by Vegetius
Download the full article: An Asymmetric Approach to Yemen
We are in a war of containment against radical Jihadist Islam, and Yemen is the next campaign in that conflict. How we conduct that campaign may be the critical turning point in that extended war. There are more tinderboxes for potential Jihadist outbreaks on the horizon; Somalia and several other places in Africa are among the leading candidates. We are running out of American troops to intervene in these hotspots, but we can ill afford to ignore them. Perhaps it is time to consider some asymmetric approaches to this very wicked problem.
The bad news is that Yemen is a tough nut. It is running out of oil, it has two civil war/insurgency situations, and an exponentially growing number of unemployed young men. The government only controls about a third of the country. In other words, it is a perfect breeding ground for radical Jihadists, and foreign fighters are flocking there in droves.
The good news is that Yemen is not yet a failed state. It has a functioning, if very imperfect, government. We have been able to deal with this kind of situation before. El Salvador is a good example. In that case, we were even able to take a bad government and help it become much better. The government of Yemen will not become a functioning Jeffersonian democracy in the near future, and we do not necessarily need it to become one to achieve and acceptable strategic outcome. What we do need is to have Yemen become a hostile place for radical Jihadists, and do so without committing large numbers of American troops in the process. This is where an asymmetrical approach comes in into play.
Download the full article: An Asymmetric Approach to Yemen
Vegetius is a government employee and former infantryman; he has experience in Iraq and Afghanistan.
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Comments
Forgive me, but any strategy that aims to contain an enemy worries me; it seems such a view is destined to fail. It is a strategy that defined success as the status quo. It is an absolutely defensive strategy. What ever else Ronald Reagan did, he did recognize that containing the USSR was a losing proposition.
Indeed Maj. Scarlet, the victors historically set the conditions after defeat. But a wise victor assimilates those they conquered into the empire.
But of course the subject is asymmetrical warfare in Yemen. It might also be wise to remember that Al-Qa'idah Jihad Organization of the Arabian Peninsula does not pose a threat to President Saleh - only us, and the Saudi Kingdom.
It would be prudent for us to keep our footprint on the southern peninsula small, though effective, and recognize under Saleh, we can probably only contain Qaidah there.
President Saleh will only use the training and aid we give his government to repress and kill those he feels are a threat to him. And if he has to give us a few Jihadists, he'll not be opposed to that either - Pakistan being a role model for him.
Anon,
it is a cold hard fact that the victors set the conditions after defeat. the victors have no reason to hear your concerns. they beat you. the end.
it is up to the loser to decide whether continued resistance is worth it or not. continued resistance is fanned by outside support and it is quelled by cutting it off.
the situation between the hindu tamils and the buddhist sinhalese is fairly complicated. the sinhalese have a right not to feel sympathy for the tamil.. who are not native to sri lanka but were imported by the brits as labor for the tea fields. the sri lankans, a former brutalized british colony, have every right to have their country returned to them in a manner they see fit. they are a sovereign country that has every right to address their internal security. we are seeing similar problems around the globe from the british model of "divide and conquer".
it isn't our place to put demands on them to settle anything. perhaps the tamils should go back to where they came from and if not.. why not?
i'm playing the devils advocate here so don't get too stirred up about what i've said. i'm not against trying to settle the situation between the tamils and the sinhalese.
Much funding for the LTTE came from the Tamil diaspora in Europe and Canada, and funds are still thought to be yet available having been hidden away.
Don't lose site that this conflict in Sri Lanka lasted well over 20-years, and might have gone on still had Tigers not turned toward confronting the Sri Lankan army conventionally - a huge mistake.
In parting, also consider the conditions that originally existed that fueled the LTTE's ideology haven't been addressed by the Sri Lankan government - is it overwith, or just dormant?
Vegetius,
perhaps you should read up on the Sri Lankan model of how to do business. when you take fighting a foe seriously, you have a higher success rate. when you can't even bother to read your own manuals.. and allow your enemies to have "unassailable bases of operations" in other countries.. a classic and fatal error, then you might as well not start the war in the first place.
I just returned from iraq.. when i arrived there.. not a single person in my unit had read fm 3.07. how are you supposed to do stability operations if you don't even know what the key tasks are?
we are failing because we don't have the will to fight correctly. mark my words.. even if we leave afghanistan and iraq in stable and healthy condition.. al Qaeda will still exist because we haven't properly dealt with the real puppet masters of AQ.. mainly saudi arabia.
a lot of wishful thinking and western myopia going on here.
the variables you list for explaining that yemen is a "tough nut" are actually opportunities.. at least for the strategic minded.
while the sheiks are important.. the sheiks can also be easily influenced by the locals "perceptions" of outsider help. going in and throwing around cash can easily make the sheiks look like western pawns and discredit them.
we didn't need to turn ourselves in to warrior nations to defeat the nazis.. we conducted an industrial war.. finished the business and demobilized not just our military but our national will. we could, if we had courageous enough leadership, mobilize again as an industrial war nation (imagine 15% of the US on active duty), wipe out the threat in the middle east, and come home and demobilize. we have always been successful when we take these steps.. failed otherwise. the author seems to miss this point.
Stunningly,author says "China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, and the rest of the of the Arab oil producing states have as much of a stake in this struggle as we do." Bud.. who do you think is funding these non-state actors? China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, etc are all working asymmetrically against us. This statement is so mind numbingly ignorant of the current global political struggle that I'm surprised it got published here.
If you are happy with Afghan President Hamid Karzai, along with his brother Ahmed Wali, and their cozy relationships with dubious personalities working at cross-purposes against America for profit and survival. You will be sure to be infatuated with President Ali Abdullah Saleh of Yemen, who has to hold the record (Uncle Fidel of Cuba aside) as quite the survivor.
Yemen under Saleh, will only create a hostile environment for al-Qaeda Jihad Organization of the Arabian Peninsula if they become a threat to his government, which from time-to-time he, like Pakistan, selectively allows us to target.
Yemen may be running out of oil (though mismanagement acerbate the extraction and pumping) but they certainly aren't in short supply of Qat to chew - their national pass time after the noon meal, socializing up on their muffrages (upper decks).
Please, let's be careful on how we pick our friends - a minor principle of asymmetrical warfare possibly? Since tomorrow they may not be so friendly after all.
Bob,
what the Sri Lankas did was much more complicated than boiling it down to getting support from china.
http://www.priu.gov.lk/news_update/Current_Affairs/ca200908/20090825fun…
i'm fairly certain i read somewhere that china was somehow involved with the Tigers. at least ideologically that would make sense. the tamils were also known to train with the iranians. missing from the link above is who exactly their support came from. the link above list some criteria for why it was successful but missing from the list is the fact that they isolated the terrorist from their support bases in other countries. this is why i say we are making a critical mistake in our wars by not isolating the groups trying to harm our efforts.
Actually the critical factor in Sri Lanka wasn't so much the will (the Singhalese have always had the will to kill Tamils) but the means, i.e. lots of heavy artillery, ammunition, rockets etc all paid for and supplied by China. Ever heard of the 'String of Pearls' strategy (i.e. China does for you in SE & Central Asia and you provide deep water ports for its navy). Previously the Sir Lankan govt simply couldn't afford all the gear to put down the more ideologically motivated Tamil Tigers. (Still you got to love the Tiger Leader and his 2nd in command charging the Sri Lankan army in their armoured bus as a last hurrah!)