Brown and Mystic, two questions for you: 1) What do you call someone who "fought" against an enemy nation twice and now rides on the back of their invading tanks and fights his own people? 2) Which is more accurate a label: the clan courts on the ICU or the transitional puppet government on the TFG? Originally posted by General Duke: ^^^Wish Riyaale was more than a Qad merchant, turned NSS bully, do we now? Poor Duke. You've never heard me praise that man nor do I have a tattoo of him on my shoulder blade like you do of Yeey. Riyaale has more in common with warlord Yeey of this puppet regime than you'd ever admit. Ayaan daro, indeed.

^ Warlord worship. Perhaps you should change your signature.

Bogus claim: Originally posted by General Duke: There is enough evidance that certain dupious business groups were behidn this demo. To coincide with the forcefull arms removal date. Thus the protest was about keeping the clan guns and nothing else. Challenge of bogus claim: Originally posted by mystic: You allegations are unsubstantiated, what prove do you have that the businessmen are behind this protest. Response to challenge of bogus claim: Originally posted by General Duke: ^^^Mystic here is the basic problem with you. Your first mistake is to call H.E Abdullahi Yusuf a warlord,..... Yuusf was decorated war hero, who fought for Somalia in both 1964 & 1977-78 wars, a factional leader of the SSDF, like Tuur & Silanyo where the SNM.

May Allah grant him Jannah.

Mogadishu on the brink of guerrilla war as Islamists leave a power vacuum in their wake EVEN AS the Ethiopian Army began its assault this weekend on the "final" stronghold of the Islamists who have ruled Somalia for the past six months, the defeated faction was already reverting to a guerrilla war that will mean yet more suffering for people in the Horn of Africa. Ethiopian soldiers, backed by tanks, armoured cars and jet-fighter-bombers, are pursuing hundreds of Islamist fighters into the dense Ras Kamboni mangrove forest at the southern tip of Somalia between the Indian Ocean coastline and the Kenyan border. Here the Ethiopians hope to declare victory for Somalia's fragile, secular, unelected Transitional Federal Government (TFG) - which has the seal of approval of the African Union and the United Nations - over the Union of Islamic Courts, which has ruled the country since June. continued... But the Ethiopians will inevitably find that their two-week-long blitzkrieg has been the easy part of the pacification of Somalia, whose new interior minister, Hussein Farah Aideed, son of a notorious warlord, admitted: "We have only a symbolic government. Ministries we don't have, a military we don't have. We're limited." Aideed's father, the late Mohammed Farah Aideed, was targeted by US soldiers in a failed raid in 1993 that led to the ignominious deaths of 18 American troops and the US withdrawal from Somalia. The rusted parts of the US Black Hawk helicopters shot down in that incident still lie on the ground in Mogadishu, the Somali capital. African analysts are asking: does Meles Zenawi, Ethiopia's prime minister, think he is Africa's George W Bush? "We're going to turn this place into another Iraq," construction worker Abdullah Hashi said in reaction to the entry of Ethiopian troops into Mogadishu. Hashi said he was a member of a new anti-Ethiopian underground, with many other signs of an emerging resistance by Somalis who, whatever their differences, are generally united by dislike of neighbouring Ethiopia. Masked gunmen, shouting anti-Ethiopian slogans, are already emerging on the streets of the capital, a sure sign that a classic guerrilla resistance is underway. Tajudeen Abdul-Raheem, a Uganda-based political analyst and deputy director (Africa) for the United Nations' Millennium Campaign, said: "If a country with almost 100% Muslims wants to be governed Islamically, how undemocratic is this the overthrow of the Islamic Courts administration? Does Meles not realise that the Transitional Federal Government will remain a puppet regime?" The comparison with Iraq is inevitable, but the Ethiopians and the TFG face a problem that the Western allies in Iraq did not: the West toppled Saddam Hussein who was widely hated, but the Union of Islamic Courts enjoyed more support among Somalis than any other of their rulers in past decades. Though the puritanical courts frowned on films, dancing and music - widely enjoyed by Somalis, who tend to interpret their Islam liberally - the people of the towns welcomed the fact that life was safe under the courts' rule. People put away their guns, but they are again unlocking them in anticipation of anarchy. People threw support, whether reluctantly or enthusiastically, behind the Islamists because they established order, replacing the warlords who ruled by thuggery, threats and bribes. The courts managed to get the country's economy moving again, reopening Mogadishu's airport and seaport after they had been closed to commercial traffic for more than 11 years. WITH Somalia fundamentally unstable, with many weapons still in the hands of warlords, divided into complex clans, subclans and sub-subclans, it is totally unclear how the TFG intends to establish its writ. The task is daunting. The TFG has somehow to try to piece together a country that has not had a functioning government for 15 years. Those years have been marked by the fall of a dictator, general Mohammed Siyad Barre, followed by a civil war; the rise of a coalition of warlords; the failed US intervention; the overthrow of the warlords by the Islamic Courts; and now the arrival of yet another foreign army from a hated neighbour. Among the most important subtexts of the saga is the suspected presence in Somalia of at least three al-Qaeda-linked operators accused of involvement in the 1988 bombings of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania and attacks on other Western targets. This explains US support for Ethiopia's invasion; the presence of the US 5th Fleet, normally based in Bahrain, off the Somali coast; and reports by intelligence sources that US special forces are operating on the Somalia-Kenya border. The Ethiopian-US grand design looks like turning into a very long war. High-level negotiations have begun to send in an African Union peacekeeping force. But given the failure of underfunded and undersupplied AU peacekeepers in Darfur, it is hard to see why they can hope to succeed in the even more fearsome cauldron of Somalia. Sunday Herald

The US Army is to apologise to the families of officers killed or wounded in action who were sent letters urging them to return to active duty. The letters were sent to more than 5,100 Army officers listed as recently having left the military. But this figure included about 75 officers killed in action and about 200 wounded in action. More than 3,000 members of the US military have died in Iraq since the war began. Casualties have also been suffered in Afghanistan since the US invasion. "Army personnel officials are contacting those officers' families now to personally apologise for erroneously sending the letters," the army said in a statement. It said the database normally used for such correspondence with former officers had been "thoroughly reviewed" to remove the names of dead and wounded soldiers. "But an earlier list was used inadvertently for the December mailings," it added. BBC

Somalia's transitional Government says it is indefinitely abandoning plans to disarm civilians and clan militias in the capital, Mogadishu, after an outbreak of violent protests there. About 200 people took to the streets south of the capital, Mogadishu, chanting "We don't want disarmament, we don't need Ethiopians here". They threw stones, blocked roads and lit up tyres. Ethiopian forces fired shots into the air to disperse the youths. A number of people were injured when a grocer opened fire on some of the demonstrators, who tried to loot his shop. On Monday, Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Ghedi announced a three day-ultimatum for people to surrender their weapons or face forceful disarmament, but the order went largely unheeded. Heavily-armed Ethiopian forces helped the Somalian Government drive out Islamists rebels from Mogadishu a week ago, ending six months of Islamist rule across much of southern Somalia. ABC News

Does this puppet government take the people of Muqdisho (and Somalia) for fools?

Somalis protest over Ethiopians Hundreds of people have taken to the streets of the Somali capital Mogadishu in protest at the presence of Ethiopian forces backing the interim government. Witnesses said Ethiopian troops fired in the air to disperse the crowds, as youths burnt tyres and threw stones. A BBC correspondent in Mogadishu says one person has died and at least 10 others have been injured. The protests came as the government indefinitely postponed a disarmament programme in the capital. The original deadline for handing in weapons was Thursday but few people have done so. Observers say Mogadishu is awash with weapons, and violence has increased since Ethiopian-led troops ousted Islamist militias. Meanwhile the US has agreed to provide $10m (£5.2m) towards the funding of a proposed 8,000-strong African Union (AU) peacekeeping force for Somalia. The money is part of a total of $40m that the US Government has pledged to support Somalia's efforts to restore stability. Assistant US Secretary of State Jendayi Frazer is expected to visit Mogadishu on Sunday. 'No surrender' Residents of the capital came out onto the streets, shouting "Down, down with Ethiopia". Protesters voiced their opposition to the disarmament programme. "We don't want a one-sided disarmament ... we don't need the Ethiopians, they must leave our country," said Bile Abdi, quoted by AFP news agency. Several said the programme should cover the whole country, so that all clans throughout the country could be disarmed simultaneously. Ethiopian troops supporting the transitional government ousted Islamist forces less than a week ago. But on Friday, al-Qaeda number two Ayman al-Zawahiri reportedly urged the Islamist militias to fight "crusaders". "I speak to you today as the crusader invader forces of Ethiopia violate the soil of the beloved Muslim Somalia," the five-minute tape, posted on a website used by militants, said. "I call upon the Muslim nation in Somalia to remain in the new battlefield that is one of the crusader battlefields that are being launched by America and its allies and the United Nations against Islam and Muslims." 'Rare chance' On Friday, Somali interim President Abdullahi Yusuf called for a "speedy deployment" of peacekeepers in his war-torn country. Speaking at a Nairobi meeting, he said there was a rare chance for a real political breakthrough in Somalia, plagued by violence for 15 years. He said the AU force, agreed by the UN Security Council before the current hostilities, should be deployed as soon as possible. Ethiopia's Prime Minister, Meles Zenawi, has said he wants his forces out of the country in a matter of weeks. Kenya's government has shut its border with Somalia, despite criticism from the United Nations' refugee agency. BBC

Sat Jan 6, 2007 2:57 AM ET By Sahal Abdulle MOGADISHU (Reuters) - Hundreds of Somalis burned tires and threw stones on Saturday in protest at the presence of Ethiopian troops in Mogadishu, a week after the forces helped the interim government drive out Islamists, witnesses said. Ethiopian soldiers shot in the air to disperse the crowd, a Reuters witness said. One resident said the protesters burned tires near stalls sellings jars of fuel in a central K4 area. "All the businesses (near K4) are closed. People are busy defending their businesses," resident Abdi Nur said. Several groups of dozens of people, including women and children, marched in the streets shouting "Down with Ethiopia". Heavily-armed Ethiopian forces helped the Somali government drive out the Islamists from Mogadishu a week ago, breaking free from its provincial outpost Baidoa to end six months of Islamist rule across much of southern Somalia. The protests come just days after an ambush killed at least one Ethiopian soldier in south Somalia and a hand grenade was thrown at Ethiopian troops in Mogadishu. Western and African diplomats had called on Friday for the urgent deployment of peacekeepers in Somalia as al Qaeda's deputy leader urged defeated Islamists to launch an Iraq-style insurgency against Ethiopian forces there. "You must ambush, mine, raid and (carry out) martyrdom campaigns so that you can wipe them out," Ayman al-Zawahri, deputy to al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, said in his message. Al-Zawahri's message, posted on a Web site used by militant Islamist groups, is likely to reinforce Washington's belief that the Somalia Islamic Courts Council is linked to and even run by an al Qaeda cell, a charge the Islamists have denied. The Islamists have vowed to fight on, melting into the hills in Somalia's remote southern tip where Ethiopian and government forces are hunting hundreds of their fighters. Reuters

Is this how the genius politician A/Y plans to unite the nation behind him? Have the names (or clans) of these parliamentarians been released anywhere? While the Kenyan economy and its farmers reap millions every month from the Qaad exports to Somalia, here is the Kenyan government showing their credentials as a client state of the US. The ICU put a dent in their economy in the past few months and now they're exacting their revenge. Somalis have no friends in the world today. Not even in their own so called government.

Originally posted by Baashi: How do I know? Well look up the founding members of this think tank and make up your mind whether they have any weight in the Bush adminstration today. The Project for the New American Century may be publicly (according to the New York Times, etc..) dead but it's policies and their effects will linger for decades to come. As for the Discovery Institute, it's the new kid on the block and is quite alive and well.

Originally posted by Baashi: Embrace TFG before it is too late. Why? With all its shortcomings, the TFG has the backing of the "world". With money and guns it will be able to line up its fav warlords and enough sub-clans to establish itself before any meaningful challenge can emerge. Looking to beat Koshin Mohamed for that Ambassador-designate spot yaa Baashi? Please don't be offended but you walked right into that.

Originally posted by Baashi: Now the think-tank you cited has been discredited by the elites of this country. They don't longer have sway over current adminstration. Really? How do you know this? Perhaps I should send Mr. Koshin some flowers for labeling him a Hamid Karzai. :rolleyes:

^ Here's the smoking gun. I read about this study when it first came out. It hits the nail on the head when it compares socialized medicine (in the UK, most EU countries and Canada) and private insurance health "care" in the US. Enjoy. England beats US in health stakes By Clive Cookson in London Published: May 2 2006 Middle-aged English people are “much healthier” than their American counterparts, even though the US spends far more on medical care than the UK, according to a large international study published on Tuesday in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Americans have significantly higher rates of diabetes, heart disease, stroke, lung disease and cancer than English people in the 55 to 64 age group. Sir Michael Marmot, professor of epidemiology at University College London, who led the British arm of the study, said the findings would surprise international health policy experts. His US colleague, James Smith of the Rand Corporation in California, added: “You don’t expect the health of middle-aged people in these two countries to be too different, but we found that the English are a lot healthier than the Americans.” The researchers who were funded by several US and UK government agencies, set out to look at the social and economic factors affecting health but shifted emphasis when large differences emerged between the two countries. The study looked both at the way people reported their own health and – to guard against any bias from self-reporting – at objective biological markers of disease from blood tests. Altogether there were about 15,000 participants. Samples in both countries were limited to whites and excluded recent immigrants, so as to control for racial and ethnic factors. “This study challenges the theory that the greater heterogeneity of the US population is the major reason the US is behind other industrialised nations in some important health measures,” said Richard Suzman, programme director at the US National Institute on Ageing, which co-funded the research. As expected, people with higher socio-economic status, as measured by their income and education levels, tended to enjoy better health. But because the national differences were so great, those at the top of the education and income scale in the US suffered diabetes and heart disease at a similar rate to those at the bottom of the scale in England. The researchers are struggling to explain their findings. Their analysis shows that lifestyle factors – particularly the fact that Americans are more obese and take less exercise – cannot account for the whole discrepancy. though they may provide a partial explanation. Different health systems may also be part of the story. The researchers note that the US spends $5,274 per head on medical care while the UK spends $2,164, adjusted for purchasing power. But Britain’s National Health Service provides publicly funded medicine for everyone, while Americans under the age of 65 have to rely on private insurance. Prof Marmot suggested that, while the healthcare provided by the British state health service was not superior to the private US system, it provided important psychological reassurance. As the researchers say in the journal paper: “To a much greater extent England has set up programmes whose goal is to isolate individuals from the economic consequences of poor health in terms of their medical expenditure and especially earnings and wealth reduction.” Financial Times

Originally posted by Baashi: Investigative reporters in this forum have the goods on this dude. Findings are numerous: 1. Nepostism 2. Age 3. Inexperience Though initially I thought all of those three, after reading about the Discovery Institute and the K&L Gates, it is now clear to me we have another junior Hamid Karzai or even a Ahmed Shalabi in the making. This is bigger than Somali petty clan squabbles and simple nepotistic favoritism. This is the Project for the New American Century yaa Baashi. Call me paranoid but this wreaks of a quest for something (perhaps resources, perhaps plain hegemony but surely a quest for profiteering of some sort) that is higher than anything Yeey or Zenawi can fathom.

When the Islamic Courts were in control, Abtidon, 26, who consults for a relief group, dressed more conservatively, tucking in his shirt, wearing a nice belt and leather loafers. These days, though, "you have to dress like them," he said, referring to the ******. So he wears his shirt untucked. "And I have started wearing these shoes," he said, showing his old rubber sandals. "When the Courts left, it has become a new life," he said, in a manner more grim than enthusiastic. "Now has come a problem bigger than not being able to watch a film. Now, you could lose your life." The clock is ticking for Yeey and his cabal.

Not quite, madam bariis. In that same article you posted, the author says this in the last paragraph: Gorton, an attorney with the Seattle law firm of K&L Gates (formerly Preston Gates & Ellis) and a member of the Discovery Institute board, said he met Mohamed [Koshin] several years ago and that his firm has helped Mohamed secure the diplomatic credentials needed to move within government circles in Washington. K&L Gates, the law firm, boasts such former employees as Patrick Pizzella, former Assistant Secretary for Administration and Management of the Department of Labor, who is a good friend and known associate of none other than Jack Abramoff, the convicted Republican lobbyist now serving time in a federal prison. What does this have to do with Koshin? Ask yourself why a heavily Republican "law" firm and the Discovery Institute (another conservative "think tank") would groom an asylee to the US and help him receive "diplomatic credentials needed to move within government circles in Washington"? It's not like he's a Rhode scholar, so you can't say he's their next hot junior attorney. The dude didn't even finish an undergraduate degree. Soon he'll be the ambassador for the government of Somalia to the government of the United States. The latter, coincidentally , installed the former using a another client state just days ago. Ain't it just grand? But wait, there's more. Here's the press release on the Discovery Institute's site: Somali Ambassador to Speak in Seattle Wednesday By: Staff Discovery Institute January 3, 2007 WHAT: Mr. Koshin Mohamed, Seattle resident has been asked by Somali President Abdullahi Yusuf to serve as Somalia's new ambassador to the United States, pending formal U.S. recognition of his government. The continuing success of Somali troops of the Transitional Government of Somali, aided by Ethiopia and, indirectly, the U.S., in defeating the Islamic Court government of Islamic radicals has a Seattle area dimension that has not been noticed until now: the leading U.S. representative of the now-successful government, Koshin Mohamed, is a resident of Seattle, where he attended the University of Washington and owns a financial services firm. WHEN: Wednesday, January 3, 2007, 11:00 A.M. WHERE: Discovery Institute office, 1511 Third Ave., 8th Floor, Seattle, WA 98102 WHO: Koshin Mohamed, whose efforts for the Transitional Government of Somalia have been encouraged by several Seattle-area and national figures, will answer questions about the current reality in Somalia, the danger of terrorism there and elsewhere--and the attempted assault on him over the New Year's holiday in Seattle. Bruce Chapman, president of Discovery Institute and a former U.S. Ambassador (to the United Nations organizations in Vienna) will introduce Ambassador-designate Mohamed. Already Crowned. LOL.

By its ill-judged invasion of Somalia, Ethiopia has become an accomplice in Bush's war on terror Cameron Duodu Friday January 5, 2007 The Guardian If the 20th century taught us anything, it was that powerful armies can be brought to their knees by small groups of fighters who are not afraid to die. Small Vietnam humiliated mighty America, and the "stone-age" mujahideen of Afghanistan sent the Soviet army packing. With all this so apparent, why has the Ethiopian prime minister, Meles Zenawi, sent his army into Somalia? The transitional government had been fighting a civil war against the Union of Islamic Courts (UIC). Meles may think the former has the people's backing, but that poses the question: if it's so popular, why does it need the Ethiopian army to fight for it? Ethiopia fought a war against the Somali government in the late 1970s and early 80s, but there has been peace on the border for over a decade. So Ethiopia cannot point to internal safety concerns in allowing itself to be drawn into invading its neighbour. The crisis has now escalated sharply with the deployment of US naval forces to prevent UIC fighters from fleeing, the US claiming that some have ties to terrorist organisations, including al-Qaida. The Ethiopian invasion will certainly be resisted by Somali patriots. It will initially be classified as "successful" because it will establish a semblance of law and order. But the routed UIC, although weakened by internal squabbles, will seek safe havens nearby, regroup and woo back its supporters. The UIC knows that when faced with a conventional army backed by an airforce, the best option is to disappear into the undergrowth or behind the desert dunes. The Somalis have been "disappearing" like that for centuries, always coming back to harass those who claim to have defeated them. The danger this time is that the resistance will draw in other countries. Eritrea, which fought its own costly war with Ethiopia, does not need an invitation to help its enemy's enemy. The UIC is also said to be receiving financial assistance from rich leaders of sympathetic Islamic sects, drawn from such countries as Saudi Arabia, Yemen and the Gulf sheikhdoms. And the most explosive fuel will be the involvement of the US on the side of Ethiopia. General John Abizaid, commander for the US central command, is reported to have visited Ethiopia last month, after which Ethiopia moved from providing the Somali government with "military advice" to open armed intervention. The US objective is to safeguard access to the Red Sea for its oil tankers, and to prevent al-Qaida cells being nurtured in Somalia or in Ethiopia, which has a sizeable Muslim minority. Now, by allowing the US to persuade it to invade, Ethiopia has signalled to the Islamic world that it is willing to join the US in its "war on terror". Can Ethiopia afford to be universally regarded as a US puppet? In the African Union (AU) - which has its headquarters in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa - US policy is already causing enormous confusion. For months the AU has been trying, unsuccessfully, to persuade the UN security council to bolster the AU force in Darfur, Sudan. Yet within days of Ethiopia's invasion, the security council, under US instigation, was able to pass a resolution asking for an AU force to be sent to Somalia. Clearly, the US wants to legitimise the invasion by placing it under the umbrella of the very AU that it has humiliated for months. As one of the poorest countries on earth, Ethiopia needs to have the solidarity of the "wretched of the earth". In allowing itself to be associated with George Bush's foreign policy, it is placing itself on the wrong side of the struggle between the weak and the strong. The Guardian

El Jefe - u must stop seeing Somali politics as an adverserial, zero-sum game only. Hardly the way to move things forward in a fractured and complicated society such as Somalia. I wish I were the one who saw it this way. In reality, it's not far from how you describe it above. Furthermore, I didn't bring any Rwanda comparison. All I'd like to bring to your attention is: the TFG starting with disarmament before doing anything else wreaks of trouble. How could any sane Somali give their weapon to those same people who came in riding on an Ethiopian tank? Even worse, it was the same warlords that terrorized them in the past that came riding on these Ethiopian tanks. A double whammy indeed. I say let everyone keep their weapons until the dust settles. If the TFG proves to be what many of us suspect, a puppet government, it will have been a good decision. If they prove us wrong, people will disarm for they have no reason to keep their weapons.

Somalis loath to disarm Only a handful turned in weapons by the time a 72-hour amnesty ended Thursday. Tension grips the capital. By Rob Crilly | Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor MOGADISHU, SOMALIA – The old Fiat truck is still smoldering more than 12 hours after a rocket-propelled grenade slammed into its radiator, setting its cargo of fuel alight and injuring three of the passengers. "This wasn't political. It wasn't the Islamists. This was bandits," says a police officer standing on the sand road, a couple of miles north of the Somali capital, Mogadishu. "There isn't much we can do," he adds. "We are simply outgunned." For six months, the notoriously chaotic city was pacified by the Union of Islamic Courts (UIC). Its leaders imposed Islamic law and succeeded in ending almost 16 years of Kalashnikov-fueled racketeering by freelance warlords. But now, after a two-week preemptive offensive launched by troops from neighboring Ethiopia helped the weak, secular Somalian government force the Islamists to flee, the bandits are starting to return. Earlier this week, the prime minister announced a 72-hour gun amnesty. Residents could give up their AK-47s, grenades, and "technical" battlewagons - pick-up trucks mounted with heavy machine guns - or face the threat of seeing them taken by force. Somalis reluctant to give up guns But when the deadline came and went Thursday with only a handful of weapons turned in, the government was forced to back down. Mogadishu now has three months to disarm, according to the deputy prime minister. It is a humiliating and potentially dangerous climbdown. The truck was attacked at a checkpoint manned by warlords and now residents fear that the old extortionist roadblocks may be going up once again. "If this is how they are going to govern, then heaven help us," says Abdullahi Ahmed Adam, sipping bitter coffee on a roadside stool. A woman selling mangos opposite the Villa Baidoa, an old presidential palace designated as a gun collection site, says Ethiopian soldiers inside had collected only one weapon. "It was only a Thompson," she says laughing at the pre-World War II machine gun which changes hands for only $10 in Mogadishu. A city armed to the teeth Mogadishu remains awash with weapons held by people too scared to give them up. Most families keep one in the house to deter robbers. Businesses group together to employ armed guards. And most hotels have a dozen or more militiamen available to visiting dignitaries or journalists for $20 a day or less. Hussein Aideed, deputy prime minister and minister for the interior, estimates there are $3 billion worth of guns in Somalia. He says the three-day amnesty was ill-conceived. Some businesses should be licensed to hold weapons legally, and the government needs to find a mechanism to disarm clan rivals simultaneously, he adds. "But the prime minister is an academic, not a military man," Mr. Aideed says in his office at Villa Somalia, which will be the president's residence once it is safe for the president to come to Mogadishu. "The prime minister has good intentions, but Somalia is not like that." While serving in the government, Aideed was one of the clan-based warlords who controlled a chunk of Mogadishu before losing ground to the Islamic militias this summer. His father was the man that US Rangers were trying to capture during the disastrous "Black Hawk Down" episode, in which Somali mobs dragged bodies of dead US soldiers through the streets in 1993. At the moment, he has 1,000 police officers for a city of 2.5 million people. He has appealed to some 3,000 former officers to return to work without pay and without guns. His entire police arsenal comprises 326 AK-47s - a gift from Yemen to the Somali president for his personal bodyguard. Aideed says that disarmament can only be imposed on the city if and when a regional peacekeeping force is deployed to support his police. There are diplomatic efforts to find countries willing to send forces to Somalia, but Aideed worries that help will not come soon enough. "We have goodwill from the people to build security so we have to do it fast. If we don't then that goodwill will disappear." he says. Mogadishu has been on edge for the past week since the Islamist militias vanished, many fleeing south toward the Kenyan border, others blending back into civilian life in Mogadishu. "There are 3,500 Islamists hiding in Mogadishu and the surrounding areas and they are likely to destabilize the security of the city," Aideed said at a news conference. Thursday, gunshots punctuated the muezzin's call to prayer in the south of the city - recently a stronghold of the Islamists. Meanwhile, Somali troops and their Ethiopian allies continued the hunt for the remnants of the Islamist militias believed to be in and around Raas Kaambooni, close to the Kenyan border. In response, Kenya has sent troops to seal the border. The US Navy has deployed off the coast of Somalia to prevent Al Qaeda operatives or other foreign militants from escaping by sea. With the Islamists defeated - at least for the time being - all eyes are on the old warlords who used to rule Mogadishu. At least one says he has no intention of handing over his weapons until the city is secure. Mohamed Qanyare Afrah, who commands 1,500 men, says his force exists to protect his kinsmen from their rivals in Mogadishu's main ****** clan. "If you disarm one clan, and you do not disarm the other clan, then that other clan will take the benefit of that, creating insecurity," Mr. Qanyare says. "So what I'm saying is that they must disarm simultaneously," which, he says, would require a well-coordinated nationwide program. "That cannot happen any time soon." CS Monitor

Not to mention this is being conveniently done in Muqdisho and not in other parts of the country. Unless Yeey disarms his own clan first, does he think the clans of Muqdisho will happily give him their weapons so he can stick them up their behinds? Mise you, like others on this site, take the Muqdisho clans for fools? Geedi and Caydiid Jr. are clearly the exception, I'm afraid and the old man will get burnt by none other than those clans. Be back later.

^ In this environment, yes. I see no good coming out of it. All those who declined to voluntarily disarm must be anticipating trouble. It's hard not to. So, given there's an ongoing occupation, a government with no backbone or any means to acquire one, a severely deteriorating security environment, forcibly disarming anyone is throwing fire into a 93 octane fuel tank. Or you don't think so yaa Le Point?

Ugly Dynamic in Somalia US Backs Reactionary Invasion by Ethiopia On December 19, open war broke out in the Horn of Africa. With U.S. backing and support, at least 15,000 troops of Ethiopia's battle-hardened armed forces invaded neighboring Somalia and quickly routed the Union of Islamic Courts (UIC), an Islamic fundamentalist force that had only recently consolidated power over much of Somalia. Guided by U.S. intelligence and satellite information, the invading army drove the UIC back from the Ethiopian-Somali border and, after barely a week of fighting, poured into Somalia's coastal capital of Mogadishu, accompanied by some armed units of their allies, the so-called "Transitional Federal Government" (TFG) of Somalia. The U.S. has sent this armed force marching into Somalia in order to assure that no force hostile to U.S. interests will be allowed to consolidate power there. This new and unjust warfare has plunged Somalia into crisis, and will drive its bitterly impoverished people to new suffering and desperation. And this Ethiopian invasion, despite its quick initial victories, is a move that could very possibly draw much larger forces, including other countries in the surrounding region, into a maelstrom of confrontation and reactionary war. This is nothing new for the U.S. which has backed and used brutal armies to carry out its bidding in African countries as diverse as South Africa, Angola, Mozambique, the Congo, and in Somalia and Ethiopia themselves before this newest round. They have forced people to endure unimaginable suffering as they have installed neocolonial governments, plundered the continent of its raw materials and competed with their rivals over militarily strategic areas. The cruelest part of the tragedy this time is that the Islamic fundamentalists of the UIC do not provide a progressive alternative to the masses that can shatter the imperialists’ grip and that, once again, a battle is shaping up between two reactionary--and mutually reinforcing--poles. U.S. Aggression in Somalia For many long years the people in Somalia have suffered bitterly from the legacies of European colonialism, the operations of modern capitalist-imperialism and the constant clan warfare between rival, backward-looking warlords. Somalia's central government collapsed in the early 1990s, and the attempt by the U.S. to impose its domination by invasion failed there in 1993, after the famous "Black Hawk Down" rout of U.S. forces in Mogadishu. After September 11, 2001, the U.S. started a new and aggressive series of operations around Somalia--saying that the "failed state" there could potentially become a gathering point for Al-Qaeda forces from fleeing the U.S. attacks on Afghanistan. There was both truth to this statement and rank opportunism--in other words, there actually was and is such a possibility AND the U.S. is at the same time using this threat as a justification to further extend and tighten its domination around the world. In October 2002, the United States sent 1,500 troops to establish a military base for itself at Camp Le Monier, in the nearby country of Djibouti. Quickly this Djibouti base became the staging area for extensive and often covert operations throughout the Horn of Africa and in nearby Yemen--with the U.S. acknowledging the deployment of hundreds of elite commandos there, while insisting that their main work is "humanitarian assistance" projects. The U.S. unleashed a campaign of intrigue and superpower pressure in Somalia and tried to impose a government on Somalia in 2004--the so-called Transitional Government. On May 6, 2005, U.S. Marines conducted a major intrusion into northern Somalia, complete with television coverage --all while Pentagon spokespeople insisted that such operations were not being conducted. Meanwhile, the U.S. actively propped up the extremely oppressive and tottering government of neighboring Ethiopia headed by Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, trained Ethiopia's armed forces, and prepared to use these forces as a proxy force (armed agent) for any future U.S. operations in Somalia. The Emergence of the Islamic Fundamentalists: A Reactionary Pole of Opposition As has been happening in so many places in the world, the bribery and belligerent demands of U.S. imperialism brought some forces to its side and bitterly alienated others. The U.S. has failed to impose its domination over this huge, tumultuous and fragmented region--with a population of 165 million people in an area roughly half the size of the continental U.S.--and in many ways reinforced the banner of Islamic fundamentalism (or Islamist Jihad) as a counter pole to its actions. In Somalia, a new force arose, Union of Islamic Courts (UIC), based in its own coalition of clan and warlord forces. It sought to consolidate national power using Islamic fundamentalism as a unifying force--and imposed a harsh theocratic order in many of the areas under its control, immediately enforcing strict religious codes for dress, behavior, and punishment. This included draconian restrictions on and repression of women, the stifling of intellectual and artistic endeavor, and in general the enforcement of patriarchal authority--that is, the absolute authority of the (male) head of the clan (or extended family) and of the main religious figure in the area. These social relations are based on a feudal form of production--one where peasants are exploited by and beholden to those who own and control the land. The Islamic fundamentalist trend generally aims to both reinforce those backward relations and get a share of the imperialist plunder of the nation. At one point, the U.S. tended to back these sorts of forces against revolutionary or progressive secular nationalists; but today, through the peculiar way things played out after the collapse of the Soviet Union, they have emerged as a pole of opposition. But this is a reactionary pole of opposition, one that poses no real future for the masses. And, as we are seeing again in Somalia, these two poles both contend with and mutually reinforce each other (with the U.S. pointing to Islamic fundamentalists in Somalia as an excuse to sponsor an invasion, and the Islamic fundamentalists in turn pointing the finger at the U.S. to rally support). The UIC systematically pushed aside the weak and highly unpopular Transitional Federal Government. By summer, the pro-U.S. TFG leaders and armed units were huddled in the backwater border town of Baidoa under Ethiopian military protection, as the UIC established control over much of Somalia. In fact, the current Ethiopian invasion was long in the planning, and was unleashed within weeks after top U.S. general Abizaid made a personal visit to Ethiopia to confer with its government and military leaders. While U.S. officials have made pro forma statements denying involvement, the U.S. “encouragement” of Ethiopia’s actions--beginning with Ethiopia’s infiltration of their troops into Somalia six months ago--is a more or less “open secret,” acknowledged in ruling class newspapers like the New York Times. Press accounts in East Africa reported U.S. Marines entered northern Kenya to interdict any reinforcements or supplies arriving to support the UIC war effort through the southern Somali coast. And they reported that Ethiopian forces received detailed military intelligence during their offensive from U.S. surveillance planes. The U.S.-sponsored invasion has already intensified the suffering of the Somali people and is quite likely to lead to a new escalation of the internal fighting within that country. It has bolstered the extremely oppressive government of Ethiopia and will attempt to consolidate new forms of rule by hated clan warlords over the 10 million people of Somalia. And it threatens to further strengthen the influence of reactionary class forces holding up the banner of Jihad--not just in Somalia but potentially within Muslim areas of Ethiopia, and much more broadly in the world. These events underscore the compulsion felt by the U.S. ruling class to ruthlessly press ahead, on a world scale, making major new gambles and committing major new crimes to reinforce and further impose their domination. And they once more reinforce the deadly dynamic in which the people are caught between the dead ends of Jihad and McWorld/McCrusade, a dynamic which must urgently be broken. IndyMedia

Somali Government Compound Hit by Grenade By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN KISMAYO, Somalia, Jan. 4 — A hand grenade was tossed into a government compound today in Mogadishu, Somalia’s capital, in yet another sign of a growing insurgency as security seems to be unraveling across the country. Just days after Ethiopian-led troops helped rout Somalia’s once powerful Islamist forces and install a new government in the capital, violence is surging in the form of anti-government attacks and increased banditry, both of which were mostly unheard of during the Islamists’ short-lived reign. Witnesses said that shortly after nightfall, a man in a pickup truck flung a grenade over a wall and into a compound that housed Ethiopian and government soldiers. Apparently, no one was seriously hurt and the pickup truck escaped in a blaze of gunfire. In northern Mogadishu, residents said that four people were killed Wednesday night after bandits fired a bazooka at a truck whose driver refused to pay an extortion tax. Unauthorized checkpoints have popped up all over the city, reminiscent of the years of anarchy when clan-based militias carved up Mogadishu and much of the rest of Somalia. In Dhagtur, in central Somalia, Shabelle radio reported today that five people, including two children, were killed by a tribal militia during a gun battle. A dispute over a well was cited as the possible cause. But despite the thickening bloodshed, Somalia’s newly-empowered transitional government is not slowing down. Today, Ali Mohammed Gedi, the veterinarian-turned-prime minister, appointed more than 30 new judges, including two women. “Quite soon, the police stations in Mogadishu will be operational,” Mr. Gedi said. “If a criminal is arrested, the police will have the access to put the criminal on trial.” It sounds simple, but since Somalia’s central government collapsed in 1991, the wheels of justice have rusted over, with few functioning police stations, jails or courts. Mr. Gedi also pushed ahead with his disarmament plan, extending today’s deadline by two more days and threatening house-to-house searches if people did not turn in their guns. In Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia, Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni said today that his country was ready to volunteer about 800 soldiers to serve as peacekeepers in Somalia. The African Union is trying to cobble together a peacekeeping force to take the place of Ethiopian troops and lend much needed muscle to the transitional government. The transitional government is still battling the last remnants of the Islamist forces, who have fled to a remote, heavily-forested area in southern Somalia along the Kenyan border. Somali officials said that several hundred Islamist fighters were cornered and it was only matter of days until the Islamist movement, which had ruled much of Somalia for the past six months until Ethiopian forces intervened, was finished for good. NY Times