From: Berhane Habtemariam (Berhane.Habtemariam@gmx.de)
Date: Tue Dec 08 2009 - 06:28:55 EST
Costs of War: The Somalia Inheritance
8 Dec 2009
Among the many messy fronts President Obama inherited from his predecessor's
war on terror, few are as intractable, complex and bloody as Somalia. Guess
whose fault that is, Shaun Waterman writes for ISN Security Watch.
By Shaun Waterman in Washington, DC for ISN Security Watch
_____
Under the Bush administration, Somalia became a front in the war on terror.
Disdaining nation-building and other international community initiatives,
the counterterror ideologues of the administration cast a complex
intra-national conflict with deep historic roots and significant regional
connections as a Manichean struggle of 'moderates' against 'extremists.'
The impact of this policy can be illuminated by considering the career of
Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed.
In June 2006, Sheikh Sharif was the chairman of the Islamic Courts Union
(ICU), a loose coalition of indigenous Islamist militias which had driven a
hated band of US-backed warlords from the Somali capital, Mogadishu.
US support for the warlords had fuelled nationalist and Islamist
anti-Americanism in the country and strengthened the hand of the most
radical group in the ICU, al-Shabaab, some of whose leaders were linked to
al-Qaida by US authorities.
"Had it not been for the United States' counterterrorism efforts, the sharia
courts and al-Shabaab might have remained marginal,"
<http://www.foreignaffairs.com/print/65623> concluded a recent review of the
sorry record of US Somalia policy by Bronwyn Bruton of the Council on
Foreign Relations in Washington.
Faced with a disaster of their own creation, US policymakers compounded
their errors by giving at least tacit support to an invasion by
Christian-majority Ethiopia on Christmas day 2006.
Martin Fletcher, in an
<http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/us-taking-dangerous-gamble-in-mo
gadishu/story-e6frg6so-1111112756977> analysis for the Times of London that
week, called it "a dangerous gamble."
The Ethiopians said they were restoring the internationally backed but
widely reviled internally Transitional Federal Government (TFG). But the TFG
was only able to function with the support of Ethiopian forces and the
occupation sparked a multi-faceted insurgency that continues today, directed
against a UN-backed African peacekeeping force, ANISOM.
<http://www.foreignaffairs.com/print/65623> Bruton echoes many other
experts in concluding the invasion was "a catastrophe." It turned al-Shabaab
from an insignificant fringe group into the leadership of a fully fledged
Islamic insurgency which has
<http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/sep/23/somali-militia-pledges-alle
giance-to-bin-laden/> pledged allegiance to Osama bin Laden and has global
recruiting opportunities among disaffected youth in the many Somali diaspora
communities in the US and Europe.
Sheikh Sharif - who was detained crossing into Kenya shortly after the
invasion, and
<http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2007/02/somalias_islamist_co.php>
released a few weeks later after meetings with US officials - is now
president of the latest incarnation of the TFG.
Weaker than ever
Barely able to control Mogadishu, even with ANISOM's 5,000 troops, the TFG
faces an insurgency as sophisticated and deadly as any in the 18-year
history of Somalia's internal war.
Using tactics like suicide bombing honed in Iraq and Afghanistan, and
trained by veterans of those conflicts, al-Shabaab and its allies have
proved able to strike directly at senior government ministers.
Last week's attack on a university graduation ceremony carried out by a
suicide bomber dressed as a woman killed at least three cabinet ministers,
and, as <http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/04/world/africa/04somalia.html> the
New York Times reported, "illustrate[ed] how weak the government really is
[...]. The insurgents seem to have the ability to strike at will."
In retrospect, the attack may turn out to look something like a turning
point for the fate of the post-invasion political settlements, tortuously
hammered out in Djibouti with Sharif and other faction leaders.
Nonetheless, US diplomats, including Secretary of State Hilary Clinton
"argue that the Sharif-led TFG is Somalia's 'best chance' for peace," notes
Bruton, adding sardonically that this is "a label that has been attached to
every Somali government since 2000."
Bruton argues for an almost Zen approach to policy: "Sometimes, as in
Somalia, doing less is better." The US should embark on "a policy of
constructive disengagement toward Somalia. Giving up on a bad strategy is
not admitting defeat," she concludes.
<http://www.realclearworld.com/articles/2009/10/31/fragile_gains_in_somalia_
97318.html> Other experts urge focus on the basics of governance and
security, and Andre Le Sage of the US National Defense University noted
recently that the TFG will likely to continue enjoy support from "the United
Nations, the European Union, the African Union, and many of their member
states" in addition to the US.
War on terror blinders
The problem is that there has been too little detailed thinking about what
it might mean to take off the war on terror policy blinders with regard to
Somalia.
John Brennan, President Barack Obama's most senior counterterrorism advisor,
said earlier this year that Somalia was exactly the kind of place where
<http://csis.org/files/attachments/090806_brennan_transcript.pdf> joined-up
policy thinking was required about a proliferating and shifting set of
threats to regional and global/US security.
"Somalia's a good case in point in terms of not looking at an issue only
through the counterterrorism prism," he said. "What we need to do, though,
is to have a more comprehensive approach" to US policy toward all the
nations of the Horn of Africa.
He said a lot of meetings were underway to develop policy that would "deal
with the situation in Somalia in a thoughtful manner; not just to put
Band-Aids on problems that are there, but how are we going to address it
longer term?"
No word yet on how that's going. Typically, complex policy processes like
this one require the close attention of the most senior officials to make
the wheels turn, even slowly. With the level of attention Somalia is getting
in Washington at the moment, it's easy to imagine they aren't turning at
all.
_____
Shaun Waterman is a senior writer and analyst for ISN Security Watch. He is
a UK journalist based in Washington, DC, covering homeland and national
security.
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