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SharkswithfrikingLazers 05/20/2012 04:07 PM Report
KHAT and YEMEN!
The most operational franchise of al-Qaida today is the Yemen-based al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, according to John Brennan, President Obama's counterterrorism advisor. He describes the group as very, very dangerous. Several terrorist plots originated there, including the recent underwear bomb plot, which was just exposed by a double agent.
Khat is a narcotic-like leaf that is chewed throughout the horn of Africa and in parts of the Arabian Peninsula and almost every Yemeni chews it.
And the reason that I'm so struck by that experience is because the United States bans its employees in Yemen from chewing Khat. Every other government allows its ambassadors and other diplomatic figures to go to khat chews. That's where you learn everything in Yemen, is at a khat chew. No one's going to send you an email telling you anything. You have to go to a khat chew, sit on the floor, and chew with people into the night.
And that's how you get intelligence. That's how you get permission. That's how you get anything done.
http://www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.php?storyId=152854335
robdverity 11/02/2010 04:49 PM Report
Threats emanating from Yemen, Somalia et al exacerbate the futility of our misadventures in Iraq and Af-Pak. But it acquires more life-time enemies, so we will persist. Understand they want to use drones on Yemen. Mindless! Kill more civilians, make more enmity and enemies and assure conflict and mayhem and inevitable terror-strikes on the homeland.
Bin Laden's goal: bankrupt us swatting at flies.
We're run by a ship of fools. They'll (al Qaeda) win. Some of them can read and even write. More than enuff to match our arrogant: conventional vs asymmetrical. Bring our troops home, spend money on intelligence and ME peace. US hit still inevitable, but we'll save LIVES and money with the same outcome in the interim.
REMant 11/02/2010 12:24 PM Report
What this episode tells me, is that we spend too much effort worrying about hijackers, and not enough screening baggage, etc. But in his Post column today, Ignatius makes far too much of al-Qaeda motives and capabilities. They just want to create a sensation, provoke an inordinate response, and thereby increase their following. This is what Hezbollah does, and it has always been the tactic of agents provocateurs. Bush saw an opportunity in it to increase HIS following. That's what the public has to be wary of, not "threat levels."