelings toward Hamas, this was bizarre and didn't present the US judicial system in a good light when it came to the GWOT. Legally, it wasn't any different than if we sent a swat team into Ibb to capture a local qat dealer- because qat is so very, very bad). The case against al-Awlaki is obviously a little more clean-cut, but when it comes to perception that doesn't matter. The government handing him over to a haughty and arbitrary United States is just another way they can be painted as lackeys to America (and probably Israel, because why not?).

Sadly, I think we're in a bind. We've trumped up this relative nobody to be the living, breathing embodiment of evil, the next Osama, a terrorist out of our nightmares, capable of riding into town wielding a sword made out of machine guns, or something. Yemen's unwillingness to extradite will make it clear to anyone with an opinion that they are an unreliable partner playing a double game and bent on making AQAP happy. This isn't the case- whatever Salih;s opinions are about Qaeda as a whole, AQAP is his enemy. He wants to get them, I think, but can't further and needlessly provoke the citizenry just so Sean Hannity doesn't call Obama a coward. Our breathless hype has made reconciling positions almost impossible. When we look back on the Yemeni chapter of al-Qaeda's history I think the relentless overstatement of his importance will be the most baffling thing.

"Our Man in Sana'a"

2010-10-04T12:16:00.000-05:00

I'd be remiss if I didn't talk about Ellen Knickmeyer's piece in Foreign Policy, and you all know how much I hate to be remiss. The article is about how President Salih is corrupt and mismanages the country. This is: not a surprise, but it is good to know just who we are getting into bed with.

I didn't have a problem with most of it, on the surface. It is an insanely corrupt government, and that is just killing Yemen. She does an excellent job of highlighting how corruption is destroying any chance of rebuilding an imploding infrastructure. And there is no doubt that Salih has made some criminally bad decisions, and indecisions.

But there are some strange things going on, outside of factual errors (such as saying Salih led the 1962 coup- he fought on the side of the Republicans, but was decidedly not a leader). For one thing, the decisions are presented outside of context. This blog always argues, at the risk of being a bore, that long-term thinking almost always has to be sacrificed to the alter of the immediate. This isn't good, but it also isn't terribly immoral- it is probably amoral. Considerations of the day are key, and the chaos the create down the road will be dealt with down the road. Obviously, this heightens the shuddering violence and instability of the country, but to present this as something unique to Salih is misleading.

A good example of it is this:

When it comes to short-sightedness regarding Yemen's best interests, Saleh and his ruling family circle have demonstrated a near unerring propensity to err since he assumed the presidency in 1978, after leading a military coup in 1962. Since then, Saleh has built a power system based heavily on buying the goodwill of Yemen's tribal leaders, allegedly paying them to deliver the votes of their people in election after election.

There is the coup part in there, but that has been covered (and I do like the phrase "unerring propensity to err".). It is the second sentence which weirds me out. This is presented as if it is something that Salih does because he is corrupt, and because he cares more about power than governance, rather than an inevitable feature of ruling Yemen. The tribes have always needed to be propitiated, and not just to get votes. Assuming another president could avoid this is unrealistic.

What gets me in the conclusion.

But if Saleh continues to refuse and delay reforms, the United States and its allies should do something inconceivable in the can-do war on terror: back off and let Saleh feel the pain of his sucked-dry economy and thwarted people. Rather than trying to prop up another wobbly tyrant, as in Afghanistan, the United States would help most by allowing Yemen's citizens, and potentially better Yemeni leaders, to finally have a say.

This reminds me of one of my favorite lines in literature, the last line in The Sun Also Rises. Brett wistfully and probably unrealistically says to Jake that they good have had such a damn good time together, to which he replies yes, "Isn't it pretty to think so?" There is a devastating mix of romanticism, weariness, cynicism and a touch of hope in it. But it never happened, it never was going to, and it being pretty is as far as the thought would go.

It is pretty to think that cutting back aid would allow a good government to spring into place, that backing off would do anything other than accelerate the chaos. But it won't- there isn't anyone with a power base to really run Yemen, and that is how we are forced to think. I am not saying that Yemenis inherently need a strongman or that Arabs just want someone to rule them or any of that claptrap, but that Yemen right now, with its hideous conditions, isn't able to transition from Salih to a competent bureaucrat with an efficient civil service humming beneath him. A lot of this is Salih's fault; a lot of it is in the system. No one wants to support him forever. I'd love it if it were possible to replace him with someone better who could keep things together. But we don't choose the countries we are involved in, and can't choose the conditions we find them in. What we can choose is how to deal with them smartly and with long-term planning. In the short-term we need Ali Abdullah. We can't dreamily turn our back and wait until there is a more comfortable leader with whom to deal. Our policy has to know this, but also to help ease into the next five, ten or twenty years. Anything else is an exercise in feeling good at the expense of our security and those we are ostensibly helping.

As always, the policy of AJG is to allow the person I've needlessly attacked to respond, in full and unedited, with as many attacks at my learning, character or grooming as desired. Ellen Knickmeyer, if by some chance you are reading this, please feel free to drop me a line and open a debate.

Exciting Stories for Cool Kids!

2010-10-04T11:48:00.000-05:00

That title seems more gripping than "A Few Links About Aid In The Arabian Peninsula". I think it will also be the title of my forthcoming 1940s-style mystery serial. Anyway.

The first link is from Nasser Arrabyee, about Germany providing some 110 million bones, US, to Yemen for aid projects such as water and other infrastructure needs. This is good, of course. It does, however, highlight a troubling trend, at least in the long-term: the perception that aid comes in two different ways- the US provides guns to the regime, and Europe provides what the people actually need. This is balderdash, or maybe poppycock- the US is also providing hundreds of millions in direct aid. But it is also giving over a billion in military aid, and has trumpeted that number far louder. I understand there are domestic reasons for wanting to highlight the exploding side of aid rather than the weak and palsied "keeping people alive" side of it- that is one of the seemingly unavoidable stupidities in our political climate. But the dangers of this barely need to be written. If the only perceived US footprint is a boot- regardless of how accurate that is- we lose. Maybe not in the short-term, but in the extremely medium term. The US is the primary foreign target of jihadi rhetoric. Even if there is a tacit agreement among the Friends of Yemen- we provide guns; you: butter- and even if the end result is the same, the story of the US propping up an apostate dictator to crush the little guy is a propaganda coup. The US needs better PR on this.

A slightly more difficult question is the proposed $60 arms deal to Saudi Arabia. This has been percolating for a while, but here is the briefest summary, from the CFR website.

Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states have recently ordered U.S. weapons worth around $123 billion. The largest deal, if approved by Congress, would be a $60 billion package of U.S. arms for Saudi Arabia, including eighty-four new and seventy refurbished F-15 fighters, supplied largely by Boeing, as well as seventy Apache helicopters, seventy-two Black Hawks, and thirty-six Little Birds.

On the above link there is also a learned debate about the merits of such a sale, mostly revolving around whether it will provide a good counterbalance to Iran. I don't feel qualified to weigh in on that question, so instead I'll talk about the potential impact on Yemen. I know, weird twist, right?

The helicopters scare me. The Sauds have never exactly been reluctant to interfere in Yemen, physically if needed. This was shown again last year, when they foolishly enmeshed themselves in the Houthi war. And what is the point of fancy new equipment if you can't use it? I don't doubt the Saudis are very concerned with Iran, but it is a mistake to think that Yemen is an afterthought for them. The odds of new, well-publicized US arms being used in Yemen are pretty short. I'd take that bet in a heartbeat.

And then what? Well, nothing unites Yemenis like Saudi interference. Even those who were on the side of the government liked seeing the overbearing older brother get their nose bloodied in Sa'dah. It is another great marketing gimmick for AQAP and for the Houthis- the US is selling arms to two corrupt governments in order to crush you. Even if we discount the propaganda bonus, Saudi involvement further complicates an impossible situation in the north- our goal is to keep Yemen from falling apart, not speed that up. Of course we're going to sell arms to the Saudis, but we also really need to keep an eye on how they are used.

A few links, Yemen-related

2010-09-30T16:20:00.000-05:00

Chris Boucek has a new book out on Yemen: Yemen on the Brink, published by Carnegie. I think it is a collection of essays (the titles look familiar). Put this on the "to-read" list, for sure. Chris' insights and research are always extremely valuable.

Oliver Holmes has a gripping story in Time about the children of Sada'a- they have known war and displacement for 6 years; there is no way that doesn't warp you. Along with the basic demographic and environmental issues Yemen is facing in the medium-to-long term (and yes, the short) this will only add pressure. It could be noted that if things continue to go poorly in the south you can have a pincer movement of trauma.

This makes twice today I've linked to Time, which I think puts the total times this blog has done so at two.

Finally, here's a story about what else was potentially foiled in the Hawta battle: a "plot to kill senior military officials and foreign targets". This is fairly predictable, even if it doesn't fit our usual conception of terrorism. AQAP will strike at the US or Europe or elsewhere if the opportunity presents itself, but right now it is focused on destabilizing the government through attacks and assassinations. This is why I think it is useful to look at them as primarily a rebel group with ultimate jihadi goals. They aren't entirely a rebel group, like say the Houthis, but many of their motives and methods are the same. It will be interesting to see how it plays out as they more prominent in the jihad community and continue to attract foreign fighters, many of whom won't really care about the immediate Yemeni goals. I think whether or not the organization can survive will depend on how much influence al-Wuhayshi will be able to impose on his new troops. If they can keep his vision and patience as a guiding light, they will continue to grow as a threat, perhaps exponentially. If not, the leadership of AQAP has shown no revulsion at taking out their own- which could provide a fatal distraction. I am not currently willing to hazard a guess as to which way it will go, but an influx of fighters could provide a way to destabilize the group itself.

This seems like it should be its own post once I get my head around what I am trying to say.

Scariest read of the day

2010-09-30T15:58:00.001-05:00

Shockingly, it isn't about Yemen (yup- I am going to go one post not talking about Yemen). Barton Gellman in Time has an up-close and well-reported look at extreme right-wing militias, many of whom think war against the government is both inevitable and desirable. It is unsettling- you want to think of these guys as toothless (literally and figuratively), but they have weapons, oftentimes a feverish religiosity, and a deep-seated conviction that the government is illegitimate and that they are the representatives of the people's will.

OK, maybe this is about Yemen. The parallels with AQAP are pretty striking, anyway.

Here's a money quote, and a perfect example of cold-blooded sociopathy wrapped in a bogus cloak of Constitutionalism.

Regardless of what conscience tells them, what chance do would-be armed rebels possibly have of prevailing against the armed might of the U.S.?
One answer comes from former Alabama militia leader Mike Vanderboegh, who wrote an essay that is among the most widely republished on antigovernment extremist sites today. In "What Good Is a Handgun Against an Army?" Vanderboegh says the tactical question is easy: Kill the enemy one soldier at a time. A patriot needs only a "cheap little pistol and the guts to use it," he writes, to shoot a soldier in the head and take his rifle; with a friend, such a man will soon have "a truck full of arms and ammunition." Vanderboegh is hardly a man of action himself, living these days on government disability checks. Even so, when he wrote a blog post in March urging followers to protest the health care bill by breaking windows at Democratic Party offices, they did so across the country.

Anyone else love that this clown lives off the government?

I think it boils down to self-pity, in the end, and a rage against your own impotence. Regardless of the proximate cause- taxes, the ATF, the scourge of insurance companies no longer being able to deny pre-existing conditions- it is about bored people trying to make something heroic about their lives and being desperate to blame others. Which I get, and there is certainly a lot of truth in thinking that large and powerful forces don't give a good goddamn about you. However, that, among other reasons, is why I am a liberal. For all the massive flaws of elected officials, I trust their response to citizenry a damn sight more than enormous corporations. It is a bit disgusting and a large part terrifying that there are some people who disguise treason in the cloak of patriotism.

Incompetence? Complicity? Or Bad Luck?

2010-09-29T13:23:00.000-05:00

Nasser Arrabyee has an excellent piece on the escape of many AQAP fighters from the battle of Al Huta. He calls it the "hit and run" style of fighting. I don't know if this is deliberately Fabian, but it might be a pattern. This isn't the first time AQAP has been surrounded and about to be crushed by the government before slipping away (not all of AQAP, of course- they are too diffuse to be slaughtered in one battle). So this raises three possibilities. Probably more, actually, with many sub-possibilities, but I've already typed the word "three", and I will be damned if I backspace.

1) Incompetence. The Yemeni army, even with US training, isn't exactly a skilled and professional fighting force. Sure, they stopped the pipeline attack, and that was good, but even with overwhelming numbers they were unable to capture or kill a cornered and desperate force.   They are trying, but just don't have the abilities or the leadership to have anything more than sporadic and limited success.

2) Complicity. This is the conspiracy angle. Salih loves getting US dollars, and knows that he has to be a willing partner. The attack, following Brennan's visit, was a great example of a dude firmly on our side in all this. He was trying to level a great blow against his and America's mutual enemies. But letting them slip away ensures more dollars.   It is the double game we're all familiar with- taking money but letting the problem continue, on order to keep taking money.

3) Bad luck. Tough terrain, hostile locals (it was in the south, where there is already seething anger at the government), a quick and slippery opponent. At Tora Bora, bin Laden and co. managed to slip away from the greatest army the world has ever seen. How can you blame the Yemenis for similar misfortune?

Temperamentally, I tend to lean toward 1 or 3- human events are far more the product of chance, circumstance and lack of planning than they are the result of conspiracy or long-term duplicity. This is especially true in Yemen, where long-term planning is often over-whelmed with the immediate needs of the day.

Now, Salih has obviously played the double-game before, fighting some terrorists but coddling others. As I've argued before, I don't think this is sign of bad character- it is a sign that he is the President of Yemen, not the United States. It is childish to think that he, or any other leader, would act solely and 100% in line with the US.   That said, I think that he is concerned with beating AQAP, since they are a constant thorn in his side and are intent on bringing him down. My take is that while Salih wouldn't mind stretching things out, and almost certainly will, he also wants to successful operations- and not just for PR.

If this pattern continues though, I might be forced to change my mind and delete this post and swear all of you to silence, under penalty of torture. But for now I'd be interested to hear which of the above three readers think is closest to the truth, or something else I haven't thought of.

Foreign Fighters

2010-09-28T23:23:00.000-05:00

I just spent a couple of days at the Foreign Policy Research Institute's Foreign Fighters Conference. I was lucky enough to be on a panel with Chris Boucek and Barak Salmoni, both of whom blow me away with their knowledge and insight. It's a real kick to get to do things like that. The whole conference was fantastic, with excellent panels on Somalia, the Maghreb (a region that almost never gets talked about) and Af/Pak, as well as a free-wheeling and even contentious discussion of recent trends in the foreign fighter phenomenon. The FPRI will have the whole thing on their site soon enough, and maybe we can get more into the latter discussion then (I don't want to summarize). One of the things I got out of it was the lack of need for a comprehensive model when discussing these things, even though a model is sexy and elegant and has the veneer of summation. Everything is local and context-specific, and any unified theory will have more exception than rule.

One thing that was brought up in our Yemen panel, both by Chris and Barak (but not by your scribe) was the strange division between Yemen and Somalia. This is something I have talked about, but not terribly well. Those two countries are very close and have a lot of ties. Political shorthand often obfuscates reality. We see Yemen as a Middle East country and Somalia as an African one, but that distorts geographic facts. Barak proposed calling the area the Northeast/Horn of Africa Continuum (or something along those lines- I didn't write it down), which would help to focus our thoughts, even if it is tougher on the tongue. Chris elaborated on that, pointing out how in academia, politics and especially in the military these are in separate branches, even though they have a vital relationship.

My own contribution was about how the local context of Yemen could affect foreign fighters who are rushing there full of adventure and C4. I think they will be a problem, but I am also pretty convinced that unless al-Wuhayshi can keep a strict control over the fighters, they will be an uncomfortable graft on the population. AQAP has done an excellent job so far of cultivating tribal relationships, and this is a delicate balance. I think that a glut of Pakistanis and Egyptians and even annoying Americans who got dumped and decided that was cause for jihad could potentially turn the population against them. Who the fuck likes new converts?

I also want to thank Jihadology's and AJG buddy Aaron Zelin, as well as reckless hobo Greg Johnsen for watching the webcast and sending in questions, though I don't think I answered either.

Laptop James Bonds

2010-09-23T18:55:00.000-05:00

Esquire has a neat little article about counter-terrorism blogs, with a nice mention of Waq al-Waq (and includes, among others, Jihadica and the Jawa Report). We are all lumped under the flattering headline of "Laptop James Bonds". I suppose I'd pick Sean Connery, but am more likely more like Roger Moore.

Apology

2010-09-23T11:35:00.000-05:00

In the post two below, I sort of half-jokingly linked to Sarah Palin's Twitter feed. I apologize to anyone who got sucked into a quagmire of paranoia and self-righteous anger. Such as this.

Left: how can u "take on" the Tea Party? It's a MOVEMENT...of the people; u "taking on the people"? Did u really not know it's not 1 party? 9:09 AM Sep 21st via Twitter for BlackBerry®

With all the talk from the Left re: who funds Tea Party Americans, one might point out the Left's "tea party" is Acorn, funded by Fed Govt 7:57 AM Sep 21st via Twitter for BlackBerry®

These two posts contain 15000 examples of contradiction, ignorance, conspiracy-addled twaddle, and logical impossibilities. Can you name 7?

The big story

2010-09-23T11:32:00.000-05:00

Obviously, the big on-going story is the fighting in Hawta between the government and al-Qaeda. Anwar al-Awlaki may or may not be trapped, depending on who you believe less. There have been casualties on both sides. I don't think we'll know the full story of this battle for a couple of weeks. Right now, it looks as if it may be a hinge moment, but those moments are recognizable only in retrospect, and what seems important now may end up being nothing. We've been down this road before, so I don't want to jump to any huge conclusions.

But one undeniably interesting story is this, from The Yemen Observer.

A Yemeni tribal sheikh said Tuesday that al-Qaeda fighters who are being cornered in a mountainous area in southern Yemen threatened to kill him if he did not stop trying to negotiate with them.

“ I tried to contact with them for negotiations, but they told me to stay away from them, and they said they would kill me to closer to Allah (God) if I do not stop trying to talk to them,” Sheikh Hassan Ba Hanhan of Al Huta said.

Again, this shows how little respect AQAP has for some Yemeni norms, even as it seeks to use others to solidify itself. Right now, I am unsure if these threats come from a position of strength or weakness. My instinct says weakness. I think the ferocity of the fighting may have taken them off guard. Another interesting part of that story is this:

Yaslem Bajanoob, chairman of the local council of Mayfa’a, said that some people are hesitant to leave their houses and properties because they are afraid of plundering and looting acts if the army storms the village.

Bajanoob said that the tribesmen held meetings today Tuesday and warned from any looting and plundering of their houses and properties.

Many complications in these battles. Memories of the army looting and stealing after the 1994 war are still fresh. Even the most secular Southerner, overjoyed at the destruction of fanatics, also is wary of the army. I think that people tend not to want to project the messiness of their own lives to other countries. Looking abroad, we tend to see enemy or friend, without knowing how the two can overlap, even though we see that in our politics all the time. In Yemen, an enemy of AQAP can also be an enemy of Salih. We have to embrace complexity instead of ignoring it.

Obama's Decisions

2010-09-23T11:18:00.000-05:00

Aaron Zelin has a thoughtful article in FP's The Middle East Channel today. In it, he essentially asks: what happens if the Obama plan to eradicate AQAP works? Will they then again look away from Yemen and focus on something else, ignoring the structural challenges that remain? If they do, Zelin reminds us, we'll be dealing with this again and again. It will be like those Saw movies: endless sequels that nobody I know wants to see.

Zelin also brings up this provocative question:

Another issue has to do with the legality of targeting an American citizen. How the Obama administration decides to handle the situation with Anwar al-Awlaki will shed light on the United States' legal policy vis-à-vis the war on terror. Will it lead the United States down a slippery slope that further erodes the rule of law and its legitimacy in the eyes of the international community? Or, will it affirm Obama's statement in his inaugural address: "we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals."

I would quibble slightly with the wording- I think this will show if Obama wants to lead us back up that slope, since we sprinted and tumbled ass-over-tea-kettle down it the last nine years, to the point where it is hardly shocking that a citizen could be killed extra-judiciously. There is a case for it, of course- he is at war with the US. I'm not a legal scholar, though, and am reluctant to sound off half-cocked on this.

There has been some talk of trial, though that brings up another boatload of questions both legal and political. The Yemeni government might be more amenable to arresting and extraditing al-Awlaki if he can get a fair trial in the US. I don't like the "kill or ok maybe capture" strategy, especially for someone who is as low-level as al-Awlaki, but it is better than "kill at all costs". Obama has to be willing to withstand the empurpled bloviating of ignorant senators, commentators, and other slackers for whom nothing less than a "trial" at dawn followed by a noon execution will suffice. Long term thinking has to be the key. Zelin's article helps to shape that framework.

The Grand Chessboard

2010-09-23T11:05:00.000-05:00

Or the little one.

MOSCOW, Sep. 22 (Saba)- Yemen ambassador to Moscow Mohammed al-Hilaly denied on Wednesday reports over the Yemen national chess team played against the Israeli team within the framework o the World Chess Olympics in its 39th edition currently taking place in Russia.

In his statements to Saba, al-Hilaly said that the Yemeni chess team was surprised by the first round draw which placed it in front of the Israeli entity.

He added that the team withdrew from the game which made the organizing committee to set the Yemeni team as a loser and announced win for the Israeli entity team.

The ambassador emphasized that the news which circulated that the Yemeni chess team played against the Israeli team are false and baseless.

Because, you know, that would be awful.

Look, I am ok with Arab solidarity and defending the Palestinians, especially with a far-right government in Israel (though the timing of this is a little off). But sports, or at least competition, should generally be removed. There is no need to punish the participants.

This is one of those stories where you either get angry or shake your head and laugh. I am leaning toward the latter, mostly because of the terms "false and baseless", which is a level of outrage normally only seen when another candidate circulates rumors that you might, in fact, be running a child sex ring. Although I suppose that the late Bobby Fischer would approve of this tactic. Perhaps the Yemenis were just paying homage to one of the best?

The danger of al-Qaeda

2010-09-21T16:13:00.000-05:00

Heavy fighting in Hawta today, in the south. The army is taking it to AQAP, or at least trying to- it seems that the militants have a better chance at living once the army gives them their full attention. Although it might be assumed as much, I don't think this is a direct result of Counter-terrorism chief John Brennan's talks with Salih. I don't think the talks hurt, of course, but it has been my contention that Salih sees AQAP as enough of a threat to his regime that he wants to be going after him. As far as AQAP is concerned, there is no double game.

But that can also be a problem. The fighting is displacing thousands in an already explosive and on-the-edge south. This is creating yet another IDP nightmare for a government that may or may not have the will, but certainly does not have the means, to deal with it.

Brennan's advice to Salih has to mention that while he eradication of AQAP is a fine goal, try not to burn the country to the ground in doing so. There has to be support for what could be perceived as failure, even if it looks bad in the press and no-nothing mouth-breathers criticize Obama for "weakness." In a speech at the US Institute for Peace, Daniel Benjamin outlined the administration's strategy for Yemen, and it seems they are taking the long view, at least in theory. I hope this is the case. It is tough in today's 1-hour news cycle to be able to slow-foot things and work 10 years down the road, especially with such a volatile issue as terrorism. But to not do so is insane.

Programming Notes

2010-09-21T13:13:00.001-05:00

I'll be in DC next week for the Foreign Policy Research Institute's conference on "The Foreign Fighter Problem". My panel is on the Yemen Case Study (surprisingly enough), and the paper for the panel will be delivered by AJG pal Chris Boucek of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Also on the panel are Jeremy Sharp of the Congressional Research Service and WINEP's Barak Salmoni. We'll be starting at about 8:45 on Tuesday, which is unfortunate seeing as how the Bears have the Monday Night Game. The whole conference looks excellent, and if you are in the area and interested just run your mouse over this word, and you can get all the info you desire.

The Oath

2010-09-20T18:36:00.000-05:00

PBS will be showing The Oath tomorrow, the Laura Poitras documentary about Salim Hamdan and Abu Jandal. Here is the official blurb.

Filmed in Yemen and Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, The Oath interweaves the stories of Abu Jandal, Osama bin Laden’s former bodyguard, and Salim Hamdan, a prisoner at Guantánamo facing war crimes charges. Directed by Laura Poitras (Flag Wars, POV 2003; the Oscar®-nominated My Country, My Country, POV 2006), The Oath unfolds via a narrative rife with plot reversals and betrayals that ultimately leads to Osama bin Laden, 9/11, Guantánamo and the U.S. Supreme Court. Winner of the 2010 Sundance Film Festival Excellence in Cinematography Award: Documentary. A co-production of ITVS in association with American Documentary/POV.

And here is the trailer.

Check your local listings. I look forward to seeing it, and have heard nothing but excellent things. I'll try to have something up about it on Wednesday, but I am not a terribly good critic.

Waq al Whaaa???

2010-09-20T15:57:00.002-05:00

Sorry for the awful awful title. But Greg has emerged from his Pynchonian silence to blog back at Waq al-Waq. Catch it before it fades away, somehow.

Niqab News

2010-09-20T15:56:00.000-05:00

Haley Sweetland Edwards, who was once kind enough to post her thoughts on the niqab on this very blog, has a piece up in Slate's XX page. It is about France's ban of the burqa. It is well-argued, and shows the difficult and frustrating dilemma of taking your own commitment to plurality seriously- it is sometimes uncomfortable, and there is no hard line dividing right and wrong. It is easy on the extremes, but difficult the closer you get to the middle.

Haley is also now writing from the Caucuses at The Haley Bureau, which is an unassailably cool thing to do, and the official position of Always Judged Guilty is immense jealousy. There is a longer piece on the burqa controversy up there now.