Strike first

THE OCTOBER 6 TERRORIST attack on the French super-tanker Limburg -- similar to that on the USS Cole two years earlier -- refocused attention on Yemen as a base for international terrorism. In the wake of the latest war in Afghanistan, Al Qaeda has sought new means of striking western interests. Though the Bush administration would prefer no distractions as it prepares for a possible major attack on Iraq, a deteriorating security situation in Yemen may not allow this luxury. As American forces begin to mass in the Gulf, there will be enormous pressure from military planners to eliminate a strong security threat in the rear. To meet Al Qaeda's tactical innovations, the United States is responding with a new form of covert warfare.

SPECIAL FORCES

US special forces have been concentrating in Djibouti, apparently preparing for raids on Yemen, a major recruiting base for Al Qaeda. The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) is in charge of the projected mission, which would involve large numbers of covert operatives working for its paramilitary groups. Elite special operations troops are being transferred from Pentagon command to the covert military units of the CIA for use in Iraq and Yemen. The group in Djibouti includes the Pentagon's secret Delta Force, trained in snatching suspects from hostile countries. Washington does not officially recognise Delta Forces existence; American operatives in Yemen would carry no ID and wear no uniform.

The army's general staff has been quietly criticised in Washington for a perceived reluctance or inability to drive home attacks on Al Qaeda in Afghanistan. A large Delta Force raid on Kandahar in October last year collapsed in the face of fierce Taliban resistance, spurring reevaluations of the role of special forces. There is a belief in the administration that too many generals are preoccupied with congressional approval.

The force being assembled is part of Washington's search for new methods to revive America's lagging 'war' on terror. It also reflects growing admiration for the British SAS in US government circles. Special operations troops are considered more capable of dealing with a highly decentralised country such as Yemen, where tribesmen follow local leaders rather than central government. The strategy avoids committing large numbers of regulars who would quickly become a target for guerrilla attacks.

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has been a prime mover in turning the war on terror over to special forces. In July he commissioned his chief special operations officer, General Charles R Holland, to create an aggressive war plan using special forces to reinvigorate flagging operations in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Rumsfeld has also stated Washington's intention to prevent Al Qaeda from establishing a base in Yemen.

The CIA's new secret paramilitary for counter-terror operations was revealed in June. The unit's activities are directed by the Agency's counter-terrorism centre, but information regarding its size and operations is classified. It can only be ordered into action by the president, though certain members of Congress must be informed. Targets in Yemen would be individuals rather than places; Al Qaeda does not have bases or training facilities there. The paramilitary will work in cooperation with the newly formed Yemeni National Security Agency, which specialises in counter-terrorism and reports directly to the Yemeni president. It won't be the first CIA involvement in Yemen. In 1979 the Agency organised and funded a terrorist bombing campaign in southern Yemen. The scheme ended badly, with about a dozen agents arrested, tortured and executed.

NATION UNDER ARMS

Unlike Iraq, there is no easily identified villain in Yemen for Washington's ongoing 'struggle between good and evil.' Like Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, Yemen presents a security threat to American interests despite having a friendly government. Unlike those two nations, it has made significant progress in democratisation, the oft-cited solution to the Arab world's woes.

Since September 11, its importance has been emphasised by visits to the capital San'a by CIA director George Tenet, US Vice-President Dick Cheney, FBI head Robert Mueller, and chief of coalition military operations in Afghanistan and Pakistan, General Tommy Franks. A Green Beret detachment trained a number of snipers and other counter-terror troops in the country this year, but its mission ended in July. After American expressions of dissatisfaction with San'a's efforts in repressing political Islam, in early September President Ali Abdullah Saleh began deploying troops to Islamist strongholds in northern provinces.

Unlike the weak case against Iraq as a centre of Islamist terrorism, there is no question about Yemen's importance in international jihad activities. As many as seventy Yemenis are held at Guantanamo Bay. Over five hundred more are in Afghan and Pakistani jails as suspected Al Qaeda members. Thousands of others are unaccounted for.

There have been recent high profile arrests of Yemeni Al Qaeda suspects in New York state and Pakistan, where eight, including September 11 suspect Ramzi Binalshibh, were detained in early September. Osama Bin Laden's family is from Yemen, and he maintains strong ties there in the eastern Hadramawt region. Even the Russians have complained about Yemeni volunteers fighting alongside rebels in Chechnya.

Besides prominent involvement in the September 11 attacks, Yemenis were also implicated in the 1998 embassy bombings in East Africa and the attack on the USS Cole in Aden. The US State Department is widely thought to have hindered the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)s examination of the Cole incident. This contributed to the departure of its leading Al Qaeda investigator, John O'Neill, who was one of the few to identify the scale of the threat prior to September 11. O'Neill became Director of Security at the World Trade Center and was killed in the attack

An additional concern is Yemen's poorly regulated role in the arms trade. Arms trafficking is a leading industry, with dealers provided with end-user certificates that allow weapons to be funnelled through Yemen to their ultimate destination in embargoed countries. The 1994 civil war left Soviet tanks and large quantities of other military hardware in tribal hands. A population of eighteen million has no less than fifty million firearms.

The consequences of this incredible over-armament of the civil population were demonstrated a year ago in an earlier attempt to arrest the victim of the Predator attack, Ali Qaed Senyan al-Harthi. Tribal leaders in the Marib region were accused of harbouring al-Harthi and another Al Qaeda agent, Muhammad Hamdi al-Ahdal, both wanted in the Cole investigation.

A raid designed to arrest the fugitives at the village of al-Husun met with disaster, leaving eighteen soldiers dead and the suspects still at large. The importance of the operation was emphasised by the fact that President Saleh's son was its military leader. An air force jet flew over and broke the sound barrier as the army was preparing to move in. Thinking they were under attack, the tribesmen opened fire with devastating effect. Cole attack planner Ahmed Bilal - also known as Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri - remains at large in Yemen.

ISLAMISTS JOIN GOVERNMENT

Saleh has sought to integrate Islamists into the government. Up to forty thousand Yemenis volunteered to join the CIA-backed jihad in Afghanistan in the 1980s. After their return, Saleh relied heavily on the Afghans' to defeat the socialist government of South Yemen in the 1994 civil war. The mainly Sunni Afghans were also used to control any resurgence of the Zaydi Shi'a, from whom the old royal family was drawn. The Zaydis ruled Yemen from the ninth century until 1962, with interruptions. The Shi'a make up nearly half of Yemen's population.

On their return from Afghanistan, many of the veterans formed the Jamiat al-Jihad group and allied themselves with Yemenis opposed to the socialist government of southern Yemen. Together they assassinated a hundred and fifty Socialist party members between 1990 and 1994.

By 1994 Bin Laden was adding his voice, protesting the presence in South Yemen of 'infidel communists: The cost of this support became obvious when the Afghans successfully demanded that the government declare Sharia - Islamic law -- the sole source of Yemeni legislation.

Following a pattern established by Islamist parties elsewhere, the Islamists sought not the traditional power ministries - foreign affairs, defence, interior - but the ministries of education and justice. When they took over these portfolios all secular and socialist teachers were fired, as were nearly all female judges. Since then the Islamists have extended their influence into the universities, the security services and the army.

The Islamist Islah Party's anti-American leader is also parliament speaker and regarded as politically untouchable. Some members of Saleh's ruling General People's Congress (GPC) party have expressed open support for Bin Laden. Shaykh Tarik Bin Nasr Bin Abdullah al-Fadli and Jamal al-Nahdi, both members of the GPC, were implicated in a 1992 attack on US marines in Aden.

TRIBAL BROTHERS

The Islah Party is tribal based and incorporates many of the Afghan veterans. The district of Lahej became their stronghold after the defeat of South Yemen socialists allowed Islah members to seize abandoned government posts in the region. The Yemeni regime has investigated the role of employees of the Lahej district government - controlled by Islah - in the Cole attack.

Islah is led by Shaykh Abdullah al-Ahmar, chief of the powerful Hashed tribe. The party ruled in coalition with the GPC from 1994 to 1997. Al-Ahmar has denounced the continued detention of Islamists without charge as an attempt by Saleh to ingratiate himself with the Americans. There have been terrorist bombings in support of their release.

Both Bin Laden and Saleh are from the Hashed tribe. The president's membership of the tribe complicates his relationship with Shaykh al-Ahmar, who remains his nominal chief. Bin Laden served in Afghanistan with the leader of the radical faction of the Islah party, Abdul Majid al-Zandani, a prominent member of the Muslim Brethren (Ikhwan) who has also been head of the consultative council or Majlis al-Shura.

Though Bin Laden has worked to cement his relationship with the Sanhane branch of the Hashed, Al-Ahmar remains closer to the Saudi regime, which is constantly attempting to spread its influence in Yemen. Al-Ahmar serves as Saleh's point man in all disputes with the Saudis. As Saudi analyst Mamoun Fandy has pointed out, the Saudis therefore maintain a greater influence on the Islah party than the absent Bin Laden.

Some Afghans have preferred to stay under arms - possibly a meaningless phrase in the Yemen context - rather than participate in the political process. An Islamist gang called the Aden-Abyen Islamic Army (A-AIA) was formed by Afghans who had helped Saleh defeat the socialists in 1994. The kidnapping of sixteen western tourists by the A-AIA led to a bloody debacle as four of the tourists were killed in a rescue attempt that strained relations with Britain.

The leader of the A-AIA, Abu al-Hassan, relied heavily on a tradition that the Prophet Muhammad once said that twelve thousand holy warriors would emerge from the Aden-Abyan region to restore Islam. Al-Hassan was executed for his role in the kidnappings, but there were revelations at his trial that members of the government had been closely involved with the A-Ark. Afterwards it appears that the organisation changed its name to The Islamic Army of Aden and set up a training camp in the mountains near Hatat in the Abyan province. In May the Yemen army attacked the camp with heavy artillery and helicopter gunships, with little apparent effect.

PRECARIOUS POSITION

Saleh's rule is highly personal, involving lengthy and frequent consultations with tribal leaders, balancing priorities and mediating disputes. His authority relies on a network of tribal and religious-based allegiances. Until a year ago, Yemen was the only state in the Arabian Peninsula not to have an American military presence. The introduction of US forces would threaten that entire network.

Saleh has been playing a delicate political game, offering the Americans unqualified support while trying to downplay the relationship in front of his wary tribal supporters. He has attempted to demonstrate solidarity with the US without offending his constituency. For example, hundreds of foreign religious students were expelled from the country after it was revealed that jailed Taliban enthusiast John Walker Lindh had studied at Yemen's militant al-Imam university.

The Yemen president is determined not to make the mistake again of siding with Iraq and damaging relations with the US, as he did during the 1991 Gulf war. Parliamentary elections are expected early next year, and cooperation with the Americans is not a vote-getter in Yemen. Government officials - including, at one point earlier this year, Saleh - continue to routinely deny any Al Qaeda presence.

The US appears to have sidestepped concerns about the international legality of its strike on al-Harthi by obtaining Saleh's permission in advance, but his reluctance to admit as much reflects his precarious role in the war on terror. It would be a mistake, however, to assume that such permission will now be routine as more targets are identified. US defence officials have already named a dozen Al Qaeda operatives they intend to eliminate, having tired of Yemen's arrest, detain and release approach to terrorism.

DIRTY STRUGGLE

While Saleh cannot allow the US to deploy large numbers of men in Yemen without endangering his position, the Bush administration's new 'strike first' policy against potential threats to US interests may make his objections irrelevant. Russia appears to be ready to implement its own strike first policy, using language almost identical to that of President George Bush and his spokesmen. Based on the American precedent, the Russian military has now been authorised to operate abroad with new precision weaponry.

American special forces have been on steady deployment since September 11 last year, serving in Afghanistan, Pakistan, the Horn of Africa, Georgia, Iraq and the Philippines. If, as expected, the planned war in Iraq involves large numbers of such troops, they will have their limits severely tested. A long and difficult mission in Yemen will only further aggravate the situation.

Nations such as Russia, Israel and India will be closely watching events in Yemen for justification of their own international counter-terrorism campaigns. The big question is, how far is the US willing to go? Will it seize Islamist members of the government, surely dooming its ally Saleh? If American raids drive militants north across the frontier with Saudi Arabia, it might be necessary to spread the war into sensitive Saudi territory. A covert struggle against the well-armed tribes of Yemen on their home turf may become the dirtiest campaign of the war on terror so far.