Why Ansar al-Asheria succeed easily in their attacks on Yemeni military and security positions?

By Fatik al-Rodaini

SANA'A, May 7, 2012- Ansar al-Sharea, an Islamic group linked to al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula has lately increased its attacks on security and military bases and checkpoints almost in the Yemeni southern provinces.

As a matter of fact, the group started its operations against government forces since the last year after widespread protests against the ex-president Ali Abdullah Saleh, before that the group was hidden and it seldom was carried out attacks on the Yemeni military positions.

With almost more than a year of political turmoil al-Qaeda has expanded its existence in Abyan province as its headquarters as well as in Shabwa, Mareb, Hadhramout, Lahj, Aden, and Dhale provinces. They carried out several attacks against Yemeni military and security bases killing and wounding hundreds of Yemeni troops and officers.

The last attack by Ansar al-Sharea or al-Qaeda militants was on Monday when the group stormed a military position in southern Yemen where militants control broad swathes of territory, killing at least 32 Yemeni soldiers, wounding and capturing score of them as well.

Ansar al-Sharea said on Monday that the latest raid was a response to recent statements by Yemen's new President Abdu Raboo Mansour Hadi that he would defeat the militants, who have been emboldened by more than a year of political upheaval.

The last storm was carried out at five am this morning outside the Yemeni city of Zinjibar, the capital of Abyan province, killing at least 32 soldiers. They also had captured a number of soldiers and made off with weapons and ammunition.

The group said that the Monday's attack came hours after a suspected U.S. drone strike killed al-Qaeda leader, Fahd al-Quso and one of his bodyguards in Yemen's southern province of Shabwa.

The attack on the military bases in the southern provinces by al-Qaeda militants is not the last in the series attacks of al-Qaeda and it is not the newest the group actually carried out a similar attack last March when the militants killed about 100 soldiers in a raid on a military base in Doufas city of Abyan province.

The extremists claimed that 'around 100 soldiers and officers were killed while 12 others were wounded and 73 soldiers held captive' they later being released by Ansar al-Shareia, when the Yemeni government paid a ransom for the militants to free the kidnapped, in these attacks as well as looted military equipment.

The question her is: '' Why Anar al-Asheria succeed easily in their attacks on Yemeni military and security positions?"

According to a military expert, Colonel Ahmad Madhkoor, who said that the group depends most the time on their own fighters in the Yemeni military bases, who give them specific information about their bases. ''The elements of the group gave al-Qaeda group precise details about their mission and sometimes they also specify the time of the attacks for them,'' Madhkoor said.

In fact that al-Qaeda has its own spies everywhere as we have seen lately that al-Qaeda claimed responsibility for a string of attacks in Yemen, including an assault on soldiers that left scores dead in the southern province of Abyan and the bombing of a military plane in Sana'a. The group blew up a Yemeni air force military plane in Dulaimi army base that was transporting weapons to Aden and Hadhramout provinces.

Not only in the southern province but also in the northern provinces. Lately, Yemen's Interior Ministry had warned of potential attacks by al-Qaeda fighters in the Yemeni capital, Sana'a, and in other provinces.

Madhkoor added that al-Qaeda could not carry out the attacks alone without helping from the inside. Otherwise, the Yemeni troops are not ready to fight against al-Qaeda because they are being easily targeted to the group.

The Yemeni expert reported that there is a potential cooperation between the fighters and Yemeni officials who always don't pay attention of intellectual information of al-Qaeda attacks, and they ease the way for them.

Another possibility is that al-Qaeda fighters are not necessary members in al-Qaeda group, and they are members in another organization such as the Southern Movement, which for Years they seek independence from the north. ''If we see to the name of the deaths in these attacks we can find that most of them are from the north,'' Madhkoor added.