Yemen wants far more military aid than the U.S. has promised in the fight against escalating terrorism - billions of dollars more than Washington has in mind.And yet Yemeni authorities have little to show for the significant Western aid that has already poured into the impoverished country.
In fact, the al-Qaida offshoot that claimed responsibility for the failed plot to send mail bombs from Yemen to the U.S. appears more emboldened than ever. And Yemen's government seems to feel more threatened by an increasingly restless secessionist rebellion in the south, where it has little control, than by militants linked to Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula.
Since the Oct. 28 discovery of the two mail bombs, U.S. officials are pressing Yemen for more and faster cooperation on intelligence-sharing and more opportunities to train Yemeni counterterrorism teams. Yemen is the poorest country in the Arab world and the government's authority is weak in areas outside the capital of San'a.