Earlier today many of the internet jihadi forums posted an official audio tape from the al-Malahim media wing, which released all AQAP's statements.
(A note of caution: if it doesn't come from al-Malahim don't trust that it is from AQAP. There is a big difference between the rubbish spewed on some of the threads on jihadi forums and official statements.)
Much of the statement is what one would expect. On behalf of AQAP, Wihayshi pledges allegiance to the new amir of AQ, Ayman al-Zawahiri. He also claims Ali Abdullah Salih is "doomed."
But there are also some interesting parts of the short statement that I think deserve highlighting. As al-Masdar pointed out in its piece on the statement (Ar.), Wihayshi attacks the official opposition in Yemen, by which his listeners will understand the JMP, accusing them of wanting to please the US. Given how the JMP has acted lately, Wihayshi isn't the first person to say this. Indeed many Yemenis in the streets are saying the same thing, but importantly Wihayshi is able to co-opt the criticism for al-Qaeda.
This is something the AQAP leader has done previously, and in my opinion it continues to show that he has a nuanced understanding of the shifting landscape in Yemen, which makes him an incredibly dangerous adversary.
Wihayshi also makes the claims that AQAP supporters are present in the squares of change and squares of freedom around the country. This is probably true, at least in some sense. (How do you measure someone's private loyalties?) And it really isn't new, AQAP has done this a number of times previously, particularly in Abyan and Shabwa at public rallies prior to this year's protests.
That being said, we should be careful not to read too much into Wihayshi's comments here. AQAP isn't running the protests, and as much as Wihayshi tries to bend the narrative arc to fit what he has been saying for years there is still a lot of space between the two. Private citizens mixing with protesters aren't the same thing as an official AQAP presence at the protest centers.
Finally, for me, the most fascinating part of the statement was the very end, in which Wihayshi lays out five points. He calls them "stages." Nearly all of these (save the final) are focused on the local situation in Yemen, things AQAP claims it would do if it comes to power in particular regions. High on the list are things like re-establishing security (remember the origins of the Taliban?), preserving Yemen's wealth (many in the country intuitively feel their lives would be better if the government didn't steal so much of the oil revenue), and so forth.
This is quite obviously a recruiting pitch, an attempt to differentiate AQAP from the government and the opposition, showing as Wihayshi often does that only a return to Islamic law will result in a better life for Yemenis.
It is difficult to judge what, if any impact Wihayshi's words will have on people in Yemen, but as water, gas, and electrical shortages continue and with food increasingly priced beyond reach it stands to reason that, as I argued months ago in the NY Times, the current climate of instability and insecurity isn't hurting al-Qaeda. As I said then this may well be the west's last best chance in Yemen.
The window of opportunity for the US and its international allies to do something in Yemen is closing fast, and no drones aren't the answer.
While I've been busy thinking and blogging about drones these past few weeks, things on the ground have continued to evolve even if there hasn't been a great deal of movement.
Last week I gave two up-dates on the situation in Yemen the first to Robert Siegel of NPR's All Things Considered, you can listen here.
For the second I talked to Justin Elliott of Salon, who transcribed the interview here.
Also I highly recommend Robert Worth's excellent piece in the NY Times Magazine from this past Sunday. Yemen is a difficult place to get right, balancing competing narratives and different versions of events. Most journalists give one angle a go, but Worth covers several in this fascinating piece that, for my money, gets Yemen right.
Nearly a week ago, a British man was killed in Aden when his car exploded as he turned the ignition. No one has yet to claim responsibility.
On Sunday a suicide bomber, who has been identified as a Saudi (no confirmation from AQAP as of yet) drove his pick-up into a convoy of soldiers preparing to depart for Zanjubar, where militants have been fighting portions of what is left of Yemen's military.
And today, Nasir al-Wihayshi, the head of AQAP released a short 10 minute audio-tape, pledging allegiance to Ayman al-Zawahiri. Essentially confirming that AQAP's accepts him succeeding Osama bin Laden.
(I have only listened to the tape once, and have yet to read through the transcript, so there will be more commentary to come as well as notes from what looks to be a fascinating (Ar.) interview al-Masdar did with an officer in the 25th Mechanized, which is the military unit fighting in Zanjubar.)
For the past few weeks I have been going back and forth with Frank Cilluffo and Clint Watts over their paper on what to do in Yemen. (Their original post is here, my critique is here, and their rebuttal is here.)
Last week the argument spilled over into twitter, with Will McCants taking their side. Although outnumbered I have attempted to fight back valiantly. Unfortunately I haven't had time to respond in full form until today. (Also this debate seems to grow with time, so I'll try to keep this short, attacking what I see is they key flaw of their argument: namely, that it won't work.)
As I understand the argument Cilluffo and Watts are making, it basically boils down to this: the US needs to increase its use of drone and air strikes in Yemen to keep AQAP back on its heels so that the organization doesn't attack the US.
Now, contrary to what some seem to believe I'm not an out and out opponent of drones. In fact I find myself agreeing with Andrew Exum when he writes: "I do think the drone program has been a tactic executed in the absence of a strategy and without proper transparency and oversight."
Drones are a weapons system that likely isn't going away anytime soon. Now, I do have some serious questions about whether the drone and air strikes that the US is carrying out in Yemen are legal under the Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF) from 2001. And I would be much more comfortable if there was a new AUMF, but Congress doesn't appear to be moving anywhere on that, so we'll have to leave that not insignificant caveat aside for the moment.
Drones have a place in the US approach to Yemen, but they are only one, and hopefully a small piece of any strategy. At the moment they seem to be the only tool the US is using, and that is a dangerous and deadly mistake.
In Yemen the US is driven by the fear that a terrorist plot originating from the country could strike the homeland. This is neither sustainable nor wise. When the fear subsides, as it did in 2004 and 2005, policy is left adrift, bouncing from one minor crisis to another without the benefit of an overarching strategy.
When the fear is acute, as it is at the moment, the US runs the very real risk of making the situation worse. For some time I have been arguing that the US air strikes from Dec. 2009 - May 2010 instead of weakening AQAP actually made the organization stronger. Yes, the US was able to eliminate some key commanders, but these individuals were easily replaced by new recruits.
In a twitter exchange Will McCants asked how I came to that conclusion, which is obviously a fair question. When, I explained that it was based on my analysis and reading of Sada al-Malahim's growing stable of writers, the martyrs biographies as well as AQAP videos and local news reports from Yemen, he said my sourcing was a little thin.
Fair enough, I can only use the evidence that is available. But I have been studying AQAP and its predecessors for a number of years and that is what I see when I look at the evidence. (An organization that is getting stronger not weaker as a result of US attacks.) Maybe I'm wrong. That is certainly possible. But no one I know has looked at all the evidence and come to the opposite conclusion: that the air strikes are working.
This, I think, gets at one of the key problems of Cilluffo and Watts' paper. They argue that leadership decapitation is the most effective way of reducing AQ's capabilities. And in a sense they are right, but what they miss is that this is not a zero-sum game.
There is, I think, a dangerous assumption here: that the US has a good handle on the all the dangerous figures within AQAP.
After nearly a decade of continuous war in the Muslim world I find the idea that killing AQ figures is a zero-sum game to be fundamentally flawed.
Since their rebuttal didn't deal with my example of Badawi and Banna v. Wihayshi and Raymi, I'll throw out another one.
One of the individuals the US is most worried about at the moment is a Saudi member of AQAP named Abdullah Asiri. This is the guy who built the bomb used by the underwear bomber as well as the two parcel bombs last fall.
In September 2002 Abdullah was a chemistry student at a university in Saudi Arabia. Eventually, he dropped out of school and to try to make his way to Iraq, but he was arrested by Saudi forces and, according to him, this is when his thinking started to change. Now, Abdullah never made it to Iraq and wasn't a member of the original AQAP.
So by the time he arrived in Yemen he had little experience on a battlefield, but in a very short time he has become someone who has cost the west millions in airport security and continues to worry security officials.
And until 2009 no one knew about him. Given how many Yemenis and Saudis have fought in Iraq and Afghanistan over the past decade the odds are that there are many more like him, probably even with better training and more experience than he had when he started in 2006.
My point is the: the US needs to use drone and air strikes much more judiciously in Yemen, being careful not to make a bad situation worse. And so far it has been neither careful nor judicious, which is why AQAP is growing stronger instead of getting weaker.
A military heavy response to AQAP may give the illusion of confronting the threat, but it won't defeat the organization. And if it actually exacerbates the problem, as I believe it is, then it is time to look for a new approach. The US has a great hammer in drones, but AQAP - no matter how much we want them to be - is not a nail. Military alone can't defeat the organization.
Ok, I didn't do very well at keep this short, but hopefully this helps move the discussion along.
Late last week Frank Cilluffo and Clint Watts released a policy brief from George Washington University’s Homeland Security Policy Institute entitled “Yemen and al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula: Exploiting a Window of Counterterrorism Opportunity.”
My in-box quickly filled up with helpful people sending me copies of the report, I have now had time to read it and digest and my thoughts follow below.
(Note:) I don’t know Frank Cilluffo but I do know and respect Clint and he has seen a copy of my rebuttal here prior to posting.
For those who are faithful readers of Waq al-waq it should come as no surprise that I strongly disagree with the report and its conclusions. I think this is what happens when smart people tackle a complex problem in an environment they don’t know particularly well. The report, in my opinion, is full of assumptions that make sense broadly but break down the closer one gets to Yemen.
Obviously there are parts of the report I agree with, and many other places where well-intentioned people can disagree.
(Quotes from the paper are in italics; mine are in regular caps.)
Assumption 1: AQAP suddenly stronger this month
“This week’s escape of 63 suspected al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) fighters from a Yemeni prison exemplifies how President Saleh’s departure to Saudi Arabia and Yemeni instability embolden this lethal al Qaeda affiliate.“
I’m pretty sure that AQAP was emboldened prior to Salih’s departure, the group has been incredibly active in Yemen recently and I would argue that largely as a result of US air strikes between December 2009 and May 2010, the organization is actually stronger now in terms of recruits than it was when it dispatched the so-called underwear bomber who tried to bring down the airplane over Detroit on Christmas Day 2009.
Assumption 2: Huthis and Southern Movement are responsible
“In recent weeks, the writ of government in Yemen has evaporated under the twin strains of the Houthi rebellion in northern Yemen and the Secessionist movement in southern Yemen.”
This is simply untrue – the writ of Yemen’s government has evaporated under popular protests. The Huthi rebellion has been ongoing since 2004 and the Southern movement since 2007 – neither of these are new, and neither of these are the cause of the recent collapse.
Assumption 3: The Foreign Operations Unit
“For the U.S., AQAP’s Foreign Operations Unit is of greatest concern. The unit was described by Dr. Thomas Hegghammer as a small cell, “which specializes in international operations and keeps a certain distance to the rest of the organization.”
Anwar al-Awlaki, an American born cleric, allegedly leads this group, steadily morphing his role from an Internet ideologue to full-blown operational planner. Awlaki’s online sermons, recruitment of U.S.-based Americans and production of AQAP’s English-language jihadi magazine Inspire with Samir Khan (another American AQAP member) have inspired lone wolf attacks on Americans. Ibrahim Hassan Asiri, AQAP’s talented bomb maker, transforms the Foreign Operations Unit’s threats into sophisticated attacks.
Asiri and his well-trained bombmaking protégés have demonstrated their capabilities repeatedly by devising undetectable devices that nearly killed Saudi Deputy Interior Minister Prince Mohammed bin Nayef in 2009, almost brought down an airliner over Detroit on Christmas Day 2009, and halted air cargo shipments from Yemen in 2010. The Foreign Operations Unit’s special knowledge of the U.S. and unique destructive capabilities make AQAP an immediate threat to the U.S.”
This theory was put forward by the very smart Thomas Hegghammer, but it is just that: a theory. We’re not certain if such an operations unit exists and in fact much of what we know about AQAP’s operations suggests that this theory doesn’t hold any water. AQAP has written time and again that it seeks to attack targets in Yemen, the region, and the west.
For example, the 2009 attempted assassination of Muhammad bin Nayif, Saudi Arabia’s deputy Ministry of the Interior was planned in Marib by Qasim al-Raymi and Ibrahim Asiri. In many ways this plot prefigured the Dec. 2009 attack – same explosives, same bomb maker and same basic set (bomb in rectum and/or underwear).
We also know that Asiri’s fingerprint was on one of the 2010 parcel bombs, but – and here is the kicker – the major players involved in this attack are also actively involved in domestic operations in Yemen. It would also stretch the imagination to believe that al-Raymi, AQAP’s head military commander, would be taking orders from Anwar al-Awlaqi, who Hegghammer regards as the head of the Foreign Operations Unit.
A closer reading of the available sources suggests that the AQAP brain trust is active – as they claim to be – on the domestic, regional, and international fronts.
Thomas may very well be right about the Foreign Operations Unit - he is after all a very smart guy. But the evidence we have suggests otherwise.
Assumption 4: AQAP and al-Shabab
“Moreover, AQAP acts as a critical conduit for regional AQ activities linking al Shabab and other East Africa-based AQ operatives with sustained resources and foreign fighters- some of whom were recruited from Europe and North America.
Al Shabab’s consolidation of power, leadership, homicide/suicide bombing tactics and targets are likely indicative of AQAP’s regional influence. Perhaps most troubling is Al Shabab’s growing international ambitions as evidenced by recent attacks in Kenya and Uganda and complete alignment of their goals with those of Al Qaeda’s.”
The links between AQAP and al-Shabab are not well documented – there is a lot more that we don’t know than there is that we know. I’m uncomfortable at how seamlessly the report jumps from AQAP to al-Shabab, dangerously conflating the two as closely allied groups – I haven’t seen evidence to support this reading.
Assumption 5: It Is the Terrorists We Know
“Elimination of key AQAP members, especially those in the Foreign Operations Unit, would immediately increase U.S. security. Removal of Wahayshi, al-Shihri, Awlaki, Asiri or any other key AQAP leaders could short-circuit AQAP’s operational capability and disrupt their regional coordination of AQ efforts. As Dr. Hegghammer noted, “AQ in Yemen is short on this type of human capital,” suggesting targeted leadership decapitation would seriously weaken AQAP’s proven international terrorism capability.”
I’m certainly in favor of eliminating people like Wihayshi, Shihri and Asiri – but here is the problem: the US does not have a good record of hitting what it aims at in Yemen. It has missed Awlaki numerous times, and the same goes for Wihayshi and Raymi – and these strikes, as I’ve said before, don’t happen in a vacuum. The dead women, children and innocent civilians are, I believe, at least partially responsible for the influx of recruits AQAP has benefitted from in 2010 and 2011.
There is also an underlying assumption here that our knowledge of AQAP is more complete than it actually is. The US has been down this road before. After the 2006 prison break, the US was most worried about Jamal al-Badawi and Jabir al-Banna. But, of course, as we all now know it was actually Nasir al-Wihayshi and Qasim al-Raymi that were the most dangerous escapees.
The idea that we can kill these leaders and they won’t be replaced is a tempting one, but not one that history supports. The US killed Harithi in 2002 and the organization crumbled – it has learned since, which is why the regional leaders the US killed last year have all been replaced.
Assumption 6: Limited Consequence to Bombing
“For the first time, the U.S. can pursue AQAP targets in Yemen without being embroiled in Yemeni government politics and trapped in Yemen’s dual insurgencies. “
The idea that the US can drop bombs on a country and not become involved in its internal politics is, I believe, a dangerously mistaken idea. There will be consequences to US actions, particularly when the US misses – and it will miss.
I’ve talked myself blue in the face, arguing that AQAP has been making an argument that Yemen is no different from Iraq or Afghanistan, and that just like those two countries Yemen is under western military attack. This is important because if AQAP is successful in this argument than many more Yemenis will be willing to fight.
Why do you think more Yemenis went abroad to fight in Iraq and Afghanistan than are fighting at home? The answer is because many still don’t see Yemen as a legitimate theater of jihad. The more bombs the US drops – the easier it is for AQAP to make this argument and the wider the war gets. I’m particularly worried that eventually the circle of who constitutes an AQAP member becomes so wide that the US can’t kill its way out of the war.
Assumption 7: It is the US v. al-Qaeda
In dismissing several possible policy options Cilluffo and Watts fall into a common trap. Namely, that it is the US against AQAP. This is the conventional wisdom and just the way AQAP would like to frame the conflict. As long as it is the US against AQAP, the US will never win this war. It has to be Yemen against AQAP.
Most Yemenis are strongly against AQAP – a fact the organization has recognized by playing with a different name recently – and this animosity has to be used to the mutual advantage of both Yemen and the US. This requires seeing Yemen as more than just a CT problem.
Drones and Special Ops are a unique tool that can be part of the solution in Yemen if used very judiciously, but they can’t be the whole of the solution. And I think right now most policy makers look at Yemen as simply too hard to do and throw up their hands and want to hear the seemingly simple solution that Cilluffo and Watts offer - keep AQAP on the run and they won’t attack – they jump on board. But it won’t work. And in a few years will be in an even worse position and wondering how things got so bad.
The US should be just as active diplomatically as it is militarily, but at the moment the very overwhelmed embassy in Sanaa is unable to take advantage of Salih’s absence from the country to transition away from his rule. The longer the political stalemate goes on the worse the AQAP problem will become – US bombs or no.
Assumption 8: Things will go Great
I agree with Cilluffo and Watts that when drone strikes or Special Ops go right – like they did with bin Laden – they are excellent. But what happens when they go wrong? And they go wrong a lot in Yemen.
Take for instance the May 2010 strike that killed Jabir al-Shabwani, the deputy governor of Marib, instead of the AQAP figure the US was targeting. His tribe is now active in cutting off supplies and electricity to Sanaa as punishment to the government for its complicity in the strike. That in turn is creating a more chaotic environment in Yemen. My point is simply this: these strikes when they go wrong have consequences that are incredibly difficult to predict. And it is so easy to make a bad problem worse.
Assumption 9: Questioning hurts the mission
“Debates over the legality of pursuing AQAP in Yemen through drones and SOF create unnecessary seams in our nation’s fight against a seamless terrorist enemy. The threat environment we face today predicates the further synchronization of the military and intelligence community.
This evolution in the operational environment demands that the authorities under Title 10 (legal basis for the military services and the department of defense) and Title 50 (procedures for covert actions) be equally synchronized and coordinated. The many corridors inside the Beltway must not stymie operational performance in the field.
The U.S. State Department officially designated AQAP a Foreign Terrorist Organization in January 2010 and most of AQAP’s leaders are now Specially Designated Global Terrorists under Executive Order. Under this legal designation, the U.S. should use all available assets to eliminate the immediate threat of AQAP.”
The legal question is something I’ve been pondering for a while now – largely thanks to the great work by the guys at the Lawfare blog. Maybe someday I’ll even fulfill my childhood dream of going to law school.
First, I think it is good to ask questions, and I think the Obama administration has acknowledged as much in the aftermath of its handling of Libya and the War Powers Resolution.
The question I’ve been pondering lately is this: If the Obama administration is using the 2001 AUMF to justify its air strikes in Yemen, what happens if Ansar al-Shariah or any of the other militant groups around Zanjubar and elsewhere turn out not to be AQ?
Does the AUMF still apply?
Adm. McRaven’s testimony as interpreted by Lawfare seems to suggest that there is a difference between AQ, the Taliban and other groups. So if the militants in the south aren’t AQ are US strikes illegal? If not, what authority is the US using?
Conclusion:
Cilluffo and Watts have provided one possible way for the US to go in Yemen. I think that way is a mistake that won’t yield the results the US wants to see in Yemen.
The bottom line is this: the US has tried this before in Yemen and it hasn’t worked. It only made the problem worse. Doubling-down on a failed strategy is only going to get it more of the same.
Still, one of the criticism academics like myself often come up against is that we provide an analysis of the situation without giving direction on a better way forward – I hope to correct this in an upcoming paper. Stay tuned.
Early this morning, a number of prisoners escaped from a Yemeni central prison in the eastern coastal city of al-Mukalla.
The details, as with most stories - particularly breaking ones - out of Yemen, are still a bit sketchy.
Most reports suggest that anywhere from 40 - 68 prisoners have escaped. Currently, there are four theories as to how this happened.
1. Tunnel: Of course, a tunnel was responsible for Yemen's most famous prison break in 2006 - which I have called AQAP's genesis moment. But still I don't think a tunnel is likely here, and has been discounted by at least one user on a jihadi forum, who claims that the prison's location on a mountain makes this impossible. (I have been unable to confirm the exact location of the prison.)
2. Uprising: This version has prisoners overpowering guards and breaking free - most of the reports claim that at least one prison guard was killed and possibly another one or two injured.
3. Outside attack: This version has AQAP members swooping down on the prison and breaking their comrades out of jail.
4. Inside Job. This theory argues that Salih and his allies are responsible for the prison break, and are attempting to use the threat of more AQAP attacks and future chaos in Yemen to blackmail the US and Saudi Arabia into letting him remain as president. I guess on the assumption that the US and Saudi Arabia think he has been doing a bang-up job so far.
My hunch is that today's events are a combination of 2 and 3, that is an outside attack by AQAP members, who were then supported by some of the prisoners. But that is just a guess, and I have no inside information.
The reason I lean this way is that AQAP has tried this before. Last summer it attacked an intelligence center in Aden in an effort to free some individuals that were being held there. To me, this sounds like a similar operation and one AQAP thought it could get away with given the current state of security in the country.
For those who want to see a conspiracy theory, there are plenty of shadows to poke into. Salih is weak and the prison break just happened to take place on the day Jeffrey Feltman, the Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs came to town.
And of course as I have said before and will say again in a soon to be released bloggingheads on Yemen, Salih over-hypes AQ and the opposition downplays AQ to the point that it is just one more thing both sides use to attack each other with.
But regardless of how it took place - it seems to have taken place. And this means that both Yemen, the US, and regional countries are going to have to deal with the aftermath. And that, in turn, will depend a great deal on who these individuals are.
Identities are very important. After the 2006 prison break I spent a long time combing through jihadi forums and news reports to put together bios of the 23 (Part I and Part II) and as it turned out the two individuals the US was most worried about (Jamal al-Badawi and Jabir al-Banna) were not the two most dangerous individuals (Nasir al-Wihayshi and Qasim al-Raymi). We rarely have perfect or even good intelligence on these figures, but their personal histories matter a lot.
My guess, based on early reporting, is that many of these individuals fought in Iraq. That is not to say that they are all members of al-Qaeda, because there is a difference. But I'm worried that these individuals - if the reports are true - are experienced fighters.
When they got back to Yemen they were arrested and thrown into prison - and prisons in Yemen are radicalizaton factories, where men are crammed into cells and where very often more experienced fighters educate and mentor younger ones. This is a dangerous and severely understudied phenomenon that has produced a number of the suicide bombers in Yemen in recent years.
So regardless of how it happened, this prison break is bad news. Seriously bad news.
Update: Of course, as soon as I post this, the bloggingheads session I did with Robert Wright went live on the site. You can watch it here, we spent much of it talking about AQAP in Yemen.
Waq Al-Waq is a thoughtful and nuanced discussion of Yemeni affairs, based in knowledge of its history and culture. It is written by Gregory Johnsen a former Fulbright Fellow in Yemen who works in the Near Eastern Studies department at Princeton University. In 2009, he was a member of the USAID's conflict assessment team for Yemen.
If you have any thoughts or comments for Gregory Johnsen, you may contact him by email.
