May 11, 2018
Donald Trump’s Shadow War
Five days after taking the oath of office, President Donald Trump dined with some members of his national security team. During the meal, Secretary of Defense James Mattis and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Joseph Dunford roughly outlined a plan for a risky counterterrorism raid in Yemen targeting Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula—the terrorist group’s most dangerous local affiliate.
In previous administrations, multiple levels of subordinates would have vetted this sort of mission before it was briefed to the president in the White House Situation Room with the full national security team present. Mattis and Dunford’s presentation to Trump was much more informal, but the new president nevertheless gave his conditional go-ahead. Then-National Security Advisor Michael Flynn convinced Trump to sign off the following morning, saying the audacious raid would distinguish him from his more deliberative predecessor.
Members of the Navy’s elite SEAL Team 6 and special forces from the United Arab Emirates were soon advancing on the compound in Yemen’s al-Bayda province. But AQAP militants detected their presence, and an intense firefight broke out. Chief Petty Officer William Ryan Owens, a longtime member of SEAL Team 6, was killed. Another five special operators were injured. One of two Marine Corps Osprey aircraft dispatched to provide air support crashed and was destroyed by U.S. forces to prevent any sensitive equipment from falling into Al Qaeda hands. At least 16 Yemeni civilians, most of them children, were killed.
Read the Full Article at POLITICO
More from CNAS
-
Thanks to Trump, Russia’s Own ‘Pivot to Asia’ Is Bearing Fruit
Commentary
If Washington wants to maintain its strategic position in Southeast Asia, it will need to do more than compete with China. It will also need to avoid handing Russia opportunit...
By Derek Grossman
-
Navigating the Currents: Sri Lanka’s National Security Debate in the New Indian Ocean Order
Commentary
Sri Lanka’s national security debate in 2026 is ultimately between whether the country can break from the institutional pressures that have constrained previous reform attempt...
By Keerthi Martyn
-
XI Jinping Looking to Bring North Korea Back Into China’s Orbit: Analyst
Video
Duyeon Kim, Adjunct Senior Fellow at the Center for a New American Security, says her sources have informed her that Beijing is unhappy with Pyongyang’s growing relationship w...
By Duyeon Kim
-
Does the Quad Still Matter?
Commentary
Under the second Trump administration, some analysts have expressed growing pessimism about the group’s effectiveness, given the president’s apparent lack of interest in atten...
By Lisa Curtis
