"Black Hawk Down: Somalia in
1992-93," International Action Center, December 12, 2001
David Leigh and David Pallister, "The
New Scramble For Africa," Guardian, June 1, 2005
"US, UN Call for Somalia
Ceasefire," BBC News, May 12, 2006
Sheikh Sherif Ahmed, "Islamic Courts in
Mogadishu Break Silence," Islamic Courts Union, May 2006
Salim Lone, "Somalia: 'Most Lawless War
of Our Generation'," Democracy Now!, April 27, 2007
M K Bhadrakumar, "The Great Game of Hunting
Somali Pirates," Asia times, November 22, 2008
Enver Masud, "Those Somali Pirates and the
Scramble for Africa," The Wisdom Fund, April 11, 2009
Ghaith Abdul-Ahad, "How Somalia's civil war became new front in battle against al-Qaida,"
Guardian, June 7, 2010
Jeffrey Gettleman, "Rare
Haven of Stability in Somalia Faces a Test," New York Times, June 25, 2010
[An African Union peacekeeping force, funded by hundreds of millions of dollars
from the United States and its allies, has killed, wounded and displaced hundreds of
Somali civilians in a stepped-up campaign against Islamist militants--Sudarsan
Raghavan, "Rising civilian toll ignites anger at African force as it
battles Somali militants," Washington Post, July 18, 2010]
[Al-Shabaab controls most of south and central Somalia with the foreign-backed
government hemmed into a few streets of the capital, where it is attacked daily -
there is no truce to defend.
The government of former geography teacher Shaik Sharif Shaik Ahmed has not
delivered on coherent government; on basic services; on building security services;
or on alliances with other factions. His government has not acted as a rallying
point for Somalis and has instead barricaded itself into the presidential palace
where it has indulged in wasteful infighting.
The last time Somalia had a functioning central government was a dictatorship which
fell in 1991. After that, a disastrous small-scale US intervention against competing
warlords ended in ignominy with dead US soldiers trailed through Mogadishu. The
larger UN mission that followed was also a failure.
The even more calamitous Ethiopian invasion in 2006, backed by Washington, created
al-Shabaab. In each case the presence of foreign forces has served to galvanise
Somalia's warring factions and helped to radicalise a country with no history of
Islamic extremism.--Daniel Howden, "Surrender to
al-Shabaab may be first step to victory for Somalia," Independent, July 30,
2010]
Gwynne Dyer, "The
U.S.-Made Mess in Somalia," Salt Lake Tribune, August 27, 2010
[The dangers of turning Africa into a front in the "war on terror" - much as it was
a front in two world wars and a cold war that were not of its making - have been
starkly revealed in Uganda following the 11 July bombings that killed 76 people
watching the World Cup final in popular nightspots. That atrocity was attributed to
Somali al-Shabaab extremists seeking to carry out retribution for the presence in
Somalia of Ugandan "peacekeeping" troops.--Nicholas Young, "Uganda: a pawn in the US's proxy African war on terror,"
Guardian, September 25, 2010]
Glen Ford, "Uganda, America's Pit Bull, Wants to Lead a
Larger War in Somalia," blackagendareport.com, October 13, 2010
Rob Prince, "WikiLeaks Reveals US Twisted Ethiopia's Arm to
Invade Somalia," antiwar.com, December 14, 2010
[The airstrike makes Somalia at least the sixth country where the United States is
using drone aircraft to conduct lethal attacks, joining Afghanistan, Pakistan,
Libya, Iraq and Yemen.--Greg Jaffe and Karen DeYoung, "U.S.
drone targets two leaders of Somali group allied with al-Qaeda, official
says ," washingtonpost.com, June 29, 2011]
Glenn Greenwald, "The War on Terror, now starring Yemen and Somalia," antiwar.com,
July 18, 2011
Mohamed Ahmed and Ibrahim Mohamed, "Somali
government declares Islamist rebellion defeated," reuters.com, August 6, 2011
Jeffrey Gettleman, et al, "U.S. Relies
on Contractors in Somalia Conflict," reuters.com, August 10, 2011
[Our experience on 9/11 indicated that while the American people are oblivious to
the role our policies may have played in the famine and destabilization of Somalia,
our security forces aren't. There are now an estimated 1 million Somali refugees in
Kenya, many applying for - and getting - humanitarian visas that allow them to enter the
U.S. Are there Somali refugees in the U.S. who have a grudge against their adopted
country? No doubt. The U.N. now estimates that 750,000 people may die as a result of
the famine. Twenty-nine thousand children under the age of 5 have already died. This
is a high price to pay for fighting al-Qaida, and Americans are not the ones paying
it.--Susan Zakin, "Suleiman's
Travels," truthdig.com, September 27, 2011
Glen Ford, "Somalis Under
Relentless Drone Attack as U.S. Tightens Military Grip on Continent,"
commondreams.org, October 21, 2011
[The Somalis' fear that Somalia will break into more bits has already caused the
president of its transitional government, Sharif Ahmed, to denounce the presence of
Kenyan troops inside Somalia, even though the Kenyans say they crossed the border
only at the invitation of his government.--"Kenya Invades Somalia,"
economist.com, October 29, 2011]
Gabe Joselow, "Kenya to Stay in Somalia Until Safe From
Al-Shabab Menace," voanews.com, October 29, 2011
"Report: Norway oil interests push Kenya into
Somalia proxy war," Somalia Youth League, November 22, 2011
[Kenya's invasion of Somalia, hailed by the West and the UN Security Council, was
meant to deliver a knockout blow to the militant Islamist group al-Shabaab. Instead
it has pulled Somalia's regional rival Ethiopia back into the country, stirred up
the warlords and rekindled popular support for fundamentalists whose willingness to
let Somalis starve rather than receive foreign aid had left them widely
hated.--Daniel Howden, "UN-backed invasion of Somalia spirals into
chaos," Independent, December, 2011]
Abdi Ismail Samatar, "An
odious affair: The UN in Somalia," Al Jazeera, April 3, 2012
[Washington is relying on proxy forces because Somalia has been essentially
off-limits to U.S. ground troops since 1993, when Somali fighters shot down two
military helicopters and killed 18 Americans in the "Black Hawk Down" debacle.--Craig Whitlock, "U.S. trains
African soldiers for Somalia mission," washingtonpost.com, May 13, 2012]
[Officially, the troops are under the auspices of the African Union. But in truth,
according to interviews by U.S. and African officials and senior military officers
and budget documents, the 15,000-strong force pulled from five African countries is
largely a creation of the State Department and Pentagon, trained and supplied by the
U.S. government and guided by dozens of retired foreign military personnel hired
through private contractors.--David S. Cloud, "U.S. is the driving force behind the fighting in
Somalia," latimes.com, July 29, 2012]
Bonnie Kristian, "Biden
Sends U.S. Troops Back to Somalia," theamericanconservative.com, July 26, 2022
