The
History Guy (October
12, 2000) New
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New The
latest changes to the History Guy
site. Information
on the History Guy, the origin of the
website, along with commentaries
and a site
map. (October
12, 2000) On
October 12, 2000, the USS Cole, an
American Naval Destroyer, entered the
harbor of Aden, Yemen to refuel. After the
mooring of the ship to a buoy, the
refueling operation began. Approximately
45 minutes into the refueling, a small
ship, described as either a Zodiac-type
rubber craft or a fiberglass boat, placed
itself alongside the Cole and blew up. The
resulting explosion tore an 40 by 40 foot
hole in the side of the destroyer, causing
casualties among the ship's crew. The
casualties total 17 dead and an additional
39 wounded. The injured were first
evacuated to Yemeni medical facilities
onshore for treatment and later evacuation
to the U.S. base at Ramstein, Germany and
a French military hospital in nearby
Djibouti. In
the words of Admiral Vern Clark, the Chief
of U.S. Naval Operations, "...this was
clearly a terrorist act.'' As the United
States later learned, the attack was
carried out by terrorists associated with
Osama bin Laden's Al-Qaeda
network. Vincent
Cannistraro, the CIA's former head of
counter-terrorist operations, (mentioned
on Oct. 19 in the Guardian
Unlimited,
a British newspaper), that early evidence
seemed to point to Osama bin Laden and a
possible link between his organization,
al-Qaeda, and Saddam Hussein's government
in Iraq. On
January 19, 2001, the U.S. Navy released
its final
report
on the Cole attack. Yemen
is a nation apparently trying to repair
its relations with the Western world. From
1967 to 1990, Aden was the capital city of
the People´s Democratic Republic of
Yemen (also known as South Yemen), a
Marxist ally of the Soviet Union. To the
north and west of South Yemen was the
Yemen Arab Republic (also known as North
Yemen), a nation that sometimes courted
favor with the West. These two rival
Yemeni governments fought several wars
(1972, 1979 and 1982) against each other,
invariably drawing in both the United
States and the Soviet Union as competing
patrons. In May of 1990, the two Arab
nations united peacefully into one Yemen.
Regional and political differences between
Northerners and Southerners erupted into
civil war in 1994, with Aden attempting to
reassert its independence. Forces from the
north laid siege to Aden and the war ended
with the defeat of the southern
rebels. Also
in 1990, the Gulf
War
began with the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait
and in 1991 became a major war with the
intervention of an international
coalition, led by the United States and
including several Arab nations. Yemen
chose to align itself with Iraq and thus
quickly became a pariah state in the eyes
of the United States and her allies. Also,
in recent years, the outbreak of
tribal
violence
and a border
conflict with Saudi
Arabia
(a major ally of the U.S. in the middle
east), and a spate of kidnappings of
foreigners made Yemen a fairly unsafe
place for Westerners. In an attempt to
repair relations, Yemen and the United
States arranged for a series of refueling
stops for the ships of the U.S. Navy,
which frequents the area as part of the
ongoing enforcement of the economic
sanctions against Iraq. USS
Cole Attack Planner Escapes
-Feb.
5, 2006 Defense
Dept. News
Briefing--Text
of Secretary Cohen's statement on the
Cole attack. Oct. 12, 2000. Navy
Investigates explosion on USS
Cole Casualties
from USS Cole explosion USA
Today: Probe turns to bin Laden
Evidence cited in attack on
Cole Patterns
of Global Terrorism:
1999--U.S.
State Dept. publication. Patterns
of Global Terrorism:
1998--U.S.
State Dept. publication. Osama
bin Laden
Page--Biographical
details and links on bin
Laden. Terrorism-Intelligence
Threat
Assessments--From
the Federation of American Scientists.
Many useful links. "The
History Guy" is a Registered Trademark. Contact
the webmaster
Please
cite this source when appropriate: Lee,
R. "The History Guy: Attack on the USS Cole
(October 12, 2000)" http://www.historyguy.com/uss_cole.htm Pages
on American Military
History Site
Map--revision
in progress
A chronicle of newer
and more recent conflicts and wars from
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A listing of wars
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Copyright
© 1998-2007 Roger A. Lee and History Guy
Media; Last Modified: 04.27.07
Statement
by the
President
on the Middle East Situation and the
attack on the USS Cole in Yemen.
Foreign
Terrorist
Organizations--From
the U.S. State Dept. Note that
different nations and governments
maintain different listings of
terrorist organizations.
Patterns
of Global Terrorism: 1999- Middle
East
Overview--Scroll
to the bottom of this document for
information on terrorist groups
operating in Yemen.
