The long-held American view on counterterrorism was a roadblock to the success of counterterrorism efforts in the Middle East. Overall, these efforts lacked resources and coherence and failed to create a multilateral security and military structure capable of confronting the threat of terrorism in the region.
Yet, in recent years, the U.S. strategic and operative perceptions of counterterrorism efforts have been challenged and reviewed. The Biden administration has shifted the American position to focus on countering domestic extremism and winning the global competition with China and Russia.
Perhaps what aided such a change in the American attitude were the unmistakeable repercussions of existing U.S. strategies. Washington was losing ground with its regional allies, as the number of victims of counterterrorism operations—and specifically drone attacks—multiplied. The fact that many local governments managed to exploit the fight against terrorism to crack down on their political opposition, curb democratic transition, and undermine basic human rights compromised Washington’s position even more.
The shift in American policy, coupled with the resolve to reduce the cost of intervention in the region stretching from Afghanistan to Mauritania, coincided with the emergence of ambitious regional powers—Iran, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Saudi Arabia, and Qatar—who were given room to maneuver and play a more influential regional role. By identifying allies and adversaries among these emerging powers, the U.S. foreign policy establishment was enabled, through local players, to redraw the map of power in countries like Yemen, Somalia, and Sudan.
In this context, the appetite of emerging regional powers to lead and control was key to the militarization of the Gulf of Aden and the Red Sea region. The Arab coalition secured an Emirati-Saudi military presence on the shores and islands of Yemen and Eritrea, allowing for maritime patrols to assist the international military bases that were already in the area. This intervention was also influenced by the trajectory of Yemen which, due to civil war, was no longer a partner country in combating security threats in the region. Rather, the country became a key part of the threat, given the Houthis’ use of sea mines and unmanned boats to target military and civilian ships attempting to navigate the area.
From Centralization to Collaboration
Although many counterterrorism initiatives were introduced by regional actors such as Russia which proposed a regional security system in the Gulf, and Saudi Arabia which supported the establishment of a Red Sea bloc, multilateral cooperation was doomed to atrophy, and an alternative bilateral cooperation approach was introduced.
Leading this new approach was the UAE, which recently concluded two agreements for military, security, and counterterrorism cooperation with Yemen in December 2022, and with Somalia at the beginning of 2023.
These agreements are consistent with the strategic vision of the UAE’s foreign policy and objectives in the region and in Africa. They are expected to protect and develop the UAE’s economic interests and enhance their operational capabilities. On a geopolitical level, the agreements seek to ensure the security of waterways, particularly the Bab al-Mandab Strait, through the presence of Emirati security and military units while sparing the UAE the burden of military deployment.
It could be argued that after years of intervention by the Saudi-led military coalition in Yemen, it would be advantageous to institutionalize the involvement of these countries, including the UAE, in the region. However, the timing of the recent UAE security agreements falls within a complex context that makes the UAE’s foreign policy more dependent on a security and military approach in fragile countries that suffer from sharp divisions and are vulnerable to regional polarization that could cause state collapse.
Moreover, the agreement with Yemen has not yet been presented to, or approved by, the Yemeni parliament. Without the parliamentary approval that would make it legitimate and binding, the agreement is flawed. Furthermore, such agreements can be expected to arouse the sensitivity of the UAE’s rivals in the region since the UAE’s latest steps could be perceived as a turn to unilateralism and an indication of the inefficiency of multilateral cooperation within the framework of the Arab coalition.
Thus far, the unilateral security approach to counterterrorism has proved unsuccessful. This approach tends to undermine the political and social alternatives that foster better governance and political participation. Clear examples of this are in Yemen and Somalia where the military approach was adopted by the two weak states at the expense of democratic transition and political independence. Both regimes have allowed external powers to interfere, influence, and control internal affairs and threaten the integrity of the state while stifling political participation and disregarding social problems. In Yemen specifically, the American approach prioritized combating terrorism and piracy in the Gulf of Aden at all costs, but this view overlooked the priorities of the people on the ground.
Mustafa Naji is a writer and researcher based in France. He holds a master's degree in the geopolitics of the Red Sea from Paris VIII and is currently pursuing a doctorate in sociology focused on the origins of political Islam.
