Tag: Ali Abdullah Saleh

3 January 2000

Posted on by William Arkin
USS Sullivans

 

The Navy destroyer USS The Sullivans (DDG 68) makes a port call in Aden, Yemen, part of a U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) military initiative to improve diplomatic relations with the Sana’a government under President Ali Abdullah Saleh.

Not known until the USS Cole was attacked on October 12 in a subsequent port call was an unsuccessful attempt by al Qaeda to attack the ship on January 3. Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, now held at Guantanamo Bay, was the local organizer behind the operation, probably masterminded by al Qaeda operative Walid bin Attash (“Khallad”), also a Yemeni. The small skiff loaded with explosives sank not far offshore as it was launched to attack the USS The Sullivans. Had the plot been discovered by U.S. intelligence, the foolish program to curry favor with the Saleh government probably would have been stopped, or at least greater force protection measures would have been applied to protect the USS Cole when it subsequently visited.

22 December 1989

Posted on by William Arkin
South Yemen

 

Osama bin Laden approaches Prince Turki bin Faisal al Saud, head of the intelligence services of Saudi Arabia, with a plan to use Arab mujahedin from Afghanistan to overthrow the Marxist government in South Yemen.

Turki rejects his proposal, but bin Laden reportedly organizes fighters anyhow under the al Qaeda flag, and then (working with tribal leaders) makes a series of attacks in South Yemen. The attacks are so damaging and threatening that Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh travels to Saudi Arabia to ask King Fahd to get bin Laden under control. The King then himself instructs bin Laden to stay out of Yemeni affairs, and Prince Nayef bin Abdulaziz al Saud (then the minister of the interior) demands bin Laden’s passport.

Less than a year later, Iraq invades Kuwait and bin Laden’s views of Saudi Arabia are forever transformed, with King Fahd inviting U.S. military forces to deploy to Saudi soil—a sacrilege to bin Laden that represents a new set of “crusaders” entering the lands of Islam.

22 October 2000

Posted on by William Arkin
Ali Abdullah Saleh & George W. Bush

 

The government in Yemen stonewalls after the attack on the USS Cole (see October 12), thereby confusing the collection of “evidence” that al Qaeda is responsible and impeding retaliation. There are many reasons—the election voting standoff between Bush and Gore, an impending change in administrations, disbelief in al Qaeda, and skepticism about the value of cruise missile attacks—that also ultimately stand in the way of an American “response,” but Yemen’s foot-dragging, and even lying, has a major impact.

Within the first weeks after the Cole attack, the Yemenis arrest two key figures in the attack. But they forbid the FBI investigators on the ground from participating in the interrogations. President Clinton, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, and CIA Director George Tenet all intervene to try to help but Yemen doesn’t budge. Ultimately, the 911 Commission concludes that because information from the suspects comes in that is secondhand, the U.S. could not make its own assessment of its reliability (911 Commission, p. 192).

Yemen would continue to be a haven for al Qaeda, even after 9/11. It would take the Arab Spring—and not anything about the American global war on terror—to finally unseat the first and only president of the country, Ali Abdullah Saleh. That has been followed by a never-ending civil war and Saudi (and Gulf state) intervention, turning the country into a humanitarian disaster and a basket case. Saleh was killed by a sniper in December 2017.