Yemen blasts villages it says are sheltering al-Qaeda men. (the Scotsman UK; registration may be required.) THE war on terror shifted to Yemen yesterday, as the government launched attacks on mountain villages said to be sheltering Osama bin Laden's supporters. The assault in central Yemen with tanks, helicopters and artillery were led by US-trained Yemeni special forces. It appeared the most serious military operation yet in an Arab country against the al-Qaeda network, blamed for the 11 September terror attacks.
OK, that's a surprise.
My guess -- and it is only a guess -- is that Yemen took a look at what happened to Afghanistan and decided that perhaps they'd rather take care of things themselves. A bit less messy that way, and the current rulers actually get to hang around for a while. (Mind, I don't think we would have carpet-bombed Yemen, not any time soon in any event.) It will be interesting to see if this actually makes a dent in Yemen's "state sponsorship of terrorism"; after all, I don't believe that the Administration's issue with Yemen is that they've done nothing about terrorist cells in their country -- not the primary issue, anyway -- but that they actually fund and sponsor terrorists. Whatever good this does for them is likely to be quite limited.
And in a related issue: anyone think it's possible to get our officials to shut the hell up? I mean, does Rumsfeld actually think that there is any European leader with a brain in their head that doesn't know that we're in a new day? They've been living with terrorism for considerably longer than we have. Granted, comparatively, their terrorists have been operating at a smaller scale, but does Rumsfeld honestly think that, for example, the British might not realize that the Real IRA might consider itself inspired now? that Spain might not consider that the Basque separatists might now be thinking, "Hey, there's a concept ..." I mean, who on earth does he think he is?
Copyright © 2001, Iain Jackson, after-words.org
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12/19/2001: vive la france
12/19/2001: princess, redux
12/19/2001: yemen and rumsfeld
12/18/2001: you're NOT in the army now
12/18/2001: interesting donation
12/18/2001: shame on winn dixie, indeed
12/18/2001: saudi princess
12/17/2001: new resolve
12/17/2001: a victim of the attack ... yeah, right
12/17/2001: polluters ho!