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WORLD | MIDDLE EAST
U.S. Troops Return to Yemen in Battle
Against Al Qaeda, Pentagon Says
Move comes after U.S. pullout, embassy shutdown in 2015
Yemeni security forces look at smoke billowing from a controlled detonation of explosives laid by al Qaeda
militants. The Pentagon said Friday that it sent a small number of U.S. special coalition forces back to Yemen to
provide assistance to an Arab coalition fighting al Qaeda. PHOTO: AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE/GETTY IMAGES
By GORDON LUBOLD and PAUL SONNE
May 6, 2016 7:48 p.m. ET
WASHINGTON—The Pentagon said Friday that it sent a small number of U.S.
special operations forces back to Yemen to provide training and assistance to an
Arab coalition to fight al Qaeda militants in the fractured country.
Defense officials said about a dozen or so special operations forces are on the
ground to assist United Arab Emirates special forces battle militants associated
with al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, or AQAP, in Yemen. They said the
deployment of forces, which began about two weeks ago, had helped Arab forces
retake the port city of Mukalla, along the southern coast of Yemen.
Since April 23, the Pentagon has conducted four counterterrorism strikes
against AQAP, killing a total of 10 AQAP operatives and injuring one more, said
Capt. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman.
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The Pentagon is also providing other support for the operations, including
airborne intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance capabilities, as well as
“advice and assistance” for operational planning. The U.S. is also providing some
maritime interdiction services, security, medical support and aerial refueling
capabilities, according to Capt. Davis.
AQAP, he said Friday at the Pentagon, “remains a significant security threat to
the United States and to our regional partners, and we welcome this effort to
specifically remove AQAP from Mukalla and to degrade, disrupt and destroy
AQAP in Yemen.”
“They do remain a significant threat to the region and to the United States,”
Capt. Davis said. He said al Qaeda has a destabilizing effect on Yemen and is
“using the unrest in Yemen to provide a safe haven from which to plan future
attacks against the United States and its interests.”
The U.S. for years had maintained a small American advisory force in Yemen to
provide assistance to elements of the Yemeni military in its fight against AQAP.
Those forces were removed more than a year ago after Yemen’s civil war broke
out.
The U.S. shut and evacuated its embassy in the capital of San’a in February 2015.
The U.S. ambassador to Yemen, Matthew Tueller, has been working out of the
American consulate in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, since last year.
U.S. officials and service members departed Yemen hastily—some embassy
officials had left their cars at the San’a airport with the keys still in the ignition.
U.S. marines disabled their side arms and M4 assault rifles before leaving them
with Yemeni officials so they could evacuate on a commercial aircraft. Some
used sledgehammers to destroy the weapons and removed the bolts at the
airport.
Since then, the U.S. has maintained a tactical focus on AQAP targets. In March,
the Pentagon announced it had conducted a “significant strike” against an AQAP
training camp.
Anthony Cordesman, a national security expert at the Center for Strategic and
International Studies in Washington, said a low-level, surgical operation by U.S.
troops against AQAP in Yemen could reassure Gulf allies, show that the U.S.
wasn’t driven out of the country and send a message to both al Qaeda and
Islamic State.
Mr. Cordesman said any operation would carry an element of risk and the
potential for things to go sour. “But it’s the kind of operation with maximum
impact and minimum cost,” he said.
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The U.S. has been backing the Saudi Arabia-led coalition in its campaign against
the Houthi rebels with air resupply operations, intelligence and logistics
support in the months since the Arab coalition intervened in the conflict
starting in 2015. The Houthis adhere to an offshoot of Shiite Islam. Iran, also a
Shiite country, supports the Houthi rebels but denies it has been supplying them
with weapons.
The chaos caused by the war created an opening for al Qaeda’s affiliate in Yemen
to build strength in the country’s south.
The Yemeni government and the Houthis are party to a cease-fire brokered by
the U.N. earlier this year. But fighting has marred the peace agreement and
progress toward a political settlement so far has stalled.
If the cease-fire fully breaks down, ushering in a return to full-scale warfare, U.S.
troops will be closer to the fight. For the cease-fire to transform into a lasting
peace agreement, the Houthis likely would have to become a party to some kind
of political power sharing agreement, but so far such an arrangement hasn’t
materialized.
“The bottom line here is that it means the U.S. is getting in deeper and deeper in
Yemen, and that really requires that we have a political process in Yemen that
puts together a government that works,” said Bruce Riedel, a senior fellow at the
Brookings Institution. “Otherwise, we’re going to sink into yet another civil war
in the Middle East with a weak partner.”
The Pentagon relies on existing legal authorities from the 2001 Authorization
for Use of Military Force to conduct strikes against AQAP in Yemen. “Congress is
being kept informed of our support for the coalition in the Mukalla effort, and of
our unilateral [counterterrorism] strikes,” the Pentagon said in a statement
Friday.
The redeployment of troops in Yemen could bring another round of calls for the
Obama administration to renew approval from Congress for its antiterror
operations, including those against Islamic State, an organization that didn’t
exist when the initial 2001 authorization was approved.
Mr. Riedel called the redeployment in Yemen another example “of creeping
expansion of the war against Islamic State and al Qaeda, with very little
congressional oversight.” The White House has asked Congress to approve new
authorities to go after Islamic State, but lawmakers have resisted, complaining
that Mr. Obama’s proposals would limit action by U.S. forces.
“To be fair to the administration, Congress has not been very eager to take on its
responsibility,” Mr. Riedel said. “Nonetheless, Americans found out this
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afternoon that American boots were on the ground in yet another country.”
—Felicia Schwartz contributed to this article.
Write to Gordon Lubold at [email protected] and Paul Sonne at
[email protected]
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