A haven for al-qaeda?
Somalia's persistent institutional weakness, coupled with known al-Qaeda connections to the country, makes it susceptible to 'hijacking' by al-Qaeda. It has been without a functioning central government since its dictator Mohamed Siad Barre was overthrown in 1991 after a brutal civil war. Armed from immense Cold War arsenals supplied by the Soviets and Americans, separate clans and subclans – extended genealogical networks – that had united against Siad Barre then assumed loose control over the regions to which they were indigenous. Despite the famine-prompted humanitarian intervention by the US in December 1992, the United Nations' attempt to rebuild the nation with Washington's assistance and several subsequent Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD)-sponsored conventions establishing transitional governments, the clans remain unwilling to relinquish regional control.
Somalia is 98% Sunni Muslim. In the late 1980s, an indigenous radical Islamic organisation known as al-Itihaad al-Islamiya (the Islamic Union) was formed. Its main objective is to establish strict Islamic unity throughout the Horn, and it has also focused on efforts to establish independence and Islamic rule for the Ogaden region of eastern Ethiopia. First obtaining arms from indigenous sources in 1991, al-Itihaad has forged links with al-Qaeda and other Islamic groups in the region, and may also have obtained assistance from Iran and Saudi Arabia as well as al-Qaeda. Al-Itihaad's links with al-Qaeda are based on a combination of common theological leanings and mutual political and operational opportunism. The group has helped run al-Qaeda training camps in a number of locations. These camps have not operated simultaneously, but as a function of where al-Itihaad was best established at a given time.
In a 1997 interview with CNN, Osama bin Laden claimed that al-Qaeda had trained and organised Somali gunmen who in October 1993 ambushed US soldiers hunting for lieutenants of clan leader Mohamed Farah Aideed – killing 18 – and dragged a dead GI through the streets of Mogadishu. The incident led to American withdrawal from Somalia and the UN's resignation to political paralysis there. The US and several of its allies now consider Somalia a potential post-Afghanistan al-Qaeda host.
Domestic and regional politics
The northern third of Somalia seceded in May 1991, declaring itself the Republic of Somaliland. It has built its own basic institutional and economic capability. Other self-declared Somali statelets are 'Puntland' and the former provinces of Bay and Bakool. Governance in these areas is less successful than in Somaliland, but clan domination permits a degree of stability. Some cohesion has emerged from an umbrella organisation of southern factional leaders, formed in March 2001 in Addis Ababa and known as the Somali Reconciliation and Restoration Council (SRRC). Members include Musa Suudi Yalahow, who controls strategic points in Mogadishu; Hasan Mohamed Nur 'Shurgudud' of the Rahanwein Resistance Army (RRA), which controls Bay and Bakool through a separate administration; and Mohamed Siad Hersi 'Morgan', military leader of forces seeking control of the southern port of Kismayu. Hussein Mohamed Aidid, son of the infamous warlord – who died in 1996 – is also an SRRC member, but controls only the former presidential palace in Mogadishu. Aidid and Shurgudud are co-presidents of the SRRC, while Morgan is its secretary of defence. Puntland, in the north-eastern part of the country, is divided between two warlords, Abdullahi Yusuf and Jama Ali Jama. Yusuf has accused Jama of being an Islamic fundamentalist, which Jama has denied.
In the latest attempt to lend order to an unruly polity, a 245-member transitional national government (TNG) was formed in Djibouti in August 2000 under the auspices of IGAD to govern the entire national territory. Whereas the TNG is intended to constitute central authority, the SRRC would preserve factional territorial control, presumably in a loose confederation. Thus, the two organisations are essentially competitive. SRRC leaders have accused the TNG of supporting al-Itihaad and al-Qaeda, and in late December 2001 called for an international force to help local militias destroy unspecified al-Qaeda bases. These positions, though not unfounded, should be treated with circumspection. The SRRC sees an opportunity for gaining American diplomatic and economic support against the TNG in casting itself as a zealous counter-terrorism partner. The TNG has also tried to burnish its counter-terrorism credentials, inviting the US to survey Somalia for signs of terrorist camps while insisting that there are no terrorists in Somalia. Those credentials appear dubious. Several senior TNG figures have been members of al-Itihaad or al-Islah (a more moderate Islamic movement). Some also have links to al-Barakaat, a hawala-style remittance firm used by indigenous Somalis and the Somali diaspora to transfer up to $700m annually to one another, and which is believed to help finance al-Qaeda.
The concerns of Somalia's neighbours, Ethiopia and Kenya, are for the most part consistent with US counter-terrorism priorities. Broadly speaking, Ethiopia wishes to establish sub-Saharan hegemony in the Horn against Egyptian influence and secure 'hydropolitical' command of the Upper Nile. More particularly, Addis Ababa wants to limit Somalia's use as a base for anti-government groups, and seeks to suppress radical Islamic organisations – including al-Itihaad, which took credit for several bomb attacks in Addis Ababa in 1996. Ethiopia supports the SRRC, and Ethiopian troops have made frequent covert incursions into Somali territory. Ethiopia has trained a large number of RRA militiamen, and in turn the RRA has expressly allowed up to 3,000 Ethiopian troops to deploy in Bay and Bakool. Ethiopian units have also intervened in Puntland in support of one of its warlords, and reportedly maintain a large base outside the city of Gaalkacyo. Kenya's key interest is in fostering Somalia's stability in order to stem refugee traffic and contain radical Islam. In mid-December, Nairobi consented to the use, by Washington and London, of Kenyan territory as a possible staging point for counter-terrorist operations in Somalia.
Although the TNG has been recognised by the UN, the Arab League and the Organisation of African Unity, it has been unable to establish itself in Mogadishu or to assert effective national control over the past 15 months. While a conference in Nairobi in December 2001 yielded an agreement between SRRC and TNG representatives to form a national unity government, Somaliland's representatives and key southern faction leaders boycotted the meeting. No substantial bilateral links between the TNG and outside powers have been established, although it is also true that few external actors consider the SRRC politically legitimate. Nevertheless, the SRRC has military superiority, and its one strong supporter – Ethiopia – shares Washington's interest in suppressing radical Islam. The SRRC therefore appears to be the preferred counter-terrorist partner for now.
Current intelligence
Following military action in Afghanistan, there have been unconfirmed reports of suspected terrorists arriving at Somali ports. However, bin Laden reportedly declined to relocate to Somalia in 1999 in the belief that its clans would be untrustworthy allies. There may be several extant Islamic terrorist camps in Somalia – most likely near the Puntland port of Boosaaso and along the Kenyan border, where al-Itihaad has taken over several mosques and recruited aggressively – but US intelligence efforts since 11 September have indicated no significant activity. A Puntland militia group and the RRA (with Ethiopian help), respectively, appeared to debilitate the group in these areas in raids between 1996 and 2000.
Although SRRC sources in December 2001 claimed that there were over 20,000 al-Qaeda terrorists in Somalia, and Ethiopian intelligence reported heavy al-Qaeda penetration, this information is presumed by most regional experts to be seriously exaggerated. Somalia appears to contain few, if any, hard military targets. Al-Qaeda's political and operational presence there remains relatively unthreatening, and al-Itihaad does not appear to have the capability to conduct international terrorist operations.
Somalia and US counter-terrorism policy
The US-led 'war' on terrorism – which embraces diplomacy, financial controls, economic assistance, intelligence collection and law-enforcement as well as military force – has already come to Somalia. Major US military action there is unlikely, however. The deployment in early December of the headquarters and 20,000 troops of the US Third Army – the ground component of US Central Command, which is responsible for US military operations in the Middle East, Persian Gulf and Central Asia – to Kuwait and Qatar mainly anticipates greater US ground activity in Afghanistan and possible military action in Iraq rather than a major move on Somalia. Substantial American military force – such as aerial bombing – could induce al-Qaeda members to hide their weapons and disperse across the porous borders with Ethiopia and Kenya. In addition, judging by the previous American experience in Somalia, bombing would probably create vast public resentment there and eventually could produce a climate even more favourable to extremist groups. Finally, the difficulty of obtaining reliable real-time intelligence on targets in Somalia makes surgical US infantry operations – involving little force protection – risky.
Present US policy towards Somalia is essentially preventive. On 24 September 2001, President Bush ordered al-Itihaad's assets frozen. In early November, the Treasury Department froze the assets of al-Barakaat. Despite company denials that it was a financing conduit for al-Qaeda, coalition partners and the UN quickly followed with similar action. Somalia's only Internet link – partly owned by al-Barakaat – was also shut down, although another company has now activated a new connection. The US and its allies have stepped up air and maritime surveillance to prevent al-Qaeda from further infiltrating Somalia and other countries. In early January, Oman-based US Navy P-3 surveillance aircraft stepped up flights over Somalia itself. This was followed by a report that the US was considering the use of Predator unmanned aerial vehicles for surveillance missions, and was determining the operational requirements for the deployment of Central Intelligence Agency personnel and special forces.
Earlier, on 9 December, up to ten civilians from the US government visited western Somalia to consult local clan leaders, and reportedly some Ethiopian military officers. Their mission was to obtain intelligence on al-Qaeda's presence in Somalia and to determine how much help southern warlords would provide in detecting, monitoring and if necessary neutralising al-Qaeda cells or affiliates. If evidence of significant al-Qaeda activity in Somalia were to emerge, the US would probably try to enlist local Somali factions to neutralise them, perhaps with operational assistance from the Ethiopian military or from US Marines or special operations soldiers. American forces could be quickly deployed from seaborne 1,200-strong Marine Expeditionary Units, three of which were being deployed in the Arabian Sea as of January 2002. Otherwise, the US appears content to foster intelligence and enforcement cooperation with Ethiopia, Kenya and Somali militia leaders, to enlist Somali militias in suppressing Islamic extremism and to discreetly encourage Ethiopian support for that objective. Washington might also provide financing and technical assistance – and may already be doing so – for an SRRC anti-terrorist militia, which began forming in late December.
The counter-terrorism effort is a long-term programme of containment, and the US-led coalition has an abiding interest in inoculating failed or failing states against co-optation by al-Qaeda or its successors. Accordingly, 11 September has made heightened American engagement in Somalia and other troubled sub-Saharan African states more probable. The TNG's futility amplifies the need for such engagement, though prospects for the TNG's success remain dim. With foreign assistance and diplomatic support, Washington may choose to encourage the political and economic development of the self-declared Somali political entities as 'building blocks' for a more cohesive – but not necessarily nationally unified – polity that would allow more effective counter-terrorist cooperation in the future.
