The USS Cole Is Bombed in Aden, the Second Intifada Erupts After the Camp David Failure and the US Presidential Election Ends in a Supreme Court Ruling

Jamaica Homes Global Conflict & Caribbean Impact Review | Published 3 January 2001 | Reporting Period: 3 October – 2 January 2001

Quarterly Briefing

• A suicide boat packed with explosives detonates against the hull of USS Cole in the port of Aden, Yemen on October 12, killing 17 American sailors and wounding 39; the attack, attributed to Al-Qaeda, strikes one of the US Navy’s most capable destroyers as it stops for refuelling; the Clinton administration debates a military response but does not launch one before leaving office; the bombing is the most lethal attack on a US military vessel since the Beirut Marine barracks in 1983 and represents a significant escalation in Al-Qaeda’s campaign against American targets.
• The Second Palestinian Intifada, which erupted on September 28 following Israeli opposition leader Ariel Sharon’s contentious visit to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, is in full force throughout this reporting period; the renewed uprising follows the collapse of peace negotiations at the Camp David Summit in July, where President Clinton’s attempt to broker a final status agreement between Barak and Arafat ended without agreement; the failure of Camp David shatters the Oslo peace process’s remaining credibility and returns the region to sustained conflict.
• The US presidential election of November 7 produces a near-deadlock; George W. Bush and Al Gore are separated by hundreds of votes in Florida, the state whose electoral votes determine the outcome; a six-week recount battle involves hanging chads, contested county procedures and competing legal actions; the Supreme Court rules 5-4 on December 12 in Bush v. Gore to halt the Florida recount; Bush is confirmed as president-elect with 271 electoral votes; the legitimacy of the process is contested by Gore’s supporters, though Gore concedes on December 13.
• Yugoslavia’s President Slobodan Milosevic is forced from power on October 5 when hundreds of thousands of protesters storm the Federal Parliament building in Belgrade after he refuses to concede defeat in elections held on September 24; Vojislav Kostunica is confirmed as the winner; the democratic revolution is the most significant change in Serbian governance since the wars of the 1990s began; Milosevic remains at large in Yugoslavia, facing war crimes charges at The Hague.
• The NASDAQ Composite, which had reached 5,048 at its peak in March 2000, continues its prolonged decline through the fourth quarter; the dot-com bubble’s collapse erases trillions of dollars of market capitalisation and begins to affect the broader US economy; the Federal Reserve’s response, including the first of a series of interest rate cuts, begins in the new year; the slowdown in US consumer spending and investment has implications for Caribbean tourism demand and remittance flows.
• Caribbean economies close 2000 with relatively favourable conditions compared to the later 1990s; tourism arrivals have been strong through the year; Jamaican tourism receipts reach record levels; oil prices, which rose sharply earlier in 2000 driven by OPEC production discipline, moderate somewhat in the fourth quarter but remain elevated by historical standards; the regional economic outlook for 2001 is cautiously positive, though the US slowdown is beginning to register in forward bookings.

Prologue: The Peace That Failed and the War That Followed

The last quarter of 2000 was defined by two failures of American statecraft and one success of Serbian democracy. The failure at Camp David in July, whose consequences became visible with the Intifada’s outbreak on September 28, removed the final diplomatic framework that might have produced a two-state solution and returned the Israeli-Palestinian relationship to a cycle of violence that will not quickly be broken. The USS Cole bombing demonstrated that Al-Qaeda’s campaign against American targets was not confined to embassies in Africa or military installations in Saudi Arabia; it reached into harbours on the Arabian Peninsula. Together, these two events cast a shadow over the incoming administration that would prove to be even darker than the closing days of 2000 could reveal.

The USS Cole and the Unanswered Attack

The Cole bombing was planned and executed with the operational sophistication that had characterised Al-Qaeda’s 1998 embassy bombings. The suicide boat, loaded with C4 explosives, had spent days in Aden harbour before the Cole arrived; the two operatives who detonated it stood to attention as they struck the destroyer’s hull, a gesture recorded by observers on the dock. The explosion tore a 40-foot hole in the ship’s port side; 17 sailors eating in the mess were killed. The investigation that followed linked the attack to Bin Laden’s network with a confidence that the Clinton administration acknowledged but declined to act upon militarily in its final weeks. The decision would shape what the incoming administration inherited.

For the Caribbean, the Cole bombing’s significance was primarily in what it suggested about the security environment that American foreign policy would face in the years ahead. The region’s economic dependence on stable US engagement — through tourism, investment and remittances — made Caribbean governments attentive to any development that might redirect American attention and resources away from the Western Hemisphere. Al-Qaeda’s demonstrated capacity to strike US military assets anywhere in the world was precisely that kind of development.

Looking Ahead

The incoming Bush administration inherits three unresolved crises: Al-Qaeda’s unchecked campaign against American targets, a new Palestinian Intifada without a diplomatic framework, and the aftermath of the closest US presidential election since 1876. Its foreign policy priorities will become clear in the first weeks of the new year through its appointments and its initial public statements on the Middle East, China and international agreements. The Caribbean enters 2001 in relatively good economic health but with a sensitivity to US economic and political conditions that makes the uncertainty of the transition a source of concern. The NASDAQ’s decline is still working through the US economy; its consequences for consumer spending and travel will be visible in Caribbean tourism figures by mid-year.

Jamaica Homes Global Conflict & Caribbean Impact Review is published quarterly, examining how wars, geopolitical tensions and major international crises have shaped Jamaica, the Caribbean and their economies.

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