the "war on terror" goes to yemen - Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community

roachboy · 12-28-2009, 08:23 AM

so it appears that the americans have been involved with the famous "training" and "advising" activities in yemen that have historically served the us so well and which have never gotten them involved with ground war. read on....

Quote:

U.S. Widens Terror War to Yemen, a Qaeda Bastion
By ERIC SCHMITT and ROBERT F. WORTH

WASHINGTON — In the midst of two unfinished major wars, the United States has quietly opened a third, largely covert front against Al Qaeda in Yemen.

A year ago, the Central Intelligence Agency sent several of its top field operatives with counterterrorism experience to the country, according a former top agency official. At the same time, some of the most secretive Special Operations commandos have begun training Yemeni security forces in counterterrorism tactics, senior military officers said.

The Pentagon is spending more than $70 million over the next 18 months, and using teams of Special Forces, to train and equip Yemeni military, Interior Ministry and coast guard forces, more than doubling previous military aid levels.

As American investigators sought to corroborate the claims of a 23-year-old Nigerian man that Qaeda leaders in Yemen had trained and equipped him to blow up a Detroit-bound Northwest Airlines jet on Christmas Day, the plot casts a spotlight on the Obama administration’s complicated relationship with Yemen.

The country has long been a refuge for jihadists, in part because Yemen’s government welcomed returning Islamist fighters who had fought in Afghanistan during the 1980s. The Yemen port of Aden was the site of the audacious bombing of the American destroyer Cole in October 2000 by Qaeda militants, which killed 17 sailors.

But Qaeda militants have made much more focused efforts to build a base in Yemen in recent years, drawing recruits from throughout the region and mounting attacks more frequently on foreign embassies and other targets. The White House is seeking to nurture enduring ties with the government of President Ali Abdullah Saleh and prod him to combat the local Qaeda affiliate, Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, even as his impoverished country grapples with seemingly intractable internal turmoil.

With fears also growing of a resurgent Islamist extremism in nearby Somalia and East Africa, administration officials and American lawmakers said Yemen could become Al Qaeda’s next operational and training hub, rivaling the lawless tribal areas of Pakistan where the organization’s top leaders operate.

“Yemen now becomes one of the centers of that fight,” said Senator Joseph I. Lieberman, independent of Connecticut and chairman of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, who visited the country in August. “We have a growing presence there, and we have to, of Special Operations, Green Berets, intelligence,” he said on “Fox News Sunday.”

American and Yemeni officials said that a pivotal point in the relationship was reached in late summer after separate secret visits to Yemen by Gen. David H. Petraeus, the American regional commander, and John O. Brennan, President Obama’s counterterrorism adviser.

President Saleh agreed to expanded overt and covert assistance in response to growing pressure from the United States and Yemen’s neighbors, notably Saudi Arabia, from which many Qaeda operatives had fled to Yemen, as well as a rising threat against the country’s political inner circle, the officials said.

“Yemen’s security problems won’t just stay in Yemen,” said Christopher Boucek, who studies Yemen as an associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington. “They’re regional problems and they affect Western interests.”

Al Qaeda’s profile in Yemen rose sharply a year ago, when a former Guantánamo Bay detainee from Saudi Arabia, Said Ali al-Shihri, fled to Yemen to join Al Qaeda and appeared in a video posted online. Several other former Guantánamo detainees have also joined the group.

Yemen’s remote areas are notoriously lawless, but the country’s chaos has worsened in the past two years, as the government struggles with an armed rebellion in the northwest and a rising secessionist movement in the south. Yemen is running out of oil, and the government’s dwindling finances have affected its ability to strike at Al Qaeda.

Meanwhile, there have been increasing Yemeni ties to plots against the United States. A Muslim man charged in the June 1 killing of a soldier at a recruiting center in a mall in Little Rock, Ark., had traveled to Yemen, prompting a review by the F.B.I. of other domestic extremists who had visited the country.

A radical cleric in Yemen, Anwar al-Awlaki, has been linked to numerous terrorism suspects, including Nidal Malik Hasan, the American Army major who faces murder charges in the shooting deaths of 13 people at Fort Hood, Tex., in November.

In the latest issue of Sada al-Malahim, the Internet magazine of the Qaeda affiliate in Yemen, the group’s leader, Nasser al-Wuhayshi, praised the use of small bombs — not just big ones — to attack an enemy, in an eerie foreshadowing of Friday’s episode on the plane to Detroit.

Yemen escalated its campaign against Al Qaeda with major airstrikes on Dec. 17 and last Thursday that killed more than 60 militants.

American officials have been coy about the role of the United States in the strikes, saying that they have provided intelligence and “firepower” for the efforts.

Yemen’s foreign minister, Abu Bakr al-Qirbi, said Sunday that Yemeni military cooperation with the United States and Saudi Arabia had increased in recent months as fresh intelligence confirmed Al Qaeda’s greater assertiveness in the country.

“There was intelligence that they were targeting the British Embassy and a number of government institutions as well as private schools,” Mr. Qirbi said in a telephone interview. “The second reason is that they have become more vocal, trying to show that they can undertake terrorist activities in an open fashion. So the government had to respond to that.”

The recent airstrikes were planned for two or three months, Mr. Qirbi said, but could not take place until there was fresh intelligence about the location of the Qaeda operatives who were the targets.

He called that intelligence — which included information provided by the United States — “the most important element” in the successful strike on the Qaeda members.

Mr. Qirbi added that although the United States provided Yemen with military hardware, the airstrikes were carried out by the Yemeni military alone.

Although the most important intelligence came from the United States and Saudi Arabia, other countries in the region have increased their financial assistance in recent months to help Yemen, said Mustafa Alani, a security analyst at the Gulf Research Center in Dubai. “There was a fear inside and outside Yemen that Al Qaeda was taking new ground, establishing training centers, making some parts of Yemen no-go areas,” Mr. Alani said. The United Arab Emirates and Kuwait in particular provided assistance, he said, because “they feel that sooner or later they will become targets too.”

In the past year, Al Qaeda has killed six intelligence officers in the provinces where it is based, part of an unmistakable campaign by the group to secure its sanctuary there, Mr. Alani said. The intelligence officers were trying to gather information on the group, and to disrupt its growing links with local tribes — a significant part of its strategy, Mr. Alani added.

The airstrikes of the past two weeks have been successful but have come at a price, Yemeni officials said. “They have been hit hard, but they have not yet been disabled,” said one high-ranking Yemeni official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the diplomatic issues involved. “The problem is that the involvement of the United States creates sympathy for Al Qaeda. The cooperation is necessary — but there is no doubt that it has an effect for the common man. He sympathizes with Al Qaeda.”

As if to reaffirm that message, Al Qaeda’s Yemeni affiliate released a statement to Internet sites on Sunday that put strong emphasis on the American role in the recent raids, deriding the Yemeni government for claiming responsibility.

Eric Schmitt reported from Washington, and Robert F. Worth from Beirut, Lebanon.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/28/wo...ef=global-home

first off, it's not surprising somehow that this infotainment would surface immediately after xmas at a point where lots of people are in holiday mode and not really paying attention. some things never change. following this logic, though, there should be some real stinky news coming on, say, thursday morning.

this is more than a little disconcerting. it would appear that the americans are messing about with another very unstable place and could easily find themselves again parties to a civil war that they themselves play a significant role in triggering (think iraq. think afghanistan)...

on the other hand, if you accept this "war on terror" logic, it would appear that it follows logically that the americans would get involved to some extent in yemen, if it is true that al qeada is using it as a staging area. and it makes sense that they would, assuming there exist resources adequate for moving such an organization around easily.

so the questions are:

were you aware that this was happening?
what do you see as the american objective here?
what do you see as likely to happen in the near term? do you think this the opening announcement of an already on-going engagement that is timed perhaps to also announce the coming of another military adventure?
what do you think the americans should do, if something other than what they're apparently doing?

personally, i think this is lunacy.
but i'll reserve my position until a bit later.

Lucifer · 12-28-2009, 09:24 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by roachboy

what do you think the americans should do, if something other than what they're apparently doing?

Personally, I'd say, "Stop travelling about the world, interferring in local politics and pissing people off", but I think that advice is about 50 years too late.

The_Jazz · 12-28-2009, 09:48 AM

Historically, it's interesting to see how the US went from predominantly isolationist to meddling in the course of a generation (the Monroe Doctrine notwithstanding). Our involvement in the Middle East, once the Barbary Wars ended, was nonexistant save tourism until the end of isolationism in the 40's.

I was aware that the US was undergoing a less-than-covert "advisory" buildup in Yemen. I can't say exactly when or where I learned that, but it seems I read something a few months ago in conjuction with some kidnappings there.

I think that the objective is pretty obvious. We've marginalized most of the jihadists in region to a great extent. They're no longer welcome in Saudi Arabia, at least openly. Most of the training grounds for these folks are currently either under our control or under attack by our allies (Pakistan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, etc.) or under the direct control of a regional power that sees no benefit in a direct attack (Syria and Iran). It seems that even Sudan is too chaotic for the jihadis to efficiently organize enough to be a direct threat to Americans, although I expect that won't last forever. The Ethopians have a vested interest in a stable Sudan, and the Ethopians are at best neutral towards the US.

I am assuming that the US forces are doing as advertised. I think that any of the hawks in the Pentagon that think that opening a third front in the GWOT will be quickly countered by cooler heads with a more realistic grasp of the capabilities of the Armed Forces (although that doesn't rule out cruise missle strikes, drones, etc.). I can't see the Obama Administration thinking that a third front is nothing more than a military adventure run amuck and ok'ing much more than advisors. The men and materiel just aren't there for such a concept, even with the wind-down in Iraq, which won't be completed for months.

Is it possible in a couple of years, especially with some provocative acts? Yes, certainly, just not in my near-term.

I don't see it as lunacy so much as a poorly-thought-out knee-jerk reaction.

roachboy · 12-28-2009, 10:44 AM

well, i see the whole logic of the "war on terror" as lunacy, so in a sense this is merely another episode.
there are many particular moments of incomprehensibility brought to you by this meme "war on terror"

anyway, the release of this wider bit of infotainment is obviously tied to this business:

US says aviation security system failed in Flight 253 case | World news | guardian.co.uk

because of the central position played in the story by going to yemen to study islam in setting up whatever is at this point known about the attempt to blow up a plane from amsterdam as it approached detroit on xmas day. so a system lapse allowed this guy to board in amsterdam....to counter that, the release of infotainment concerning actions ongoing in yemen, presumably aimed at getting at a root issue.

a small, mobile focused organization working underground with resources adequate to moving place to place will make a nation-state military entirely insane. what i see as a problem here really is that. tracking such an organization down is like trying to grab water with your hands. think the algerian war. the french managed to almost destroy the fln through 1956. to do it, they functionally declared war on the algerian people--torture, etc.---but within a couple years the fln was back, based in a different place, made up of different people most of whom were mobilized politically because of the french actions in 1956.
the french couldn't find the fln because there were lots of flns.
it didn't go well for them.

so i see basically a large-scale variant on this same dynamic taking shape. and this is one of those situations in which i'd rather be wrong, because the outcomes of the last go-round (you could also point to vietnam, but the parallels are a little looser) were not great. for anyone.

more later maybe.

Cimarron29414 · 12-28-2009, 11:33 AM

roachboy - you are one of "the americans" doing this. Your post suggests a distance that cannot be fabricated. The President you selected has authorized an expansion of the war on terror, yet again. "We americans" are doing this.

What is your alternative? Starting where we are, right this second, how would President roachboy fix the situation we find ourselves in?

roachboy · 12-28-2009, 12:02 PM

uh...it's a rhetorical tic. i'm accustomed at this point to opposing most military adventures undertaken by the united states. a function of my life-span i suppose, the time i grew up in, have lived in, so since vietnam. they always seem based on such stupid premises and lead to such fucked up conclusions. i understand in theory that i am among the americans in whose name this nonsense has been happening, but i oppose everything about it logically and politically--so sometimes it seems like there's this other place called the u.s. of a. that's populated by people i have nothing to do with and nothing in common with who use the name of the same place i happen to live to advertise and legitimate doing things that i often find to be entirely insane.

and to my mind, the whole "war on terror" is entirely insane.

but to answer the second part of your question: the massive incompetence of the bush administration has left obama boxed in on so many levels that my initial answer is that i'm glad i'm not president of the fading ship of american empire at the moment. on this matter, the unfortunate fact of the matter is that as a centrist from jump, obama accepted the notion that the "war on terror" made sense. so that's a difference. i don't accept it. i think it's nutty. so i wouldnt have been elected doubtless. not sufficiently manly for reactionary tastes i expect. and i don't like football. so not even amurican.

were i in control of this ship, i suppose i would place a whole lot more emphasis on getting israel to stop pulverizing the palestinian population in the west bank and gaza--to start doing stuff like letting in concrete for folk can build (they don't allow it for "security" reasons)...not only stop the settlements but start evacuating them, taking them down. dismantle the entire colonial apparatus in the west bank. accept the need for a viable palestine.

start allowing gaza to rebuild. end the blockade.

that would, i expect, change the climate pretty quickly.

i'm not sure i have an easy answer for what to do in either iraq or afghanistan--on iraq, conditions are quite different than we've been lead to believe (once again, we've been lied to, but no matter..i can post links if you like)...afghanistan seems a downward spiral that simply does not admit of a simple response. in a counter-factual world, i wouldn't have gone there in the first place, but that's fantasy. and the campaign's been run, when it has, quite badly. i don't support the "surge" but i don't have an alternative in mind.

as for yemen, i really don't see that this is a great move that's taking place--i don't see what it is to accomplish, and i see even less how it is supposed to accomplish it. the idea is obvious enough...but the route being chosen? it seems based on some vague hope that the desired results can be gotten to by proxy. and to be operating under the assumption that "advisors" does not mean ground engagement already. i think we're already in yemen, personally. like on the ground. maybe because it's easier than dealing with pakistan? maybe it's all theater. hard to know.

one thing i would expect though is that changing the us policy toward palestine would bring about alot more space for diplomatic and economic pressure to be brought to bear----using that route would be my preference. but the premise would have to be in place.

but these cheap calling-out games are little more than that. "yeah well what would you do?" as if you, the one asking the question, have the faintest idea yourself. easy peasy. whatever.

Shauk · 12-28-2009, 12:29 PM

Why do I get the feeling there is a larger tactic to all of this in play now? it's like a sheep herding tactic in action or something.

Like I'm guessing they took the intelligence, ran a bunch of scenarios and guesstimated the entire war from start to finish like a chess game, including where they would regroup, knowing they'd wind up in yemen at some point. This all just may be a bunch of chess moves to destabilize the entire middle east for U.S. acquisition at some point. I don't think the powers that be in the U.S. are simply going to be like "oh hey Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, we've dumped BILLIONS on you for our "humanitarian effort" to free your people from an oppressive tyrant, and spent over 8 years on killing insurgents who've launched like one successful attack on American soil ever. a minor threat compared to people who actually have standing military forces. But hey, when we kill him, we'll totally withdraw and just pay off this debt, pat ourselves on the back, and say it was justified national debt in the name of humanitarism"

Nah, they want to OWN that shit, sorry, we're going to own some of the middle eastern territories when this finally ends.

Right now, mentally, I think it's just an "us vs them" mentality and we want to take them for everything they have, and punish the governments of the countries who let it grow inside their borders by taking over and figuring out ways to profit from it to recoup our "Investment" in to this war.

Long term, it almost seems like they'd have to, cuz they've racked up so much debt that our current economic power just can't cash the checks they're writing right now.

Cimarron29414 · 12-28-2009, 12:42 PM

roachboy - The first part of my post was a negative reaction to your seeming to place yourself above "the americans." I understand your explanation, but I'm still grumbling a bit.

The latter question was not an insidious primer to be followed by "See, you couldn't do any better..." While I disagree with you on virtually every possible political position, I do respect your opinions and am genuinely curious as to your stance. Frankly, I appreciate the fact that you can say "I don't know". Too often, our politicians see "a problem" and quickly proceed to fixing it - regardless of whether the solution is better than the problem.

Like you, I don't have many answers either. Since we do not have the benefit of the intelligence gathering arm of our government, we will always be destined to making truly uninformed choices when it comes to protecting national interests. I believe this to be the case with Obama. It seems that as soon as he saw his first few intelligence briefings that he changed virtually all of his campaign stances on the GWOT. I often wonder why that is.

roachboy · 12-28-2009, 01:29 PM

i haven't time at the moment, so i'll maybe get back to this...but i don't see obama as having particularly backed off of any campaign promises insofar as the "war on terror" is concerned...but i was one of those people who wasn't particularly impressed with obama, who saw him as certainly far preferable to anything like the bush administration, but also as a centrist so nothing like what conservatives painted him as being. the central problem so far as i was concerned was that he accepted the "war on terror"--he said repeatedly (in the debates for example) that the plan was to end the excessive-to-explicitly-fascist practices foisted on the world by the bush people (gitmo, for example, which is en route--but the others? hard to say because of the raison d'etat established around the "war on terror")...drawing down in iraq (where reality is quite other than we have been led to believe it is--but this too is en route, albeit slowly)...and to focus on afghanistan, which he saw as the "legitimate" center of this "war."

so i see him as having moved in a straight line.
it isn't a line i agree with, but it is a straight line.
within the constraints imposed by the bush administration in all its grandeur of course.

ASU2003 · 12-28-2009, 02:23 PM

I think this method of fighting terror works better than invading a country and then trying to stabilize and rebuild.

Although I think the drones are getting used too much. They need to come up with a different way to covertly take out people who want to kill innocent people.

Then again, why is this in the media? No questions, no answers. Just get the job done, and don't mess up. The general public doesn't need to know and the enemy shouldn't know about the tactics used.

Cimarron29414 · 12-28-2009, 02:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by roachboy

i haven't time at the moment, so i'll maybe get back to this...but i don't see obama as having particularly backed off of any campaign promises insofar as the "war on terror" is concerned...but i was one of those people who wasn't particularly impressed with obama, who saw him as certainly far preferable to anything like the bush administration, but also as a centrist so nothing like what conservatives painted him as being. the central problem so far as i was concerned was that he accepted the "war on terror"--he said repeatedly (in the debates for example) that the plan was to end the excessive-to-explicitly-fascist practices foisted on the world by the bush people (gitmo, for example, which is en route--but the others? hard to say because of the raison d'etat established around the "war on terror")...drawing down in iraq (where reality is quite other than we have been led to believe it is--but this too is en route, albeit slowly)...and to focus on afghanistan, which he saw as the "legitimate" center of this "war."

so i see him as having moved in a straight line.
it isn't a line i agree with, but it is a straight line.
within the constraints imposed by the bush administration in all its grandeur of course.

I suppose I was referencing the endorsement, defense, and expansion of information collecting within and among U.S. citizens by the Obama administration. I believe this to be a huge 180 from the positions he took on the campaign trail and during his tenure as senator.

dlish · 12-28-2009, 06:36 PM

im not at all surprised that the US has had its intelligence gurus toiling in Yemen for a while now. The people of Sanaa are suspicious of outsiders, and saying anything not in line with the norm could get you into serious trouble.

But there's a line to be toed, and it usually is in Yemen. The really interesting thing about Yemen is that though the Saleh government 'runs' the country, the real powerbrokers isnt the government or any of its badly run agencies, but the powerful family tribes throughout the country. These tribes usually dont give much regard for politics, except when they need some infrastructre built or road laid. Thats when an unruly tourist gets kidnapped, not usually for monetary gains, but as a political pawn used by the tribes to get the government give in to its demands.

i'd agree that the jihadists have been marginalised in most of those countries, but they have been also marginalised in Yemen as well. With Al Qaeda largely unwanted in most arab lands, its only option is acceptance within other war torn nations like sudan, somalia or aghanistan. Whilst many of the arab countries still use torture as an interrogation method, and where the rule of law is as malleable as aluminium foil, jihadists usually tend to stay away from countr

Most yemenis are Zaydi's, who adhere to the Shia inclined school of thought, so having them accept an Al Qaeda ideology is far fetched, who just so happen to call shiites infidels or heretics. So those hawks who think they would fighting a nation of jihadists would be wrong to assume that a new front would be a fight against a nation of terrorists inclined with AQ. The yemenis remain extremely tribal and conservative, and loyalties and laws run along tribal lines.

Slims · 12-28-2009, 10:37 PM

I don't understand the opposition to this.

This plan involves providing aid which the Yemeni government has requested. We are helping to train government forces to better secure their own country.

Has the US later become involved directly in conflicts after our efforts have proven ineffective? Yes. But those are the minority. US Special Forces and other entities have been working for years in dozens of countries and we have not been drawn into war in the vast majority of them. In fact, most of our efforts are at least marginally successful.

When we have a situation where a country is decaying into lawlessness and it is in our own best interest to prevent that decay, it makes sense to at least attempt to stabilize that government. This applies even in those countries where we have engaged in direct conflict....we tried to prevent it and when it failed the military got involved in a more direct fashion. It is a correlation, but isn't causal in most circumstances.

dlish · 12-29-2009, 12:48 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Slims

I don't understand the opposition to this.

This plan involves providing aid which the Yemeni government has requested. We are helping to train government forces to better secure their own country.

Has the US later become involved directly in conflicts after our efforts have proven ineffective? Yes. But those are the minority. US Special Forces and other entities have been working for years in dozens of countries and we have not been drawn into war in the vast majority of them. In fact, most of our efforts are at least marginally successful.

When we have a situation where a country is decaying into lawlessness and it is in our own best interest to prevent that decay, it makes sense to at least attempt to stabilize that government. This applies even in those countries where we have engaged in direct conflict....we tried to prevent it and when it failed the military got involved in a more direct fashion. It is a correlation, but isn't causal in most circumstances.

welcome to the middle east..the clusterfuck of intervention by external forces.

The yemeni government doesnt need the help of external forces to keep it safe. it's more at risk from those that pretend to be working in its best interests.

you probably said it best yourself, most of your efforts have been at least marginally successful. i'm not sure how you measure success, but thats defintely not a statement of victory nor success by any means.

with one war winding down, there's bound to be a scapegoat somewhere. i'll give you a map of the middle east and a dart.

good luck

rahl · 12-29-2009, 08:25 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Slims

I don't understand the opposition to this.

This plan involves providing aid which the Yemeni government has requested. We are helping to train government forces to better secure their own country.

Has the US later become involved directly in conflicts after our efforts have proven ineffective? Yes. But those are the minority. US Special Forces and other entities have been working for years in dozens of countries and we have not been drawn into war in the vast majority of them. In fact, most of our efforts are at least marginally successful.

When we have a situation where a country is decaying into lawlessness and it is in our own best interest to prevent that decay, it makes sense to at least attempt to stabilize that government. This applies even in those countries where we have engaged in direct conflict....we tried to prevent it and when it failed the military got involved in a more direct fashion. It is a correlation, but isn't causal in most circumstances.

My opposition to this is that the US has failed in every military endevour since vietnam, in that we are attempting to stabalise a govn't, and we still haven't learned to mind our own business. People are dying on both sides and we are at best having no effect and more likely making things worse. The middle east is not like europe after ww2, we can't go in and help rebuild a backward religious society when they don't want our help.

dlish · 12-29-2009, 08:34 AM

who are you calling backward religious?

rahl · 12-29-2009, 08:35 AM

Govn'ts in the middle east, who base their political decisions and policy entirely on their religious beliefs.

roachboy · 12-29-2009, 08:40 AM

one way of looking at this is as a conflict over which state model is seen by the united states as functional these days--a relatively centralized state with a high degree of control, typically exercised indirectly (the american model) although there's no problem with old skool state of emergency-driven ugliness (egypt for example, with respect to political dissent). more decentralized or fractured states are apparently not able to co-ordinate action to suppress Problems from the american viewpoint. in the conflict region, afghanistan, pakistan and yemen have this structural situation in common. so much for federalism i guess.

this article talks in a bit of detail about al qaida in yemen:
Yemen is fertile territory for extremism as it tears itself apart | World news | The Guardian

and this outlines the dynamic of us involvement in yemen over the past year:

Al-Qaida: US support for Yemen crackdown led to attack | World news | The Guardian

the second is pretty interesting in particular.

dlish · 12-29-2009, 08:57 AM

with all due respect, but you obviously havent been to the middle east then.

lets see..

egypt
morocco
libya
lebanon
syria
jordan
turkey
iraq
UAE
Yemen

thats just off the top of my head..but none of these countries base their laws purely on religious beliefs.

Saudi maybe, but definately not the rest of them.

The vast majority of them base their laws on a mixture of religious and tribal laws ie. yemen, UAE, Oman etc but none rule by true islamic law except maybe saudi.

others like lebanon, turkey and syria dont base their laws on religious beliefs.

coincidntally i met one of the highest judges when i went to yemen last year. when i posed the question on whether he ruled according to sharia law, it was an emphatic no. taccording to him tribal law meshed through yemeni laws the same way sharia law was implemented into yemeni law.

as for backward...yemen and a few others may live in a time warp, but the vast majority of arabs are tech savvy intelligent people who just so happen to suffer from colonialist britains meddling

rahl · 12-29-2009, 09:12 AM

My comments were directed at the countries we are currently engaged in ( iraq, afghanistan, iran eventually) to me yemen is just more of the same from the US, we are meddling in affairs that are none of our business. The middle east is a cluster fuck that will most likely never accept a western way of life, and that's fine with me, it's their right to govern their country how they see fit. We have no business trying to tell them how to do it and I for one can't accept any reason for the needless deaths of our citizens or theirs in a historically futile effort.

roachboy · 12-29-2009, 10:20 AM

here's a piece from 2006 about the american "front" in the "war on terror" in the sahara.

Foreign Policy in Focus | The Collapse of the Second Front

it's interesting for alot of reasons, not least the fictional battles involving fictional groups affiliated in fictional ways with potentially non-fictional groups the result of which may or may not have been alot of running around in northern mali/chad it's hard to say.

security theater:
Security theater - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Slims · 12-29-2009, 10:21 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rahl

My opposition to this is that the US has failed in every military endevour since vietnam, in that we are attempting to stabalise a govn't, and we still haven't learned to mind our own business. People are dying on both sides and we are at best having no effect and more likely making things worse. The middle east is not like europe after ww2, we can't go in and help rebuild a backward religious society when they don't want our help.

I wasn't speaking of Afghanistan at all (which isn't in the Middle East, BTW).

I don't understand how you can even begin to make the argument that he US has failed in every military endeavor since Vietnam. Desert Storm was a big success, we crippled Saddam's Army and successfully liberated Kuwait.

OIF...Successful, the country is stable, we are beginning to withdrawal, the Iraqi Government is rapidly becoming self sufficient, we captured Saddam, and the quality of life in Iraq is now greater than it was under Saddam's Regime.

Panama....successful.

Grenada...Successful, and in fact they have a national holiday to commemorate our invasion and restoration of relative freedom.

Kosovo...Successful, we won even though we failed to prevent a lot of the killing due to limited, delayed involvement....but the Military operation worked well, the ethnic cleansing stopped, most of the refugees returned home, the principle actors were captured or killed with few exceptions and the region is far more stable.

And those don't mention all the major operations which never happened because US Military advisors were working quietly with countries in order to stop the spread of conflict...

powerclown · 12-29-2009, 12:31 PM

I like how Obama (codename: BlackBush-3) is also referring to America now as the "Homeland". Hoffnung und ändern!

Baraka_Guru · 12-29-2009, 12:43 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by powerclown

I like how Obama (codename: BlackBush-3) is also referring to America now as the "Homeland". Hoffnung und ändern!

"Homeland Security"
"War on Terror"
"Operation Enduring Freedom" (originally "Operation Infinite Justice")
"Patriot Act"

This isn't Nazi Germany, and it didn't start with Obama. It's the New American Century.

In some ways it's worse than Nazi Germany. You can't fight what you can't see.

And it's all insanity.

powerclown · 12-29-2009, 12:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Baraka_Guru

"Homeland Security"
"War on Terror"
"Operation Enduring Freedom" (originally "Operation Infinite Justice")
"Patriot Act"

This isn't Nazi Germany, and it didn't start with Obama. It's the New American Century.

In some ways it's worse than Nazi Germany. You can't fight what you can't see.

And it's all insanity.

All these phrases...I wonder who they are talking to sometimes. Themselves?

Baraka_Guru · 12-29-2009, 12:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by powerclown

All these phrases...I wonder who they are talking to sometimes. Themselves?

"The People"
"Fellow Americans"

powerclown · 12-29-2009, 01:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Baraka_Guru

"The People"
"Fellow Americans"

lol...

rahl · 12-29-2009, 03:25 PM

[QUOTE=Slims;2743421]I wasn't speaking of Afghanistan at all (which isn't in the Middle East, BTW).

I don't understand how you can even begin to make the argument that he US has failed in every military endeavor since Vietnam. Desert Storm was a big success, we crippled Saddam's Army and successfully liberated Kuwait.

OIF...Successful, the country is stable, we are beginning to withdrawal, the Iraqi Government is rapidly becoming self sufficient, we captured Saddam, and the quality of life in Iraq is now greater than it was under Saddam's Regime.
QUOTE]

Do you seriously think that thousands of dead american soldiers and hundreds of thousands of dead Iraqies since our occupation is a success? If so then you have a completely different view of success than most sane people.

As far as our "success" in the first gulf war, you are correct, we had an objective(defend the oil in kuwait) we did than and deterred saddam from invading further, and eventually he withdrew. That is a success in that we weren't there to try to spread our ideals or overthrow a regime, we were there to protect the oil.

KirStang · 12-29-2009, 03:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rahl

Quote:

Originally Posted by Slims

I wasn't speaking of Afghanistan at all (which isn't in the Middle East, BTW).

I don't understand how you can even begin to make the argument that he US has failed in every military endeavor since Vietnam. Desert Storm was a big success, we crippled Saddam's Army and successfully liberated Kuwait.

OIF...Successful, the country is stable, we are beginning to withdrawal, the Iraqi Government is rapidly becoming self sufficient, we captured Saddam, and the quality of life in Iraq is now greater than it was under Saddam's Regime.

Do you seriously think that thousands of dead american soldiers and hundreds of thousands of dead Iraqies since our occupation is a success? If so then you have a completely different view of success than most sane people.

As far as our "success" in the first gulf war, you are correct, we had an objective(defend the oil in kuwait) we did than and deterred saddam from invading further, and eventually he withdrew. That is a success in that we weren't there to try to spread our ideals or overthrow a regime, we were there to protect the oil.

I don't think we're in Yemen to spread our ideals and overthrow the regime?

rahl · 12-29-2009, 03:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by KirStang

I don't think we're in Yemen to spread our ideals and overthrow the regime?

I was referring to the current Iraq cluster fuck, in relation to the first gulf war. I don't know wy we're in yemen, but unless they attacked us we shouldn't be there. Since they didn't there is no justifiable reason for us to have a 3rd from now on the bullshit "global war on terror"

samcol · 12-29-2009, 06:56 PM

Why don't we take a step back and look at the fact that we don't really know what happened as there are some very strange events that took place. A key witness report I heard on a radio station today makes the whole thing sound very strange. It's a little long but worth reading.

Quote:

Kurt Nimmo
Prison Planet.com
Tuesday, December 29, 2009[/URL]

Detroit attorney Kurt Haskell appeared on the Alex Jones Show today and detailed his experience at the Amsterdam airport and on flight 253. Mr. Haskell provided information not covered by the corporate media.

In addition to a detailed retelling of the story he gave the corporate media, Mr. Haskell addressed the unprofessional and lackadaisical behavior of the FBI and airport security after the plane landed at the Detroit Metro airport in Romulus, Michigan. He characterized their behavior as a “complete embarrassment. They actually put us in more jeopardy than we were already in.”

Passengers were told to remain seated in the aircraft for 20 minutes after landing despite the fact security did not know at that point if there was an explosive on the plane or if the fire started by the suspect Umar Farouk Abdul Mutallab while on descent to the airport had spread under the floor in the cabin or to the fuel tanks in the wings.

After being allowed to disembark from the plane by officials, passengers were detained in customs with their carry-on luggage for six hours while they waited to be interrogated by the FBI, according to Haskell.

At this point a bomb-sniffing dog pointed at carry-on luggage in the possession of a man Haskell described as Indian around 30 years old. Officials led the man away to an interrogation room. Haskell said he was concerned because the bomb-sniffing dog had flagged the man, indicating he may have had explosives in his carry-on luggage. The Indian man was subsequently led away in handcuffs.

Following this incident the FBI moved the passengers to another location. “You’re being moved,” the FBI told them, “it is not safe here. I’m sure you all saw what happened and can read between the lines and why you’re being moved.”

Haskell said the corporate media refuses to cover this aspect of his story. He has repeated it to “countless” news agencies and they uniformly have not included it to his knowledge.

Mr. Haskell questioned why officials have not released the Amsterdam airport security video that will undoubtedly reveal crucial information about the “sharp-dressed man” who escorted a disheveled Mutallab to the boarding area. Haskell described the suspected terrorist as appearing to be a “poor black teenager.”

The well-dressed Indian man did all the talking. He insisted Mutallab be boarded on the plane without a passport and when an airport employee refused to do so Mutallab and the Indian man went to talk with a supervisor. The Indian man tried to pass off Mutallab as a Sudanese refugee and have him boarded despite the fact doing so would be in violation of regulations concerning refugees. In general, documentation must be provided by an embassy in order for refugees to board international flights.

Mr. Haskell did not see Mutallab again until the botched terror bombing inside the plane on the approach to Detroit. He did not know how Mutallab finally boarded the aircraft.

The FBI was not pleased with Kurt Haskell when they conducted a follow-up interview earlier today in Michigan. They showed him close-up photographs of various people, including Mutallab. “They kind of tried to trick me,” Haskell explained. The agents tried to pass off two photos of Mutallab as different people. Kurt asked the agents if they were attempting to impeach his story and smear him.

The Indian man was not included in the photographs.

Haskell asked them why he was not shown a full body shot of the suspect. Haskell was eight rows back from the suspect. The FBI agents did not answer and were displeased with the question. He also asked the FBI agents if it would be more appropriate to bring the surveillance video from the Amsterdam airport instead of still photos. “I don’t think they liked that comment from me,” Haskell added. The FBI said they did not have the videotape.

The agents showed Haskell a photograph of the man flagged by the bomb-sniffing dog and taken into custody in customs. “Isn’t this the man who had the bomb in his carry-on bag that you arrested in customs who you refuse to admit exists?” Haskell asked the agents. “They really didn’t like that comment from me and had no comment back to me but I said it sure looks like the man you refuse to admit exists.”

Kurt Haskell was circumspect and careful not to speculate during the interview with Alex Jones. He indicated he is only interested in the facts and does not want to endanger his version of events by speculating on motives.

Doesn't it seem pretty strange that this guy got special security clearance and was escorted onto the plane by a person who appeared to be in security or intelligence? The eye witnesses seem to be telling a different story than the government and media.

Also it has been reported that the entire flight was recorded with a personal camcorder

Quote:

"He sat up and videotaped the entire thing, very calmly," said Patricia. "We do know that the FBI is looking for him intensely. Since then, we've heard nothing about it."
Oconomowoc Family Survives Terrorist Attempt | Newsradio 620 - Milwaukee, Wisconsin News, Talk, Sports, Weather | Local Headlines

Maybe we should listen to the people who were there instead of beating the warm drum already as this event seems very strange to me.

rahl · 12-29-2009, 07:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by samcol

Why don't we take a step back and look at the fact that we don't really know what happened as there are some very strange events that took place. A key witness report I heard on a radio station today makes the whole thing sound very strange. It's a little long but worth reading.

Doesn't it seem pretty strange that this guy got special security clearance and was escorted onto the plane by a person who appeared to be in security or intelligence? The eye witnesses seem to be telling a different story than the government and media.

Also it has been reported that the entire flight was recorded with a personal camcorder

Maybe we should listen to the people who were there instead of beating the warm drum already as this event seems very strange to me.

Interesting story and all, but what does this have to do with a US war in yemen?

samcol · 12-29-2009, 07:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rahl

Interesting story and all, but what does this have to do with a US war in yemen?

Because this is being used as a selling point to the American people to get them behind a war with Yemen and it looks like it's built around a lot of inconsistencies that should be taken care of before getting the propaganda ball rolling any further.

If the Intelligence community can't get the the bottom of this or continues to botch investigations like this, then don't we have to assume they are bull shitting us or are too inept to lead us into war? I mean the whole Iraq intelligence blunder was pretty costly I'd say.

There are obviously other players that made this happen and some of them seem to be in the intelligence community whether US or another country. Al Qaida can't just magically get clearance to board a plane without a passport. The guy is on the terror watch list and gets on the plane without a passport. This story is preposterous in my eyes.

12-28-2009, 09:48 AM	#3 (permalink)
The_Jazz Asshole Administrator Location: Chicago	Historically, it's interesting to see how the US went from predominantly isolationist to meddling in the course of a generation (the Monroe Doctrine notwithstanding). Our involvement in the Middle East, once the Barbary Wars ended, was nonexistant save tourism until the end of isolationism in the 40's. I was aware that the US was undergoing a less-than-covert "advisory" buildup in Yemen. I can't say exactly when or where I learned that, but it seems I read something a few months ago in conjuction with some kidnappings there. I think that the objective is pretty obvious. We've marginalized most of the jihadists in region to a great extent. They're no longer welcome in Saudi Arabia, at least openly. Most of the training grounds for these folks are currently either under our control or under attack by our allies (Pakistan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, etc.) or under the direct control of a regional power that sees no benefit in a direct attack (Syria and Iran). It seems that even Sudan is too chaotic for the jihadis to efficiently organize enough to be a direct threat to Americans, although I expect that won't last forever. The Ethopians have a vested interest in a stable Sudan, and the Ethopians are at best neutral towards the US. I am assuming that the US forces are doing as advertised. I think that any of the hawks in the Pentagon that think that opening a third front in the GWOT will be quickly countered by cooler heads with a more realistic grasp of the capabilities of the Armed Forces (although that doesn't rule out cruise missle strikes, drones, etc.). I can't see the Obama Administration thinking that a third front is nothing more than a military adventure run amuck and ok'ing much more than advisors. The men and materiel just aren't there for such a concept, even with the wind-down in Iraq, which won't be completed for months. Is it possible in a couple of years, especially with some provocative acts? Yes, certainly, just not in my near-term. I don't see it as lunacy so much as a poorly-thought-out knee-jerk reaction. __________________ "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." - B. Franklin "There ought to be limits to freedom." - George W. Bush "We have met the enemy and he is us." - Pogo

12-28-2009, 10:44 AM	#4 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	well, i see the whole logic of the "war on terror" as lunacy, so in a sense this is merely another episode. there are many particular moments of incomprehensibility brought to you by this meme "war on terror" anyway, the release of this wider bit of infotainment is obviously tied to this business: US says aviation security system failed in Flight 253 case \| World news \| guardian.co.uk because of the central position played in the story by going to yemen to study islam in setting up whatever is at this point known about the attempt to blow up a plane from amsterdam as it approached detroit on xmas day. so a system lapse allowed this guy to board in amsterdam....to counter that, the release of infotainment concerning actions ongoing in yemen, presumably aimed at getting at a root issue. a small, mobile focused organization working underground with resources adequate to moving place to place will make a nation-state military entirely insane. what i see as a problem here really is that. tracking such an organization down is like trying to grab water with your hands. think the algerian war. the french managed to almost destroy the fln through 1956. to do it, they functionally declared war on the algerian people--torture, etc.---but within a couple years the fln was back, based in a different place, made up of different people most of whom were mobilized politically because of the french actions in 1956. the french couldn't find the fln because there were lots of flns. it didn't go well for them. so i see basically a large-scale variant on this same dynamic taking shape. and this is one of those situations in which i'd rather be wrong, because the outcomes of the last go-round (you could also point to vietnam, but the parallels are a little looser) were not great. for anyone. more later maybe. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

12-28-2009, 11:33 AM	#5 (permalink)
Cimarron29414 Still Free Location: comfortably perched at the top of the bell curve!	roachboy - you are one of "the americans" doing this. Your post suggests a distance that cannot be fabricated. The President you selected has authorized an expansion of the war on terror, yet again. "We americans" are doing this. What is your alternative? Starting where we are, right this second, how would President roachboy fix the situation we find ourselves in? __________________ Gives a man a halo, does mead. "Here lies The_Jazz: Killed by an ambitious, sparkly, pink butterfly."

12-28-2009, 12:02 PM	#6 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	uh...it's a rhetorical tic. i'm accustomed at this point to opposing most military adventures undertaken by the united states. a function of my life-span i suppose, the time i grew up in, have lived in, so since vietnam. they always seem based on such stupid premises and lead to such fucked up conclusions. i understand in theory that i am among the americans in whose name this nonsense has been happening, but i oppose everything about it logically and politically--so sometimes it seems like there's this other place called the u.s. of a. that's populated by people i have nothing to do with and nothing in common with who use the name of the same place i happen to live to advertise and legitimate doing things that i often find to be entirely insane. and to my mind, the whole "war on terror" is entirely insane. but to answer the second part of your question: the massive incompetence of the bush administration has left obama boxed in on so many levels that my initial answer is that i'm glad i'm not president of the fading ship of american empire at the moment. on this matter, the unfortunate fact of the matter is that as a centrist from jump, obama accepted the notion that the "war on terror" made sense. so that's a difference. i don't accept it. i think it's nutty. so i wouldnt have been elected doubtless. not sufficiently manly for reactionary tastes i expect. and i don't like football. so not even amurican. were i in control of this ship, i suppose i would place a whole lot more emphasis on getting israel to stop pulverizing the palestinian population in the west bank and gaza--to start doing stuff like letting in concrete for folk can build (they don't allow it for "security" reasons)...not only stop the settlements but start evacuating them, taking them down. dismantle the entire colonial apparatus in the west bank. accept the need for a viable palestine. start allowing gaza to rebuild. end the blockade. that would, i expect, change the climate pretty quickly. i'm not sure i have an easy answer for what to do in either iraq or afghanistan--on iraq, conditions are quite different than we've been lead to believe (once again, we've been lied to, but no matter..i can post links if you like)...afghanistan seems a downward spiral that simply does not admit of a simple response. in a counter-factual world, i wouldn't have gone there in the first place, but that's fantasy. and the campaign's been run, when it has, quite badly. i don't support the "surge" but i don't have an alternative in mind. as for yemen, i really don't see that this is a great move that's taking place--i don't see what it is to accomplish, and i see even less how it is supposed to accomplish it. the idea is obvious enough...but the route being chosen? it seems based on some vague hope that the desired results can be gotten to by proxy. and to be operating under the assumption that "advisors" does not mean ground engagement already. i think we're already in yemen, personally. like on the ground. maybe because it's easier than dealing with pakistan? maybe it's all theater. hard to know. one thing i would expect though is that changing the us policy toward palestine would bring about alot more space for diplomatic and economic pressure to be brought to bear----using that route would be my preference. but the premise would have to be in place. but these cheap calling-out games are little more than that. "yeah well what would you do?" as if you, the one asking the question, have the faintest idea yourself. easy peasy. whatever. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite Last edited by roachboy; 12-28-2009 at 12:05 PM..

12-28-2009, 12:42 PM	#8 (permalink)
Cimarron29414 Still Free Location: comfortably perched at the top of the bell curve!	roachboy - The first part of my post was a negative reaction to your seeming to place yourself above "the americans." I understand your explanation, but I'm still grumbling a bit. The latter question was not an insidious primer to be followed by "See, you couldn't do any better..." While I disagree with you on virtually every possible political position, I do respect your opinions and am genuinely curious as to your stance. Frankly, I appreciate the fact that you can say "I don't know". Too often, our politicians see "a problem" and quickly proceed to fixing it - regardless of whether the solution is better than the problem. Like you, I don't have many answers either. Since we do not have the benefit of the intelligence gathering arm of our government, we will always be destined to making truly uninformed choices when it comes to protecting national interests. I believe this to be the case with Obama. It seems that as soon as he saw his first few intelligence briefings that he changed virtually all of his campaign stances on the GWOT. I often wonder why that is. __________________ Gives a man a halo, does mead. "Here lies The_Jazz: Killed by an ambitious, sparkly, pink butterfly."

12-28-2009, 12:29 PM	#7 (permalink)
Shauk Confused Adult Location: Spokane, WA	Why do I get the feeling there is a larger tactic to all of this in play now? it's like a sheep herding tactic in action or something. Like I'm guessing they took the intelligence, ran a bunch of scenarios and guesstimated the entire war from start to finish like a chess game, including where they would regroup, knowing they'd wind up in yemen at some point. This all just may be a bunch of chess moves to destabilize the entire middle east for U.S. acquisition at some point. I don't think the powers that be in the U.S. are simply going to be like "oh hey Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, we've dumped BILLIONS on you for our "humanitarian effort" to free your people from an oppressive tyrant, and spent over 8 years on killing insurgents who've launched like one successful attack on American soil ever. a minor threat compared to people who actually have standing military forces. But hey, when we kill him, we'll totally withdraw and just pay off this debt, pat ourselves on the back, and say it was justified national debt in the name of humanitarism" Nah, they want to OWN that shit, sorry, we're going to own some of the middle eastern territories when this finally ends. Right now, mentally, I think it's just an "us vs them" mentality and we want to take them for everything they have, and punish the governments of the countries who let it grow inside their borders by taking over and figuring out ways to profit from it to recoup our "Investment" in to this war. Long term, it almost seems like they'd have to, cuz they've racked up so much debt that our current economic power just can't cash the checks they're writing right now.

12-28-2009, 01:29 PM	#9 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	i haven't time at the moment, so i'll maybe get back to this...but i don't see obama as having particularly backed off of any campaign promises insofar as the "war on terror" is concerned...but i was one of those people who wasn't particularly impressed with obama, who saw him as certainly far preferable to anything like the bush administration, but also as a centrist so nothing like what conservatives painted him as being. the central problem so far as i was concerned was that he accepted the "war on terror"--he said repeatedly (in the debates for example) that the plan was to end the excessive-to-explicitly-fascist practices foisted on the world by the bush people (gitmo, for example, which is en route--but the others? hard to say because of the raison d'etat established around the "war on terror")...drawing down in iraq (where reality is quite other than we have been led to believe it is--but this too is en route, albeit slowly)...and to focus on afghanistan, which he saw as the "legitimate" center of this "war." so i see him as having moved in a straight line. it isn't a line i agree with, but it is a straight line. within the constraints imposed by the bush administration in all its grandeur of course. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

12-28-2009, 02:23 PM	#10 (permalink)
ASU2003 immoral minority Location: Back in Ohio	I think this method of fighting terror works better than invading a country and then trying to stabilize and rebuild. Although I think the drones are getting used too much. They need to come up with a different way to covertly take out people who want to kill innocent people. Then again, why is this in the media? No questions, no answers. Just get the job done, and don't mess up. The general public doesn't need to know and the enemy shouldn't know about the tactics used.

12-28-2009, 06:36 PM	#12 (permalink)
dlish Currently sour but formerly Dlishs Super Moderator Location: Australia/UAE	im not at all surprised that the US has had its intelligence gurus toiling in Yemen for a while now. The people of Sanaa are suspicious of outsiders, and saying anything not in line with the norm could get you into serious trouble. But there's a line to be toed, and it usually is in Yemen. The really interesting thing about Yemen is that though the Saleh government 'runs' the country, the real powerbrokers isnt the government or any of its badly run agencies, but the powerful family tribes throughout the country. These tribes usually dont give much regard for politics, except when they need some infrastructre built or road laid. Thats when an unruly tourist gets kidnapped, not usually for monetary gains, but as a political pawn used by the tribes to get the government give in to its demands. i'd agree that the jihadists have been marginalised in most of those countries, but they have been also marginalised in Yemen as well. With Al Qaeda largely unwanted in most arab lands, its only option is acceptance within other war torn nations like sudan, somalia or aghanistan. Whilst many of the arab countries still use torture as an interrogation method, and where the rule of law is as malleable as aluminium foil, jihadists usually tend to stay away from countr Most yemenis are Zaydi's, who adhere to the Shia inclined school of thought, so having them accept an Al Qaeda ideology is far fetched, who just so happen to call shiites infidels or heretics. So those hawks who think they would fighting a nation of jihadists would be wrong to assume that a new front would be a fight against a nation of terrorists inclined with AQ. The yemenis remain extremely tribal and conservative, and loyalties and laws run along tribal lines. __________________ An injustice anywhere, is an injustice everywhere I always sign my facebook comments with ()()===========(}. Does that make me gay? - Filthy

12-28-2009, 10:37 PM	#13 (permalink)
Slims Eccentric insomniac Location: North Carolina	I don't understand the opposition to this. This plan involves providing aid which the Yemeni government has requested. We are helping to train government forces to better secure their own country. Has the US later become involved directly in conflicts after our efforts have proven ineffective? Yes. But those are the minority. US Special Forces and other entities have been working for years in dozens of countries and we have not been drawn into war in the vast majority of them. In fact, most of our efforts are at least marginally successful. When we have a situation where a country is decaying into lawlessness and it is in our own best interest to prevent that decay, it makes sense to at least attempt to stabilize that government. This applies even in those countries where we have engaged in direct conflict....we tried to prevent it and when it failed the military got involved in a more direct fashion. It is a correlation, but isn't causal in most circumstances. __________________ "Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery." - Winston Churchill "All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act out their dream with open eyes, to make it possible." Seven Pillars of Wisdom, T.E. Lawrence

12-29-2009, 08:34 AM	#16 (permalink)
dlish Currently sour but formerly Dlishs Super Moderator Location: Australia/UAE	who are you calling backward religious? __________________ An injustice anywhere, is an injustice everywhere I always sign my facebook comments with ()()===========(}. Does that make me gay? - Filthy

12-29-2009, 08:35 AM	#17 (permalink)
rahl Junkie Location: Ohio	Govn'ts in the middle east, who base their political decisions and policy entirely on their religious beliefs. __________________ "Your life is Yours alone...Rise up and live it"

12-29-2009, 08:40 AM	#18 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	one way of looking at this is as a conflict over which state model is seen by the united states as functional these days--a relatively centralized state with a high degree of control, typically exercised indirectly (the american model) although there's no problem with old skool state of emergency-driven ugliness (egypt for example, with respect to political dissent). more decentralized or fractured states are apparently not able to co-ordinate action to suppress Problems from the american viewpoint. in the conflict region, afghanistan, pakistan and yemen have this structural situation in common. so much for federalism i guess. this article talks in a bit of detail about al qaida in yemen: Yemen is fertile territory for extremism as it tears itself apart \| World news \| The Guardian and this outlines the dynamic of us involvement in yemen over the past year: Al-Qaida: US support for Yemen crackdown led to attack \| World news \| The Guardian the second is pretty interesting in particular. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

12-29-2009, 08:57 AM	#19 (permalink)
dlish Currently sour but formerly Dlishs Super Moderator Location: Australia/UAE	with all due respect, but you obviously havent been to the middle east then. lets see.. egypt morocco libya lebanon syria jordan turkey iraq UAE Yemen thats just off the top of my head..but none of these countries base their laws purely on religious beliefs. Saudi maybe, but definately not the rest of them. The vast majority of them base their laws on a mixture of religious and tribal laws ie. yemen, UAE, Oman etc but none rule by true islamic law except maybe saudi. others like lebanon, turkey and syria dont base their laws on religious beliefs. coincidntally i met one of the highest judges when i went to yemen last year. when i posed the question on whether he ruled according to sharia law, it was an emphatic no. taccording to him tribal law meshed through yemeni laws the same way sharia law was implemented into yemeni law. as for backward...yemen and a few others may live in a time warp, but the vast majority of arabs are tech savvy intelligent people who just so happen to suffer from colonialist britains meddling __________________ An injustice anywhere, is an injustice everywhere I always sign my facebook comments with ()()===========(}. Does that make me gay? - Filthy

12-29-2009, 09:12 AM	#20 (permalink)
rahl Junkie Location: Ohio	My comments were directed at the countries we are currently engaged in ( iraq, afghanistan, iran eventually) to me yemen is just more of the same from the US, we are meddling in affairs that are none of our business. The middle east is a cluster fuck that will most likely never accept a western way of life, and that's fine with me, it's their right to govern their country how they see fit. We have no business trying to tell them how to do it and I for one can't accept any reason for the needless deaths of our citizens or theirs in a historically futile effort. __________________ "Your life is Yours alone...Rise up and live it"

12-29-2009, 10:20 AM	#21 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	here's a piece from 2006 about the american "front" in the "war on terror" in the sahara. Foreign Policy in Focus \| The Collapse of the Second Front it's interesting for alot of reasons, not least the fictional battles involving fictional groups affiliated in fictional ways with potentially non-fictional groups the result of which may or may not have been alot of running around in northern mali/chad it's hard to say. security theater: Security theater - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

12-29-2009, 12:31 PM	#23 (permalink)
powerclown Junkie Location: Detroit, MI	I like how Obama (codename: BlackBush-3) is also referring to America now as the "Homeland". Hoffnung und ändern!

12-29-2009, 03:25 PM	#28 (permalink)
rahl Junkie Location: Ohio	[QUOTE=Slims;2743421]I wasn't speaking of Afghanistan at all (which isn't in the Middle East, BTW). I don't understand how you can even begin to make the argument that he US has failed in every military endeavor since Vietnam. Desert Storm was a big success, we crippled Saddam's Army and successfully liberated Kuwait. OIF...Successful, the country is stable, we are beginning to withdrawal, the Iraqi Government is rapidly becoming self sufficient, we captured Saddam, and the quality of life in Iraq is now greater than it was under Saddam's Regime. QUOTE] Do you seriously think that thousands of dead american soldiers and hundreds of thousands of dead Iraqies since our occupation is a success? If so then you have a completely different view of success than most sane people. As far as our "success" in the first gulf war, you are correct, we had an objective(defend the oil in kuwait) we did than and deterred saddam from invading further, and eventually he withdrew. That is a success in that we weren't there to try to spread our ideals or overthrow a regime, we were there to protect the oil. __________________ "Your life is Yours alone...Rise up and live it"