Yemen: How the Protests Stopped Up to $1 Billion in US Arms to Regime

Keith Johnson, Adam Entous, and Margaret Coker report for The Wall Street Journal:

The U.S. was on the verge of launching a record assistance package to Yemen when an outbreak of protests against its president led Washington to freeze the deal, officials say, marking a sharper turn in U.S. policy there than the administration has previously acknowledged.

The first installment of the aid package, worth a potential $1 billion or more over several years, was set to be rolled out in February, marking the White House's largest bid at securing President Ali Abdullah Saleh's allegiance in its battle against al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, the group behind the failed underwear bombing in 2009 and the foiled air-cargo bombing plot in October.

For Mr. Saleh, the money would help shore up his shaky political position and reward the risks he took by bucking popular opinion and letting U.S. Special Forces hunt down militants inside his country.

But before the first check could be written, anti-Saleh protesters took to the streets of San'a in an echo of antiregime demonstrations sweeping the region. The Obama administration's suspension of the new aid put a spotlight on the unraveling of a troubled anti-terror alliance with a man who has ruled Yemen like a family fiefdom for three decades.

The U.S. reversal was the latest and largest episode in an up-and-down history with Mr. Saleh. Throughout much of the last decade, according to U.S. officials, his commitment to cooperating with the U.S. in the hunt for al Qaeda in his country was questionable. By the end of 2009, the U.S. had become encouraged by his willingness to let the U.S. battle the group. But relations foundered a few months later after a U.S. missile strike killed a Saleh envoy.

The latest package was an attempt to get the counter-terror relationship back on track, say officials familiar with the program. Also, in addition to up to $200 million in counterterrorism support this coming fiscal year alone --- up from $155 million in fiscal 2010 and just $4.6 million in 2006 --- the proposed package was expected to include a nearly equal amount of money for development assistance that Mr. Saleh had long sought to help show a skeptical Yemeni public the benefits of cooperating with the Americans. U.S. officials hoped the package would nudge Mr. Saleh into a more active counterterror relationship.

"He's very satisfied," a Yemeni official said of Mr. Saleh's reaction to the package just before it was shelved.

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