The Western Somali Liberation Front

The history of Somalia is a bloody one, filled with failed occupation, anarchy and civil war. Early Somalia established itself as a merchant state. Its key geographical location by the natural strait between the Horn of Africa and Yemen made it a focal point for trade.This essay will explore the history of internal struggles of the Somalilands and its many wars. It will investigate the colonial influences and conflicts between Somalia and its imperial occupiers and how these influences set the stage for future conflicts between the clans. Also, it will attempt to define the reasons why Somalia has become a failed state. The importance of United States foreign policies will be discussed as they have

By the time Britain granted Kenya independence, the government realized that secession of the NFD would benefit both Kenyans and Somalis. A Pan-Somali movement had been fermenting in the Horn of Africa as early as 1946, when British Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin suggested the creation of a “Greater Somalia” (“Pursuing Pastoralists”). Kenyan Somalis assumed that independence was tantamount to secession, but their aspirations were crushed by President Jomo Kenyatta’s declaration that “Kenya will never surrender any inch of her territory to anyone” (“The Somali Dispute: Kenya Beware”). This statement was made despite the results of a 1962 commission of inquiry, reporting that over 87% of the NFD population favored secession (“Being Oromo in Kenya”). The Human Rights Watch reports that the locals were routinely “rounded up and interrogated. Thousands of Kenyan-Somalis were beaten by the security forces and accused by the acting District Commissioner of harboring anti-government elements” (“Kenya”). Kenyatta’s intransigent policies and the political separation of Kenyans and Somalis during the colonial era constituted the largest causal factor of the Shifta War.

Affirmation of Somaliland is crucial because the encouragement of African action should not become the basis for inaction on the part of the United States. Jendayi Frazer, in her report on “Somaliland: Time for African Union Leadership,” states that the United States would recognize Somaliland if the others acted first. But Somaliland deserves recognition from a purely U.S.-centric national security perspective. The United States has always stood to protect the values that it was founded upon. Somaliland, in its entirety fits this impression. The Somaliland government and population embody a moderate voice in the Muslim world that rejects radical interpretations of Islam, including that espoused by the Council of Somali Islamic Courts currently in control. It would serve as a bulwark against the further expansion of radical ideologies in the Horn of Africa by offering a brilliant case of how

In neighboring Chad, Muammar Gaddafi helped found a group known as the “Islamic Legion” which attempted to gain control of the Chadian government. This attempt failed, but sparked similar conflicts in Libya, and surrounding regions. During these conflicts, Darfur became a second front, serving as a relay point for military forces and weapon suppliers (Sikainga). Soon after these conflicts, a reformed “Arab Alliance” began to generate propaganda in Sudan claiming that the Arab population was being marginalized and calling for reform in the Sudanese government. The movement gained popularity and using the arms left in the country by past conflicts and hired mercenaries (Janjaweed), supporters soon overwhelmed the government

In 1991 when the dictator Mohammed Siad Barre was overthrown after 21 years in power, the UN forces hurriedly left and the country slid into civil war and famine. Full- scale war broke out a year later between the militias of General Mohamad Farah Aidid and his archrival, Ali Mahdi Mohamad and the United Nations watched silently, not even offering humanitarian assistance. The Somalis were angry and felt that the UN had abandoned the country. When some 500 Pakistani Blue Berets finally did come, they were ill-equipped. The Somalis were very suspicious of the UN and two months later they welcomed Operation Rescue because it was an American and no a UN initiative. Two days later, the US Ambassador Robert B. Oakley publicly embraced General Aidid

Somalis use the word burbur (‘catastrophe’) to describe the period from December 1991 to March 1992, when the country was torn apart by clan-based warfare and factions plundered the remnants of the state and fought for control of rural and urban assets. Four months of fighting in Mogadishu alone in 1991 and 1992 killed an estimated 25,000 people, 1.5 million people fled the country, and at least 2 million were internally displaced.

Over the last 13 years, since the attacks against the Pentagon and the World Trade Center on September 11th, 2001 the world has been exposed to the global threat of extremist ideologies. Service men and women have had a firsthand view of the breeding grounds and environments such ideologies are harbored and developed. With the drawdown of the war in Afghanistan, the global war on terrorism will not end. Instead the focus will shift to other dangerous parts of the world where extremists have already become established; places like Somalia in the Horn of Africa. The weak government in Somalia has fostered an environment conducive to the development of extremist ideologies. This is evident

There are many external actors that have played an immediate role in Somalia conflict which are neighboring countries and first there will be a focus on sub region and four of its constituent states for example Ethiopia, Eritrea, Kenya and Djibouti

In Kathy Gilsinan’s With World Focused on Boko Haram, al-Shabaab Steps Up Offensive (http://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/trend-lines/13841/with-world-focused-on-boko-haram-al-shabaab-steps-up-offensive), the topic of al-Shabaab’s legitimacy and terror is discussed. As Boko Haram (another terrorist organization in Africa) has begin inflicting fear through the abduction of schoolgirls and other acts of terror, al-Shabaab has began to take up arms. Its acts of violence are beginning to spread outside the borders of Somalia.

The fight was between the US forces, and later UN forces, and Aidid’s supporters (“UNOSOM II - Background”). In the end 18 US soldiers and one Malaysian peacekeeper died as well as 300 Somalis (“UNOSOM II - Background”). The result of this battle was the slow removal of US and UN forces and the cancellation of the arrest warrant for Aidid (“UNOSOM II - Background”). These events stimulated the production of Presidential Decision Directive 25, which reassessed US participation in multilateral peacekeeping operations (Clinton). US forces left Somalia in March 1994 and UNOSOM 2 officially ended a year later in March 1995 (“UN Operations in Somalia

The United States has been challenging on deciding how deep it wants to engage in controversial global peacemaking conflicts and whether or not U.S. troops’ lives should be put in danger for the so-called peacekeeping affairs . Events in Somalia between 1992 and 1994 threw that argument into sharp relief.

Al-Shabaab as a terrorist group poses a significant threat in Somalia and in the global community. This paper will start by discussing the background. In this part the paper will show how the group has evolved from Al-Ittihad Al-Islam (AIAI) to the Islamic Court Union (ICU) and lastly to Al-Shabaab. Before discussing the group’s threat of national security, homeland and international, this paper will provide the conceptual meaning of key terminology, such as national security, homeland security, international security and globalization. It is important to understand these concepts before moving toward the main argument of the paper. After providing the framework for key concepts, the paper will discuss the group’s threat to Somalia in two areas, national security and homeland security. The paper will go further and identify the threats posed by the group on other nations’ homeland security and international security. We will use East African countries and the United States examples. The paper will provide evidence to support how globalization has shaped and fueled the threats from Al-Shabaab. It will then discuss the primary response from the United States and from African countries through AMISOM. The paper will provide the way forward and suggestions for the response of the international community to Al-Shabaab. In conclusion, we will try to alert the international community that although the group has been experience hard times in Somalia, it is unwise to

Somalia is situated in the horn of Africa, it is made up of six clan families: Darod, Dir, Hawliye, Isaq, Digil and Mirifle. All of which contain sub-clans, then lineages and then down to extended family. We can see already massive ethnic divides throughout the country that could lead to a weak state. Each clan represents a cultural cleavage and fragmentation within society, a reason of conflict pointed out by Brown (in Jackson: 2002). Mohammed Siyaad Barre, president of Somalia from 1969 to 1991 led a dictatorship ruled through the narrow clan base of Darod, while condemning and excluding those from other clans (Adam: 1999). Furthermore denying them any political space, creating a state of discriminatory po-litical institutions and intergroup

Activism against FGC/M rose during the 1960s and 70s, with the former Somali regime taking an open

One of the most memorable achievement of Islamic Court Union is the Mogadishu Security. The was almost five months with security and stability felt by the Mogadishu residents. No militia brandishing AK 47 in Mogadishu, other than Islamic Courts Union’s militia. In those five months, you could you could go out to Money Transfer Companies, picked up your money sent to you by your families in abroad, and come back with your money without fear of robbers, while you could also use your cellphone. A lot of families, who fled the country,