US Commandos Raid Somalia (So What About Afghanistan?)

Stories started to dribble out of Somalia yesterday afternoon about a raid staged by 'foreign commandos' against local Islamic insurgents. It turns out that those foreign commandos were actually US Special Forces troops and their target was Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan - the man the US says was behind the bombing of the American embassy in Nairobi, Kenya in 1998 that killed more than 200 people and was al-Qaeda's biggest terror attack prior to 9/11. In addition, Nabhan was also said to be a high-ranking leader of Somalia's homegrown al-Shabab Islamic movement, which is currently locked in pitched a battle with the Somali Transitional Government for control of the capital city, Mogadishu.

According to reports, US forces used helicopters to attack a convoy Nabhan was traveling in though an al-Shabab stronghold in southern Somalia. After the aerial attack, US commandos landed and scooped up what's thought to be Nabhan's body along with, according to some accounts, other al-Shabab men wounded in the attack and intelligence material.

Needless to say, al-Shabab is rather angry about the death of Nabhan and has already released a statement saying that western countries, the United States in particular, "will taste the bitterness of our response." Meanwhile Sheikh Abdullahi Sheikh Abu Yussuf, leader of a government-allied militia fighting against al-Shabab, chalked the raid up to Divine intervention: "God has sent bombers against al-Shabab. We hope more aircraft will destroy the rest of al-Shabab, who have abused Islam and massacred Somalis." Fighting between al-Shabab and the TNG has killed hundreds and displaced tens of thousands of people from Mogadishu.

US intelligence has said for some time now that al-Qaeda is hoping to use Somalia's current status as a failed, lawless state to carve out a new base of operations for themselves, employing al-Shabab as their local muscle to help get the job done. That Nabhan had links both to a major al-Qaeda terror attack and the al-Shabab leadership shows that they are making progress on that front. The United States decision to put 'boots on the ground', albiet briefly, can be a sign that the US is taking Somalia more seriously as well. US forces have launched strikes in Somalia before, but in recent years they've been in the form of gunships or missile strikes; perhaps due to reluctant to have a repeat of the "Blackhawk Down" incident from 1993, Somalia has been a no-go zone for US troops.

So if the US and al-Qaeda are both looking towards Somalia, then what about Afghanistan? On the eight anniversary of 9/11 our top commander in Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, told Dutch officials that: "I do not see indications of a large al-Qaida presence in Afghanistan now." (Possibly because they're all heading to Somalia and Yemen - al-Qaeda's other rumored new base of operations).

Our top commander admits that al-Qaeda, our motivation for getting involved in Afghanistan in the first place, is no longer there in a meaningful way. A few days later US forces stage an the biggest operation so far against al-Qaeda thousands of miles away in Somalia, which has to beg the question: why are we staying in Afghanistan anyway?