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Analysis: U.S. Strikes Somalia

Council on Foreign Relations

January 9, 2007
Prepared by: Eben Kaplan

The last time the U.S. military conducted operations in Somalia in 1993, eighteen soldiers died in a two-day firefight on the streets of Mogadishu. That prompted a quick pullout and a nearly decade-long aversion to U.S. military intervention. But much has changed since the 1990s, and now, under the auspices of the “global war on terror,” Somalia is once again in U.S. crosshairs, evidenced Monday night in an air strike in southern Somalia (FT) which left many dead. The strike may mark the start of a more robust U.S. presence in the Horn of Africa. On Tuesday, the Navy announced the deployment of an aircraft carrier off the coast of Somalia, where three other warships have patrolled the waters since violence in the country escalated two weeks ago. Later on Tuesday, helicopter gunships attacked fighters in the south (AP), though it was not clear whether the aircraft were American.

The United States has long maintained that high-ranking al-Qaeda officials use the failed Somali state as a safe haven. The targets of the U.S. attack were senior al-Qaeda leaders (LAT), including those responsible for the 1998 embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania. A high-ranking Somali official told the Washington Post on Tuesday that at least one of the wanted men died in the strike. A Backgrounder examines terrorist activity in Somalia, and another looks at the targeted killings of terrorist leaders.

Read the rest of this article on the cfr.org website.

Copyright 2007 by the Council on Foreign Relations. This material is republished on GlobalSecurity.org with specific permission from the cfr.org. Reprint and republication queries for this article should be directed to cfr.org.