a bit of a few of them will always go back to old ways. there s nothing you can do about it. general hurtling, i wonder how we see this playing out. who is going to say, yes, bring khalid sheikh mohammed to my state? you hear lawmakers talk about it, they feel like it s a security concern, it makes them perhaps a terrorist target to have this trial going on. how do we expect that that s really going to happen? do you? if i could clarify a little bit, brianna. some of the things bob was saying, just put some numbers on it. there have been over 700 prisoners since guantanamo was opened. there are only 132 there now. so both president obama and president bush before him have already released about 600 prisoners. 132 remaining. of those, 83 of them are yemenis. that s going to be very tough right now. 64 of those 132 are cleared for release right now. so the president is going to be
you have al qaeda in the arabian peninsula. and the divisions that you see between the shiite, the sunni al qaeda and the sunni isis diminishes the threat that these terrorists would pose. but yemen has been in many of its areas a haven for terrorists for the last decade. sort of a reality check we re getting there with you, congressman. congressman sherman, really appreciate your time on this holiday friday. thank you. good to be with you. given these new threats from al qaeda-linked groups, is the president s war on terror strategy working? joining us in the situation room, we have retired lieutenant general mark hurtling and cnn national security analyst bob baer, a former cia operative. bob, i ll start with you. why is it proving so hard for the u.s. to target these factions? the problem is that bigger
only have the hard core terror suspects, and some who are still deemed a risk not able to be transferred, if you have several dozen left at guantanamo, maybe it s shown to be so expensive, congress will have a change of mind and let some of those people be transferred to the u.s. prison system. how can the u.s. ensure they don t just go right back to the battlefield? this is the big problem right now. in fact, dozens of prisoners already have been approved for transfer will not be because they are from yemen. yemen, a country where al qaeda is very strong and a lot of concern about those people going back to yemen, rejoining the battlefield. we ve already seen it in afghanistan and in yemen, in fact, one of the detainees that was released, there s now something like a $5 million reward on his head back in yemen. he s now a top senior leader in the al qaeda organization there.
and yemen, of course, is a country where al qaeda is very active. they cannot send them back there. they can t find a third-party country to take them yet. how dangerous is sending them back to yemen? how much recidivism can we see returning to the battlefield, returning to the fight? well, just a few months ago, the justice department and the state department put something like a $5 million reward on the head of a detainee that was released, went back to yemen and now is one of the most senior leaders in the al qaeda organization in yemen. so the president has a plan, 2015 is the year he s going to try to make it happen. but it may be tough to fully end the operations at guantanamo bay. it s a great example that really shows the perils here of sending some of these detainees back to areas that are so fertile for terrorism. we ll be talking with our panel about that. barbara starr at the pentagon, thank you. let s bring back in the panel, our military and security experts.
strike killing their leader in september. now all of these groups have expressed a desire to attack the united states and the group in yemen and in syria and iraq have the bomb-making capability to do it. the only question may be when and if they make their move. brianna? barbara starr at the pentagon, thank you. i want to get more now on this terror threat and the u.s. strategy against al qaeda s affiliates. joining me now in the situation room, democratic representative brad sherman, a member of the house foreign affairs committee. congressman, happy holidays and thank you so much for joining us. good to be with you, brianna. why hasn t the u.s. has more success as it tries to target certainly al qaeda in the arabian peninsula and also isis? i think we ve had tremendous success compared to the iraq invasion, which cost the lives of 4,000 american soldiers and many, many more thousands wounded, et cetera. this is a problem that needs to be managed.