A decade of missteps: How Al Qaeda became a threat again in Yemen

Since the Cole attack, the nation has been on a path toward dissolution. The government is weak, unable to control large swaths of the country and the porous borders. It is stretched thin fighting a civil conflict in the north and a separatist movement in the south. It is burdened with crushing poverty and high unemployment; oil revenues and water supplies are shrinking…

By 2003, the United States was focused on the Iraq war and appeared more intent on fighting corruption and promoting democracy in Yemen than on tackling al-Qaeda, experts said.

U.S. development aid to combat Yemen’s soaring poverty rates and high unemployment — key factors in enticing new recruits to militancy — was minuscule. It declined from $56.5 million in 2000 to $25.5 million in 2008, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. U.S. officials say the aid was cut largely because of corruption concerns.

“When you look back and see how little attention Yemen was getting several years ago, it’s shocking,” said Christopher Boucek, a Yemen analyst at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “None of these problems with Yemen’s stability are new, and we’ve known what was coming down the road.”