State of emergency in Somalia

While this is the first time that the US had admitted to carrying out actions in Somalia since 18 Army rangers were killed during the 1993 Black Hawk Down mission, in truth the US has never really been away - certainly not since 9/11. From a base in neighbouring Djibouti (formerly French Somaliland), the US has run a 1500-strong task force for the Horn of Africa - a volatile region with countries that are suspected of sheltering terrorists.

In the past two years, US special forces ran several joint missions with Ethiopia along the Ethiopia/Somalia border aimed at tracking down suspected terrorists inside Somalia. When this didn't bring the results they hoped for, the US turned to new allies inside Somalia itself.

They turned to the very same warlords who forced US troops out of Somalia in 1994. Teams of US intelligence officials visited Mogadishu several times in 2005. A small team of American intelligence officers came under attack on January 13, 2006, when fighting broke out near a Mogadishu airstrip - although it's still not clear whether they were specifically targeted or simply got caught up in a local dispute.

Either way, within a fortnight the city's warlords had formed themselves into an "anti-terror coalition" funded by the US to go after suspected terrorists. Analysts in the region claim CIA operatives delivered suitcases stuffed with $100 bills to warlords. The price of an AK-47 quadrupled to nearly $600 as the warlords re-armed.

But the "coalition" failed. The warlords, already unpopular, saw all support disappear when the Somalis realised who was funding them. By June, the UIC, a loose coalition including both moderate and extreme Islamists, had driven the warlords out of Mogadishu.

The UIC proved popular, delivering a semblance of law and order to a city once known as the most dangerous in the world.

http://www.sundayherald.com/international/shinternational/display.var.1122024.0.0.php

Privately, senior US officials in the region have admitted that they have no intelligence sources of their own inside Somalia. Newspaper reports from the region's Nairobi-based correspondents and Somali reporters inside the country are read before intelligence briefings.

What intelligence they do have comes from their regional allies - Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia's transitional government. A Somalia expert in Nairobi raised doubts over the veracity of intelligence given by governments which are paid for the information they provide.

"What if Kenya or Ethiopa don't have any new information? The need for cash is always there. The Kenyans are quite naive about the situation on the ground in Somalia and Ethiopia is pursuing its own national interest. There is heavy emphasis on faulty intelligence. The US is being milked. That's why there were so many civilian casualties."

http://www.sundayherald.com/international/shinternational/display.var.1122024.0.0.php