CBS: U.S. Attacks Al Qaeda In Somalia

(CBS/AP) A U.S. Air Force gunship has conducted a strike against suspected members of al Qaeda in Somalia, CBS News national security correspondent David Martin reports exclusively.

The targets included the senior al Qaeda leader in East Africa and an al Qaeda operative wanted for his involvement in the 1998 bombings of two American embassies in Africa, Martin reports. The AC-130 gunship is capable of firing thousands of rounds per second, and sources say a lot of bodies were seen on the ground after the strike, but there is as yet, no confirmation of the identities.

The gunship flew from its base in Dijibouti down to the southern tip of Somalia, Martin reports, where the al Qaeda operatives had fled after being chased out of the capital of Mogadishu by Ethiopian troops backed by the United States.

Once they started moving, the al Qaeda operatives became easier to track, and the U.S. military started preparing for an air strike, using unmanned aerial drones to keep them under surveillance and moving the aircraft carrier Eisenhower out of the Persian Gulf toward Somalia. But when the order was given, the mission was assigned to the AC-130 gunship operated by the U.S. Special Operations command.

If the attack got the operatives it was aimed at, reports Martin, it would deal a major blow to al Qaeda in East Africa.

Meanwhile, a jungle hideout used by Islamic militants that is believed to be an al Qaeda base was on the verge of falling to Ethiopian and Somali troops, the defense minister said Monday.

While a lawmaker had earlier told The Associated Press that the base was captured, Somalia's Defense Minister Col. Barre "Hirale" Aden Shire said troops had yet to enter it and that limited skirmishes were still ongoing, though troops were poised to take the base.

Ethiopian soldiers, tanks and warplanes were involved in the two-day attack, a government military commander told the AP on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.

Shire said there had been heavy fighting with high numbers of casualties.

"There are a lot of casualties from both sides," he said, declining to give details.

Residents in the coastal seaport of Kismayo, some 90 miles northeast of Ras Kamboni, said they saw wounded Ethiopian soldiers being loaded onto military helicopters for evacuation.

"I have seen about 50 injured Ethiopian troops being loaded onto a military chopper," said Farhiya Yusuf. She said 12 Ethiopian helicopters were stationed at the Kismayo airport.

Somali officials said the Islamic movement's main force is bottled up at Ras Kamboni, the southernmost tip of the country, cut off from escape at sea by patrolling U.S. warships and across the Kenyan border by the Kenyan military.

In Mogadishu, Somalia's president made his first visit to the capital since taking office in 2004. During the unannounced visit, President Abdullahi Yusuf was expected to meet with traditional Somali elders and stay at the former presidential palace that has been occupied by warlords for 15 years, government spokesman Abdirahman Dinari said.

U.S. officials warned after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks that extremists with ties to al Qaeda operated a training camp at Ras Kamboni and that al Qaeda members are believed to have visited it.

Three al Qaeda suspects wanted in the 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in East Africa are believed to be leaders of the Islamic movement. The Islamists deny having any links to al Qaeda.

Somalia's government had struggled to survive since forming with backing from the United Nations two years ago, and was under attack by the Islamic militia when Ethiopia's military intervened on Dec. 24 and turned the tide.

But many in predominantly Muslim Somalia resent the presence of troops from neighboring Ethiopia, which has a large Christian population. The countries fought two brutal wars, the last in 1977.

On Sunday, gunmen attacked Ethiopian troops, witnesses said, sparking a firefight in the second straight day of violence in the capital, Mogadishu.

Austin Bay
http://austinbay.net/blog/index.php?p=1590

1/8/2007
UPDATED: AC-130 airstrikes on Al Qaeda in Somalia
Filed under: General— site admin @ 6:44 pm
That’s what Fox News just reported. From what I can tell, Somali national and allied forces have the Islamic Courts and its Al Qaeda compatriots trapped in Somalia’s southern corner. Somali national forces (what StrategyPage calls Transitional National Government, TNG, or federal forces) and Ethiopian Army forces pushed the Islamic Courts militia south. The TNG and Ethiopians have the Islamic Courts boxed on land. The US Navy and coalition naval forces are covering the sea. I haven’t read anything about Kenya’s special police and border security units, but it’s reasonable to assume these forces are positioned along the Kenya-Somali border, acting as a blocking unit to stop Islamic Courts exfiltrators.

StrategyPage’s Jim Dunnigan and I discussed the “Ethiopian blitz” last week on StrategyTalk. We’re near-certain the US has provided intelligence data to the Ethiopians (probably real-time Predator imagery and target analysis for airstrikes). We rated it as “highly likely” US Special Forces and other special operations units were (are) on the ground, if only to coordinate with the naval vessels. In my mind the AC-130 attack and another reported helicopter attack confirm the presence of special ops forces — the AC-130 is a special ops airframe and typically special ops troops “in the area” help coordinate the AC-130 strikes.

Another tv follow-up — Fox is reporting that there are casualties in the area struck by the AC-130. This may be one of those rarities, a victory over Al Qaeda that will have releaseable television footage.

The AC-130 is a weapon of choice when you want pinpoint fire that also limits collateral damage. The plane also has a comparatively long “on station” capability (it can loiter). I’ll guess that the plane is flying out of Djibouti, but that is a guess.

As of this moment the story has yet to move on a wireservice. This report is available — a US “political setback” vis a vis Somalia. The US wants the Somali TNG to include moderate Islamists in a political settlement.

The US is offering cash as a diplomatic carrot:

If southern Somalia is to stabilize, it is essential that the transitional government hold substantial power-sharing talks with the Hawiye clan elders and Islamic Courts officials,” Prendergast said.

Trying to sweeten the deal, the U.S. has pledged $40 million in new aid to Somalia, including $14 million to support a proposed African peacekeeping mission. Frazer said the money wasn’t conditional on the transitional government negotiating with the Islamists.

Al Qaeda called for jihad in Somalia. Looks like it got it.

I’ll look for an update on the AC-130 strikes.

UPDATE: CBS has a report on line. David Martin handled the report. Here’s the lede:

A U.S. Air Force gunship has conducted a strike against suspected members of al Qaeda in Somalia, CBS News national security correspondent David Martin reports exclusively.

The targets included the senior al Qaeda leader in East Africa and an al Qaeda operative wanted for his involvement in the 1998 bombings of two American embassies in Africa, Martin reports. The AC-130 gunship is capable of firing thousands of rounds per second, and sources say a lot of bodies were seen on the ground after the strike, but there is as yet, no confirmation of the identities.

The gunship flew from its base in Dijibouti down to the southern tip of Somalia, Martin reports, where the al Qaeda operatives had fled after being chased out of the capital of Mogadishu by Ethiopian troops backed by the United States.

Once they started moving, the al Qaeda operatives became easier to track, and the U.S. military started preparing for an air strike, using unmanned aerial drones to keep them under surveillance and moving the aircraft carrier Eisenhower out of the Persian Gulf toward Somalia. But when the order was given, the mission was assigned to the AC-130 gunship operated by the U.S. Special Operations command…

This report confirms that the AC-130 flew out of Djbouti. I’ve visited the base there and the CJTF-HOA headquarters (Coalition Joint Task Force– Horn of Africa). I wrote this column after the visit.

VERY interesting ... word of the new Army plans, going forward into the 21st century:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In fact, this past October the U.S. Army issued its latest "urban operations" manual.

"Given the global population trends and the likely strategies and tactics of future threats," it declares, "Army forces will likely conduct operations in, around, and over urban areas -- not as a matter of fate, but as a deliberate choice linked to national security objectives and strategy, and at a time, place, and method of the commander's choosing."

Global economic deprivation and poor housing, the hallmarks of the urban slum, are, the manual asserts, what makes "urban areas potential sources of unrest" and thus, "[i]ncreases the likelihood of the Army's involvement in stability operations." And "idle" urban youth (long a target of security forces in the U.S. homeland), loosed in the future slum city from the "traditional social controls" of "village elders and clan leaders" and prey to manipulation by "nonstate actors" draw particular concern from the manual's authors.

Given the assumed need to be in the urban Iraqs of the future, the question for the U.S. military becomes a practical one: How to deal with these uppity children of the third world.

That's where DARPA and other Department of Defense (DoD) dreamers come in. According to DARPA's 2004 report, what's needed are "new systems and technologies for prosecution of urban warfare...[and] new operational methods for our soldiers, Marines, and special operations forces."

Today, DARPA, and other Pentagon ventures like the Small Business Innovation Research Program (in which the "DoD funds early-stage R&D projects at small technology companies") and the Small Business Technology Transfer Program (where funding goes to "cooperative R&D projects involving a small business and a research institution") are awash in "urban operations-oriented programs."

These go by the acronym of UO and are designed to support tomorrow's interventions and occupations.

The Director of DARPA's Information Exploitation Office put it this way:

See rest at link above.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

But, I have to post this blurb ... fascinating:

"Z-Man: Copyright infringement was probably the only thing that stopped this DARPA program from being called the "Spiderman Project."

Basically, Z-Man seeks to "develop climbing aids that will enable an individual soldier to scale vertical walls constructed of typical building materials without the need for ropes or ladders."

The Pentagon is aiming to find methods similar to those employed by "geckos, spiders, and small animals [to] scale vertical surfaces, that is, by using unique biological material systems that enable controllable adhesion."

This weaponized wall-crawler, assumedly capable of creeping into some 2025 apartment window in Baghdad, Beruit, or Kerachi "carrying a combat load," definitely is not meant to be your friendly neighborhood Spiderman."

I thought I was weird.

Have you ever considered the possibility that you are? :-)
_____________________

For more on the Horn of Africa please see
Imperial Grunts: The American Military on the Ground
(now in paperback)
by Robert D. Kaplan
http://www.amazon.com/Imperial-Grunts-American-Military-Ground/dp/1400061326

(one of the reviews)
Admiring of Grunts, Deep Between the Lines Slam on Washington, October 3, 2005
Reviewer: Robert D. Steele (Oakton, VA United States) - See all my reviews

Most important in this book is Kaplan's documentation of the fact that transformation of the U.S. military is NOT taking place--Washington is still enamored of multiple layers of rank heavy bureaucracy, the insertion of very large cumbersome task forces in to every clime and place; an over-emphasis on technology; and a lack of appreciation for the urgency of providing security, food, water, and electricity IMMEDIATELY so as to start the cycle of counter-insurgency information collection from volunteers. The author is brutal in his indictment of the bureaucracy for failing to provide the linguistic skills, four years after 9/11, that are far more important to transformation than any weapons system. He is also brutal on the delays in approving operations in the field that are associated with layered bureaucracies that come with joint task forces, and completely detrimental to fast moving tactical success at the A Team level.

Key here is the conclusion that American power can only be exercised in a sustained way through discreet relationships at every level from neighborhood and village on up to provinces and tribes. The emphasis here is on discreet, humanitarian, tangible goods and services including security. When America introduces major forces, it spikes resistance and delays the achievement of its very objective. What jumps out is the need to change how the US achieves its presence around the world. The author recommends a change in the State Department model of embassies focused on countries--State tends to be co-opted country by country and loses sight--if it ever had it--of regional or tribal nuances. The author also recommends a sustained peaceful presence at the provincial and village level around the world, through a combination of modern civil affairs and humanitarian assistance cadres and retired military given leave to choose a place they get to know and stay there to finish out their careers and then be "on tap" for retired reserve plus up.

A third theme in this book, one that Ralph Peters also makes in "NEW GLORY," is that a lot of these countries are NOT countries and should not be countries. Many borders imposed by colonialism are simply lunatic when taking into account historical and geographic and related ethnic realities. It *makes sense* to have regional summits that re-locate borders in a manner that respects historical, geographical and cultural realities, and to do so with a massive Berlin Airlift/Marshall Plan application of the benefits of peace. Ceding southernmost Thailand and the insurgent southern part of the Philippines to Malaysia, and establishing an Indonesian-Malaysian Muslim Crescent, makes sense. Similarly, in Africa and in the Middle East, there is good that could come of a deliberate recalculation of borders.

A fourth theme, and I share his admiring view of Special Operations and the Marine Corps, is that of the separation of the military ethos of service and dedication to mission, from that of the Nation at large, where Tom Friedman in "The World is Flat" declares that we are suffering from a new generation that is, in a word, apathetic. We need to return to universal service, with options for serving in the Peace Corps or the local constabulary at home. America has lost its civic integrity.

A fifth theme, one that corrected a misimpression I have shared, was of the rather special nature of the National Guard elements of the U.S. Special Forces and the Army civil affairs teams. They come out in this book as being among the best of the best.

Sixth, I found the author's field appreciation of citizen militia in Iraq, Afghanistan, the Philippines, and elsewhere to be quite illuminating. Washington is wrong to rush the transition to a centralized Army in places where tribes and militia still hold sway and can be used to provide provincial stability. We ignore the possibilities of unconventional indigenous forces at our peril.

Seventh, as on page 230, the author highlight those occasions when our unconventional warriors point out that Toyotas are better than Humvees, commercial cell phones are better than military communications alternatives. Across the book, a few good men and women with independent authority and cash resources to do instant compensation and instant aid authorization come across as vastly superior to Washington-style contracting and major joint force insertions.

Eighth, throughout the book, force protection mania is killing us and gutting our counter-insurgency potential. This comes out especially strongly in Colombia, where A Teams are forbidden to go tactical with the forces they are training, and are limited to training within safe encampments only. Force protection is a modern variation of the Soldier's Load-we are so nuts about force protection and heavying up that we are shackling our troops and our small unit leaders and completely avoiding the military value of "fast and furious."

Ninth, national and military intelligence are not meeting needs of front-line grunts. Bottom-up intelligence collection, including passive collection from observant civil affairs teams and foot patrols, is what is really working. We appear to need a whole new concept of operations and a whole new doctrine for field intelligence, one that floods areas with non-official cover and overt personnel, one that puts analyst and translators heavy-up into the front lines.

Sidenotes include great admiration for SOUTHCOM, accustomed as it is to getting along with the short end of the stick; and derision for PACOM, "twenty years behind the times, afraid of messy little wars and of a transparent humanitarian role for SF." The author regards the Global War on Terror (GWOT) as a convenient "set up" for a future war with China, not something I agree with but evidently a perception within the military that has specific outcomes from day to day. Other side notes include a brutal indictment throughout of "Big Army" and also of the US Air Force which is obsessing on more super-bombers and unwilling to fund what really works well, long-haul transports, AC-130 gunships (Puff the Magic Dragon), and more air controllers in the field with the grunts.

Super book! NOTE: I have the sense that some in the SF community have taken an intense dislike to Kaplan, and vote against the review as a way of voting against Kaplan. Fair enough, but for what it's worth, the review is a good summary intended to be helpful to all in appreciating what I take to be some pretty useful themes.

Valin says: I don't normally say MUST READ, but...You will be pleased that you did.

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