Yet it is precisely the fact that soldiers who were fighting one another not long ago now train together, or that firemen co-operate on a routine basis or that everyone from vets to central bankers meets with almost dreary regularity which constitutes the good news.

ECONOMIST: Former Yugoslavia patches itself together

"We have begun to reintroduce small numbers of trainers into Yemen, " Captain John Kirby told reporters, adding that they had been sent for "routine military-to-military co-operation".

BBC: Al-Qaeda Yemen plane bomb plot foiled by 'insider'