Somalia appears to be a possible target after Afghanistan in the war on terrorism. US officials have repeatedly said that Bin Laden’s Al-Qaeda network has cells in Somalia. The country is also considered a possible destination for fleeing terrorists. Therefore, US coalition warships are stationed off the coast of Somalia to monitor maritime traffic and stop movement of Al-Qaeda fighters. American reconnaissance planes even overfly Somali territory, taking pictures of activities on the ground.
The real questions are: How will the US fight against Al-Qaeda’s local affiliates in Somalia? Will it be a military force or are there other options? Somalia remains divided into fiefdoms which are largely controlled by rival warlords. The entire country is seen as a failed state lacking law and order. Since its formation more than a year ago, the transitional government has failed to exert its authority, even in the capital, and has been unable to disarm the militias. The Somali warlords will not put down their weapons and engage in peaceful dialogue with the government. They have routinely demonstrated their reluctance to put the good of the country above their individual lust for power and control.
Following the ouster of Siad Barre’s military regime in January 1991, a leadership vacuum was produced in Somalia. This led to anarchy and the United States rushed in, followed later by UN peacekeepers. The UN-run operation ended in March 1995, having been humiliated when 18 Americans and thousands of Somalis, many of them women and children, died in a firefight in October 1993.
This incident is the basis for the American movie, "Black Hawk Down". The movie shows dead American soldiers being dragged through the streets of the capital by militiamen loyal to a local warlord in Mogadishu. This was the reason why the Clinton administration decided to withdraw all US forces from the country. Nevertheless, political commentators criticized UN involvement in Somalia. The UN shied away from disarming militias and confined operations to protecting themselves and relief convoys.
A former US assistant secretary of state for Africa, Herman J. Cohen, recently noted, "Somalia continues to struggle to survive and restore central authority. It, therefore, remains vulnerable to external manipulation and penetration, as was Afghanistan during the period of Taleban rule. It is to be hoped that despite their suffering, the Somali people will reject any efforts by Al-Qaeda forces to exploit their weaknesses and use Somalia as a base of operations against the United States and the west. At the same time, the United States government should finally understand that failed states, such as Somalia, cannot be ignored in a globalized world, in which both productive and destructive forces cannot be contained within national boundaries."
Many Somali analysts thus believe that the UN should seek a new mandate for a new intervention aimed at rescuing Somali civilians. The mutually brutalizing behavior of Somali warlords in the past eleven years has paved the way to anarchy and has fed US fears that the country could be used as a terrorist haven. The commentators argue that the new intervention would differ from the earlier one. It would aim to disarm the gunmen and to reconcile militia chiefs or warlords with the government in Mogadishu. At the same time, the US should strengthen its intelligence about the operations of the radical Islamic group, Al-Ittihad Al-Islamia, before launching any military action. This option may be the best way to combat terrorism and would assure all that Somalia is not a threat to world peace.
