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From: Berhane Habtemariam (Berhane.Habtemariam@gmx.de)
Date: Fri Sep 17 2010 - 14:46:19 EDT
Somalia and the United States-What's to be done?
The Americans are at a loss to decide how to take on Somalia's jihadists
Sep 17th 2010 | NAIROBI AND WASHINGTON, dc
DOES it matter to the United States that Somalia is becoming a hotbed of
global jihad? The answer most often heard in Washington is impenetrable.
"Somalia is not important until it launches a terrorist attack which makes
it important," explains a Pentagon official. There is wide agreement that a
more aggressive American policy towards the jihadist rebels could well
backfire. But if America is unwilling to invade Somalia, bearing in mind its
disastrous intervention in 1993, how does it plan, through less direct
means, to limit the threat of Somali-based Islamist terrorists?
The leading Islamist militia in Somalia is the Shabab ("Youth"). It controls
large parts of south and central Somalia. In the battered capital,
Mogadishu, it is seeking to drive Somalia's internationally recognised
transitional government into the sea. The fighting is brutal. Some 200,000
civilians have fled Mogadishu this year; several thousand have been injured
or killed. The government is protected by 6,000 African Union (AU)
peacekeepers. The Shabab relies on insurgency tactics, and operates at least
two suicide-bomb units.
On July 11th it extended the fight outside Somalia, killing at least 76
people, including one American, in suicide-bombings on Uganda's capital,
Kampala. The Shabab glorified the slaughter, saying that the ordinary
Ugandans watching a football match deserved to die because Ugandan soldiers
make up most of the AU force in Mogadishu; it has warned of further attacks
unless Uganda withdraws. The Shabab carried out several suicide attacks
during Ramadan in Mogadishu.
The suicide attacks make it likely that America will keep on bankrolling the
transitional government, which is headed by a "moderate" Islamist, Sharif
Ahmed, who nonetheless insists on sharia law and has made it a crime for a
Somali citizen to be a non-Muslim. But it is doubtful whether his lot will
ever control more than a few fly-blown streets in the capital.
Assessing the Shabab's strength is harder still. It has several thousand
fighters, with nothing heavier than anti-aircraft guns mounted on pickup
trucks. The group has copied some of the Taliban's more puritanical
features, such as insisting on beards, meting out floggings, stoning
adulterers and banning music. But it is probably looser and more pragmatic
than such policies suggest. Some cells promote a Somali national spirit
whereas others extol al-Qaeda's pan-Islamic vision. All Shabab commanders
agree, however, that the present government and the AU "invaders" that help
it must be defeated. Most want to limit foreign aid, to the extent that they
are turning back UN food aid across the south. Boys are expected to fight
for the Shabab. Families who do not give up at least one son are liable to
pay a tax.
America has taken a cautious approach so far. It still hopes locals will
turn against the Shabab. American agents in Somalia and on American naval
ships and submarines off the coast have shifted their energy away from
hunting known al-Qaeda people to listening in on Shabab training camps.
America is also monitoring its home-grown Shabab supporters; 14 Americans
were recently charged with helping the group. A Shabab fighter killed in an
attack on Mogadishu airport last week was an American citizen. But not all
American support for the group is from Somali-Americans. One Shabab
commander is a white American called Omar Hammami. He was raised in Alabama
and attended Bible school before turning to Islam. America's
attorney-general, Eric Holder, says that Americans seeking to emulate Mr
Hammami can expect to be jailed at home or to die on the battlefield in
Somalia.
But the constant circulation of Somali-Americans back to Somalia to visit
family or conduct business makes it hard for American intelligence to track
would-be jihadists. Nor can Britain, Canada, Italy and Sweden, each with
sizeable Somali communities, be sure of the motives of all their citizens
travelling to Somalia.
Kenya's intelligence service is also hard put to monitor the country's 2.5m
ethnic Somalis. It does not just worry about Kenyan Somali Islamists being
trained in camps inside Somalia. More frightening is the prospect of
terrorist cells being set up in Nairobi, Kenya's capital, and elsewhere in
the region.
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