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| Al-Qaeda regrouping in Yemen | |
| 2003-11-03 | |
| I expect that this is a logical consequence of the merger between al-Qaeda and their two Yemeni jihad affiliates. Either Yemen agrees to turn themselves into the next big terror haven or things start heating up there. Al-Qaeda elements have recently warned the Yemeni government against its excessive security cooperation with the US. This time there were no explosions to accompany such a rant. Perhaps theyâve lost touch ... The mouthpiece of the Yemeni Unionist Party Al-Wahdawi Weekly in its issue released Oct. 27, said that it has received a phone call via satellites from a person named Abu Mohammed Al-Ghamedi, a Saudi national, who claimed that he was the representative of Al-Qaeda in Yemen and he went saying that they are ready to pursue attacking the American interests in the country without mentioning any other details. Dear God, not another al-Ghamdi. Is there no end to these guys? There seems to be enough of them running around to qualify as a terrorist organization on their own right. Moreover, he said that al-Qaeda elements in Yemen have been guided by Al-Muaataz Bellah, indicating that they ousted Khalid Abdulnabi, a leader of Hutat Group in Abyan. He also said that that Aden-Abyan Islamic Militant Group has joined Al-Qaeda. The Hutat Group is a new one for me, unless itâs the Yemeni Islamic Jihad. We already knew about the Army of Aden joining al-Qaeda.
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| Posted by:Dan Darling |
| #13 Speaking of holy icons. I wonder what happened to Mullah Omar's cloak of the profet. |
| Posted by: Super Hose 2003-11-3 7:21:03 PM |
| #12 .com, But I've always wanted to be a cowboy, if only it could be true. A nice ranch, a few hunert head-a cows, no worries, just me and ol'Paint against the world. Think'n me and ol'Paint 'll amble off to amble.com presently. Ya'll have a good even'n. Thankee. |
| Posted by: Lucky 2003-11-3 6:59:36 PM |
| #11 Lucky - The Wahabbists "own" the Two Holy Mosques in Mecca and Medina - a sore point with, as well as leverage against and power over, every other faction of Islam. To cut the heart out of Wahabbism would be to do the same to Islam in general. Certainly the Shi'a would dearly love to get their hands on them. You can't "move" Islam from its roots - they're extra super magically Holy and everything, y'know. They'd prolly get pissed at your insensitivity and declare jihad. ;-) Saudi Arabia is much like the surface of the Moon - with air, gravity, and ass-kicking heat 8+ months of the year. Most of it is unoccupied (and this applies to the "Anonymous" comment about occupation) wasteland. Hell, most of the occupied places other than the Red Sea coast are wasteland with buildings and streets. They don't call the Southern 1/4 of Saudi the "Empty Quarter" for nothing. If we were free to do what we wanted, the thing to do would be to "occupy" a reasonably small portion of the Gulf coast, where most of the oil is located and trans-shipped, and the Red Sea coast which is also a major shipping area. Any oil prodution left would be almost worthless without shipping. The middle of the sandbox is interesting only to Muslims as it contains Nos. 1 & 2 on their Holy Hit Parade. Riyadh (I've never been there myself, but know from others who've lived and worked there) is a wasteland, situated there because it is the traditional homeland region of the House of Saud, close to the Two Holy Mosques, and, since it once mattered in warfare as Saud subdued the holdout tribes, centrally located. You can "whack" Saudi and take them out of the terrorism game by taking the oil centers. As Willie Sutton said when asked why he robbed banks, "because that's where the money is" - without the oil, these are wild-eyed Wahabbi goat herders with a few oases of date palms. Like America has romanticized the Old West with many thinking (without really thinking) they wish they'd lived then, the Saudis have their Bedu past and love to pretend they all feel the call of the wild, but none would actually do it cuz it's damned recent history and their elders know better. I highly recommend scrolling through this online book and reading the anecdotes. They really paint an interesting picture and give background on how to deal with Saudi Arabia. You will find stories worth the effort. The one about the old Beduin and the King's train carriage was an eye-opener for me. http://www.amble.com/barnes.htm Cut off their oil and they are nothing but a tempest in a samovar in the middle of nowhere: The Moon. You don't think that more than 2 or 3 percent of the money sitting in Swiss Banks would be donated to the True Believers to wage jihad - if they knew that no more was coming in, do you? Me neither. ;-> |
| Posted by: .com 2003-11-3 5:35:24 PM |
| #10 .com - I liked the part about how you could tune to a special scriptural channel on your airplane headset. Could you imagine getting Happy Ramadan spam? |
| Posted by: Super Hose 2003-11-3 5:10:40 PM |
| #9 SH - Interesting piece, Thx! I particularly enjoyed this bit: "clerics here insist the new month begins not when scientists determine, but when the crescent moon should be seen with the naked eye" And we all know that Allah parts the clouds to permit viewing of the cresent - to remove confusion among his believers... for He is all-knowing and kind to His children. |
| Posted by: .com 2003-11-3 4:49:54 PM |
| #8 .com, did you see the Nesday article on the "modern" Saudi Ramadan where they are all text messaging Ramadan greetings to each other? |
| Posted by: Super Hose 2003-11-3 1:24:35 PM |
| #7 I've always favored a targeted approach regarding the Saudis. I don't think it is their govs policy to fund terrorist. There is popular support for them though. Why the popular support, wahabi cash and all. That segment needs to be targeted. .com brings up the foreign civilians which is a big problem in the targeted approach as they may not appreciate the hostile action to their good health. So that should be addressed, like get the hell out. That would make the loonies happy anyway. A blockade of Saudi oil assets would dry up cash. Then with clearer royal heads taking stock of the situation the targeting of the wahabi's could begin. Once free of wahabi influence the Saudi good guys(?), such as Sec of State Collin Powell's buddy Prince Bandar, would have a better chance to promote a modern state. I realize that this is on the sophomoric side. But lets not forget that radical Islam has a heart and that is what needs to be cut out. If it isn't then there is no end to this war, NO END! Screwing around in Iraq is not going to do much more than screwing around in Iraq. It's time for them to have their civil war. Anon is right about occupying Saudi, not good. Iran; let Iran be the new home of radical Islam. Iranians are smart enough to reject that by themselves. BTW, the targeting of wahabi funded mad houses must be done world wide. Use their prefered method, daytime car bombs with red cresents on them. |
| Posted by: Lucky 2003-11-3 12:35:48 PM |
| #6 Just a small question: how well would we be able to occupy Saudi Arabian territory in a war, when we're having problems with domestic support occupying Iraq, which has a mostly friendly population and the "resistance" is mostly foreign? I don't think we're up to actually trying to occupy a hostile population. |
| Posted by: Anonymous 2003-11-3 11:19:51 AM |
| #5 I should hope that the only American asset that AQ could attack in Yemen would be the bookbag that Jonnie Lindh left when he beat feat to Pakistan for his summer vacation. |
| Posted by: Super Hose 2003-11-3 9:22:21 AM |
| #4 I believe that 70% - 80% of all bad-guy funding comes from Saudi and Iran - and Saudi is probably 60%+ of that. The Saudis also fund the training grounds (madrassahs and schools and cleric centers and all the rest, whether it's in Pakiland, Germany, or Wash DC). The Iranians are tighter-fisted with their cash - recall the demands for expense reports and such in West Bank / Gaza ops they funded. LOL. They're terrorists - with a CPA, I guess. No doubt whacking either would deal a real blow to the baddies. Iran is the one that's most immediately dangerous right now, IMO - and far easier to justify with a list of casus belli items long enough to convince anyone but a NaziMedia Tool or a Donk Prez Candidate. When? When we have to, I guess, to stop them tipping their new NorK missiles with Paki-Russkie nukes. The ones with the "We will bury you" messages painted on them. The longer term problem with Saudi is sticky. And it's the one that really worries me. Geo41 actually thinks they're his friends - he's always been soft as butter in Saudi dealings. Some of that came from his buddies / Cabinet (esp Schultz and Scowcroft). Geo43 seems to have inherited the inclination, if not the full disease, as evidenced by how much cover he's given them - the blanked 28 pages and how he acted toward Clown Prince Abdullah in Crawford. Clearing the decks: We have a LOT of people over there (10,000+ American civvies in oil biz and prolly about the same number of UK Commonwealth civvies)- though the Riyadh attacks opened the gates: Most guys are staying, but sending their families back or planning to do so. Because of the causeway to Bahrain, they could get out fast, if needed, assuming the Saudis will let them go, and not have to fight over air flights. We have pulled out all but liason military. Because of Saudi laws, a hasty exit doesn't mean we lose a lot of civvy assets, either - they'll be mostly Saudi-owned, we just provide people and brainpower. So whacking Saudi is really about this "Special Relationship" crap that Roosevelt set up and Geo41 bought into 100%. He was a true Ivy League noblesse oblige Skull 'n Bones guy who idolized Henry Stimson and Wild Bill Donovan. Dubya isn't any of that, but he has to get real a lot faster than I think he's doing now. I don't think you'll be able to wean him from this legacy crap until they do something else like 9/11 and the finger points back at the Royals again. That should do it, but that's a helluva price to pay just to get Dubya to let go of his lifelong held Saudi myths, implanted courtesy of Daddy. Once the green light is on - you'll have to isolate them - airports, Bahrain causeway, Gulf docks and shipping, hiways to Kuwait and Qatar... then what? Not sure, except sea of glass.... Is that 2 cents worth? |
| Posted by: .com 2003-11-3 6:09:27 AM |
| #3 A few months ago I wrote a letter to a Yemen Times columnist, concerning his complaints about the number of guns in his country. He replied by saying that there were 4 guns for every Yemeni. I don't believe in strict gun control. However, gun sense means knowing when enough is enough. |
| Posted by: Anonon 2003-11-3 3:55:10 AM |
| #2 I do not know what all the secret intel is, but everything points to the theory that a good Saudi ass-kicking will clear up alot of this al-Q nonsense. Iran is bad, very bad, but they seem to be a close second to Saudi. .com, what say you? |
| Posted by: Alaska Paul 2003-11-3 1:38:52 AM |
| #1 This time there were no explosions to accompany such a rant. Perhaps theyâve lost touch ... Maybe they're acting like the UN, you know, blustery and ineffectual. Dear God, not another al-Ghamdi. Is there no end to these guys? There's a science experiment about this, something about how if you put a male rat and a female rat together, lots of food, no competition, pretty soon ... well, you know the results of that experiment! |
| Posted by: Steve White 2003-11-3 12:48:07 AM |