Terrorist Threat: 'The United States Doesn't Want To Take Any More Risks'

Some messages exchanged between the leader of al-Qaida and the head of al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula have pushed Washington D.C. to decide to close over 20 embassies and consulates on Aug. 4, according to several American media sources. On Tuesday, the United States informed their citizens as well nonessential personnel living in Yemen — one of the bases of the terrorist organization — to leave the country immediately. Some planes from the U.S. Air Force started to evacuate Americans from Yemen’s capital, Sanaa. Following America’s decision, London evacuated all of its personnel from its embassy in Sanaa, due to “collected worries regarding security,” according to England’s Minister of Foreign Affairs.

Dominique Thomas, specialist in jihadist networks at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales [School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences], analyzes the reality of these threats:

What is the reality of the terrorist threats targeting the United States and the Western countries in Yemen and in the Muslim world?

Dominique Thomas: The Americans had an exaggerated reaction that is explained by the two 9/11 attacks; the first in 2001 at the World Trade Center in the United States and the second in 2012 against the American embassy in Benghazi, Libya. And further, the implications of the polemic on the attack in Benghazi on the American political scene and of the risk of that polemic goes back to the beginning, in the course of the revelations of the congressional investigation. That constitutes a case of precedence for the United States, which doesn’t want to take any more risks. The smallest alert leads to extraordinary measures.

Other Western countries applied the precautionary principle after receiving information from America. Each country knows that they are essentially a target of opportunity for these groups, because of the lack of ability to strike the United States. That’s the case notably in kidnappings that target Yemeni citizens of different nationalities. The participation of the West in the transition process in Yemen and their support for President Abd Rabbo Mansour Hadi makes them a target. For example, France contributed to the process of national dialogue, going as far as writing the Yemeni constitution, a dividing element in Yemen. There were some messages addressed by al-Qaida to the Yemeni ulema asking to have France removed from this process. Investments by Total are considered similar, although in an economic context, as they seem to unjustly exploit the country’s economic resources.

Michael McCaul, president of the Committee on Homeland Security in the House of Representatives, justified these measures by the fact that the intercepted messages between the leader of al-Qaida, Ayman al-Zawahiri, and the head of al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, Nasser al-Wahichi, constitutes “one of the most specific and credible threats … since 9/11.” Is that the case?

The details that American information services have intercepted and filtered have not been shared on the networks or near sites of al-Qaida. It is a question of a mandate given by Ayman al-Zawahiri to the emir of al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, which orders imminent attacks against the West, particularly the United States. That may be credible because it is well known that al-Zawahiri has contact with al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, and notably emir al-Wahichi, a senior from Afghanistan with whom he has regular correspondence. The leader of al-Qaida passed through Yemen. Some Egyptian Islamists, the country of origin of al-Zawahiri, have high-level posts in the heart of AQAP. When the Yemeni and Saudi branches of al-Qaida merged in 2009 to become AQAP, Al-Zawahiri was the first to celebrate this merge.

But al-Qaida’s desire to attack the United States is just as strong today as it was two years ago. This desire was strengthened by both the death of bin Laden in Pakistan and the politics of drone strikes in Yemen since 2009, which have wiped out more than twenty leaders in the last three years.

In Yemen, what constitutes a reason to carry out terrorist attacks against American and Western interests?

For the Yemeni branch of al-Qaida, that’s practically become an obsession because of drone strikes, similar to the Pakistanis of Waziristan. The first raid by American drones took place in November 2002 in Yemen.

The United States is additionally seen as an imperialist power, imposing and assimilating its values in Yemeni politics by playing the godfather of the new leaders of the transition. The American military presence isn’t negligible in the south of the country either, with its Air Force base near Aden, and the presence of special forces near the American embassy in Sanaa. The United States is public enemy number one to AQAP, which is determined to attack them directly or indirectly.

We talk about the weakening of al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula. Is that the case?

AQAP has been weakened by the drone strikes that wiped out over 20 leaders since 2009. It has also been weakened by the strategy of the territorialization, which was initiated as early as May 2011 in the south of Yemen, and sought to take control of entire territories. This strategy has been painful and has cost human lives and economic investments because it has been administered in certain zones and pays tribes for their allegiance. That has maybe weakened the organization on the quantitative level, but not in its capacity to launch attacks.

On the operational level, there have always been very determined and innovative, competent engineers at the heart of the organization that can focus on new types of attacks. Financially, they have recuperated a lot of money by dipping their hand in entire sectors of the economy in the south of Yemen. Outside of Syria, lots of jihadist organizations today have the capacity to strike an entire territory or sabotage pipelines, or kill two to three officers a week, or make some regular ambushes on armed convoys. The number of attacks by AQAP over the last six months is exaggerated while the number of fighters has increased from 3,000 to 4,000, even if they are disseminated and dispersed. Since 2011, they have also had a strong social base with Ansar al-Sharia Yemen that details AQAP’s positioning.

The security reinforcement and the reduction of the current American civilian presence added to a war that is now being fought in the air, and makes attacks against the United States by al-Qaida somewhat complex. It’s clear that al-Qaida has a poor understanding of this based on their reply, which has included little action other than some small attacks and some kidnappings. But AQAP, which runs the jihadist magazine Inspire, claims responsibility for even the smallest actions, including having inspired, via that magazine, the attacks in Boston on April 15, 2013.