U.S. military teams and intelligence agencies are deeply involved in secret joint operations with Yemeni troops who in the past six weeks have killed scores of people, among them six of 15 top leaders of a regional al-Qaeda affiliate, according to senior administration officials.
The operations, approved by President Obama and begun six weeks ago, involve several dozen troops from the U.S. military's clandestine Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), whose main mission is tracking and killing suspected terrorists. The American advisers do not take part in raids in Yemen, but help plan missions, develop tactics and provide weapons and munitions. Highly sensitive intelligence is being shared with the Yemeni forces, including electronic and video surveillance, as well as three-dimensional terrain maps and detailed analysis of the al-Qaeda network.
As part of the operations, Obama approved a Dec. 24 strike against a compound where a U.S. citizen, Anwar al-Aulaqi, was thought to be meeting with other regional al-Qaeda leaders. Although he was not the focus of the strike and was not killed, he has since been added to a shortlist of U.S. citizens specifically targeted for killing or capture by the JSOC, military officials said. The officials, like others interviewed for this article, spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the operations.
The broad outlines of the U.S. involvement in Yemen have come to light in the past month, but the extent and nature of the operations have not been previously reported. The far-reaching U.S. role could prove politically challenging for Yemen's president, Ali Abdullah Saleh, who must balance his desire for American support against the possibility of a backlash by tribal, political and religious groups whose members resent what they see as U.S. interference in Yemen.
The collaboration with Yemen provides the starkest illustration to date of the Obama administration's efforts to ramp up counterterrorism operations, including in areas outside the Iraq and Afghanistan war zones.
"We are very pleased with the direction this is going," a senior administration official said of the cooperation with Yemen.
Obama has ordered a dramatic increase in the pace of CIA drone-launched missile strikes into Pakistan in an effort to kill al-Qaeda and Taliban members in the ungoverned tribal areas along the Afghan border. There have been more such strikes in the first year of Obama's administration than in the last three years under President George W. Bush, according to a military officer who tracks the attacks.
Obama also has sent U.S. military forces briefly into Somalia as part of an operation to kill Saleh Ali Nabhan, a Kenyan sought in the 2002 bombing of an Israeli-owned resort in Kenya.
Republican lawmakers and former vice president Richard B. Cheney have sought to characterize the new president as soft on terrorism after he banned the harsh interrogation methods permitted under Bush and announced his intention to close the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
Obama has rejected those two elements of Bush's counterterrorism program, but he has embraced the notion that the most effective way to kill or capture members of al-Qaeda and its affiliates is to work closely with foreign partners, including those that have feeble democracies, shoddy human rights records and weak accountability over the vast sums of money Washington is giving them to win their continued participation in these efforts.
In the case of Yemen, a steady stream of high-ranking officials has visited Saleh, including the rarely seen JSOC commander, Vice Adm. William H. McRaven; White House counterterrorism adviser John O. Brennan; and Gen. David H. Petraeus, head of U.S. Central Command.
A Yemeni official briefed on security matters said Tuesday that the two countries maintained a "steadfast cooperation in combating AQAP, but there are clear limits to the U.S. involvement on the ground. Information sharing has been a key in carrying out recent successful counterterrorism operations." AQAP is the abbreviation for al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, the affiliate operating in Yemen.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Ex-Somali Police Commissioner General Mohamed Abshir
Sultan Kenadid
Seyyid Muhammad Abdille Hassan
Sultan Mohamud Ali Shire
Designation of Al-Shabaab
SOMALI REPUBLICANS
About Us
The Foundation is dedicated to networking like-minded Somalis opposed to the terrorist insurgency that is plaguing our beloved homeland and informing the international public at large about what is really happening throughout the Horn of Africa region.
Blog Archive
-
▼
2010
(2294)
-
▼
January
(219)
- Problems in the VOA-Somali Service..Abdirahman Yab...
- Somalia Special report: The rise of 'the African ...
- Al Shabaab Terrorist bases attacked
- Snuff out militant Islam's lethal spark - kill bin...
- African summit hears world ignoring Somalia crisis...
- Explosions Raise Fears Over Somaliland region of s...
- Habar-Gidir Hawiye Kidnap British hostages poorly ...
- Chasing peace in Somalia
- Somali president off to Addis Ababa for AU summit
- Kenya Deports 16 Somalis
- Al Shabab's reign of terror grips Somalia
- Somali President Vows to Defeat Insurgents
- Bloodshed mars Somalia presidency’s anniversary
- Law official: Passenger on flight not terroris
- UN urges new approach to fight Somali piracy,Navie...
- Weekly Homeland Security News Briefing
- Pirates looted Sh45bn last year: report
- Heavy fighting in Somali capital kills 19,Islamic ...
- How al-Shabaab Targets Western Youth
- Premier discusses with Danish State Secretary
- Somalian Government Celebrates first Anniversary
- The Jihadist Next Door
- Fifth Plenary Meeting of the Contact Group on Pira...
- Mogadishu raids mar Somali leader Ahmed's anniversary
- Al-Qaeda's Yemeni branch reveals links to Somalia ...
- Attack by militant group leaves 12 dead in Somalia
- Omar Jamal address the problem at the meeting of...
- Moderate Islamists to defeat al Shabaab
- 8-year-old boy seriously wounded in Somalia dies, ...
- U.S. Army Supports Burundi's Efforts in Somalia, D...
- Somalia Islamist group bans video games
- What is needed is a system to verify the payment o...
- Somali form somaliland region Jehadest Accused o...
- Ask The Expert: Will Yemen Become A Major Al-Qaeda...
- World powers meet on Yemen after US jet plot,West ...
- N.Y. federal prosecutors pursue foreign cases aggr...
- Obama: My Qaeda Body Count is Higher Than Bush's
- Kenya urges U.S. to mobilize global support for So...
- Uncle Who Vouched for Terror Suspect Arrested
- PM Meles Zenawi addresses Ethiopians on the tragic...
- Why Al-Shabaab, an affiliate terrorist organizatio...
- Woman Killed for Refusing to Wear Veil
- Fighting in central Somalia kills at least 16
- Somalia Troops Fight Militants
- Somalia Women on Music Censorship
- US: Kenya travel advisory to stay
- UPDF soldier killed in Somalia attack,Shabaab suic...
- U.S. military teams, intelligence deeply involved ...
- Italy says Afghan meet should look at Somalia
- Battle for key western Somali town kills eight
- Islamic Militants in Somalia Murder Christian Leader
- Kenyan troops Exchange fire with Al-Shabab
- HDNet World Report Investigates a Growing Terroris...
- Al Shabaab claims responsibility for explosion at ...
- AU, UN delegation visits Mogadishu
- Al-Shabab imposes new rules in Learning centers
- Bomb kills 4 policemen in breakaway Somaliland
- EU agrees to train Somali troops
- Somalia's Shebab name market after slain Qaeda boss
- Beirut: 90 feared dead as Ethiopian Airlines plane...
- SOMALIA: Plan to integrate ex-militias into securi...
- Somalia, Sudan top agenda of OIC meet in Uganda,Te...
- AHLU-SUNNA – The New Kid In The Block
- Ethiopia attracts new foreign investment
- Kenyans killed in riot over Islamic cleric's arres...
- We'll quash Islam terror threats, says Mubarak
- England's football World Cup stars under Al-Qaeda ...
- world's most wanted terrorist Bin-Laden Claims Fl...
- Al-Shabaab associate sentenced to death in Puntland
- Somalia’s booming piracy trade
- Kenya on alert over militia scare, Donors pledge ...
- Sweden rattled by Somali militants in its midst
- Somalia's Former PM to Face Charges
- UK students recruited for Somali jihad
- Ethiopian to fly to Toronto
- African Union: Address Justice and Accountability
- News Radical Muslim back: ‘I’m happy to be home,’...
- Qaeda threat compounds woes of Yemen's Somali refu...
- Britain botched rescue attempt for Somalia hostages
- Terrorist attack is "highly likely" security servi...
- Islamist Rebels Take Central Somali Town, Eight Dead
- Shabaab looks to the Somali North
- Fears Increase Over Insurgents in Somalia Threaten...
- Somali Islamists chop off phone thief's hand
- Somali terror suspect being sent to halfway house
- Somali terror suspect rerleased from Seattle jail
- AP Interview: Interpol hunting pirate money
- Kenya may deport muslim clerk by sea,Faisal deport...
- COLUMN - American nightmare - Al Qaeda at home
- The radical Islamist group al-Shabab Accused of Cr...
- Somali hardline rebels threaten Kenya attack,Somal...
- Center for jihad apologist (CJA) Files Responden...
- Local Lawmaker Shot Dead In Northeast Somalia
- French FM rallies support for Somali president
- Watch The Pirates, Sweden to strengthen its commit...
- 'Al Qaeda expanding beyond nerve centre in Pakista...
- A somali lawmaker killed in a cold blood
- Stop hiding in Kenya, Somali MPs told .. mostly ...
- Scots firm's laser gun to foil Somali pirates. 6 p...
-
▼
January
(219)
Al-Qaida in Somalia. ...
We Are Winning the War on Terrorism in Horn of Africa
The threat is from violent extremists who are a small minority of the world's 1.3 billion Muslims, the threat is real. They distort Islam. They kill man, woman and child; Christian and Hindu, Jew and Muslim. They seek to create a repressive caliphate. To defeat this enemy, we must understand who we are fighting against, and what we are fighting for.
No comments:
Post a Comment