The appeal by Somalia’s Transitional National Government, made on Sunday, for international military intervention to disarm rebellious warlords is an admission of failure. The TNG, set up two years ago as the result of a reconciliation process instigated by the OAU, has not been able to impose its authority. It controls little territory beyond the capital, and not all of that either.
It has been a steadily failing force ever since its inception despite having the active support of neighboring Ethiopia, Eritrea and Sudan at the time and being underwritten financially by members of Arab League: it has been unable to overcome warlord hostility and the refusal of certain tribes to have anything to do with any government in Mogadishu. Matters, however, have become perilously worse in the past couple of months. Rival militias are again battling for supremacy, treating the TNG as just another faction. Here are all the signs of a power vacuum. At least, it is better to admit failure and call for help than to pretend that all is well —- when it patently is not. The question is whether the international community will respond. What the TNG appears to want is a security force to disarm the rebels, along the lines of the international security force in Afghanistan, Isaf. There are compelling similarities with Afghanistan’s recent history: tribal divisions; a civil war following the collapse of a dictatorial government long supported by the Soviet Union; a country awash with arms; warlords funded by a booming drugs trade; possible terrorist bases; and lastly, a traditional national assembly brought together to vote for a new interim leader and Parliament.
It has to be hoped that the similarities stop there and that Afghanistan’s transitional government does not end up the same way as Somalia’s. Fortunately there are some major differences. One is the massive amount of aid which the international community, notably the US and the EU, is pouring into Afghanistan; the other is the presence of Isaf.
Were the same “extras” brought into play in Somalia, it would almost certainly have a positive effect: it is purely because Somalia has been left to fend for itself that it is in such crisis. Transitional president Abdi Qassim Salad Hassan would like nothing better than to have the practical international backing enjoyed by his Afghan counterpart, Hamid Karzai. He should be given it. His is the legitimate government and the only body that separates Somalia from a full-scale return to the bloody civil war of the 1990s. The world needs to act, if only because the chaos of Somalia makes it a paradise not just for the warlords but potentially for international terrorists as well.
But a positive international response to his request will require the active support — probably the actual involvement — of more than the Africans this time: it will need the Americans and the Europeans. It is not certain, however, whether they or anyone else would be prepared to risk their forces in Somalia. The US in particular has painful memories of its troops murdered there nine years ago. On the other hand, that would be more than offset by the fact that it is chaos such as in Somalia that provides shelter and hiding places to terrorism. Bringing law back is the best way to defeat it.
