Somalia: Battle for Baidoa Begins, Islamic Courts Employing Feint Tactics

[Taliban]

Somalia: Battle for Baidoa Begins, Islamic Courts Employing Feint Tactics

 

By Daveed Gartenstein-Ross

 

I have been covering the situation in Somalia since early June, when Mogadishu fell to the radical Islamic Courts Union (ICU). The ICU has steadily gained control of strategic cities throughout the country since then, confining its secular rival, the transitional federal government (TFG), to the south-central Somali city of Baidoa. This morning I have a major piece of breaking news over at Pajamas Media, where I reveal that the ICU has begun its final push to take Baidoa. An excerpt:

 

Baidoa is heavily fortified and protected by a large contingent of Ethiopian troops but its defenses will not hold, intelligence sources tell Pajamas Media. Ethiopia has allied itself with Somalia's embattled transitional federal government.

 

Reached by Pajamas Media, Dahir Jibreel, the transitional government's permanent secretary in charge of international cooperation, confirmed that a massive offensive is underway. Jibreel said that the ICU launched an "offensive on the seat of the government from three directions: Burkhakabo, Idale and Dinsor."

 

Jibreel is guardedly optimistic, noting that the Islamic radicals "sustained heavy losses."

 

"They will overrun Baidoa," a military intelligence officer told Pajamas Media. "It's only a question of when."

 

It's worth noting that the military intelligence source with whom I spoke believes that the ICU's early attacks on Baidoa -- which got beaten back -- were not intended to take the city, but instead were feint operations designed to make the transitional government and its Ethiopian allies overconfident, and perhaps cause them to advance from their fortified positions. If he is correct that these were feint operations (and this source has been extremely reliable in the past), then the ICU succeeded in driving up the the TFG's confidence. I spoke to a number of sources close to the TFG's leadership this morning, and they were convinced that the TFG is winning.

 

COUNTERTERRORISM BLOG

[Taliban]

A weak government and firm Islamist grip on Somalia deal another blow to U.S. efforts to stabilize the country

 

Disaster looms over region

 

By KAREN DEYOUNG

Washington Post

 

WASHINGTON — Six months ago, the Bush administration launched a new policy in war-torn Somalia, putting the State Department in charge after secret CIA efforts failed to prevent Islamic fundamentalists from seizing power in Mogadishu. It hoped that diplomacy would draw the Islamists into partnership with more palatable, U.S.-backed Somali leaders.

 

Today, that goal seems more distant than ever. Since coming to power in June, the Islamists have expanded their hold on the south. A largely powerless, U.S.-backed government remains divided and isolated in the southern town of Baidoa. U.S.-sponsored talks and a separate Arab League effort seem to be going nowhere.

 

Al-Qaida, long hovering in the shadows, has established itself as a presence in the Somali capital, said U.S. officials, who see a growing risk that Somalia will become a new haven for terrorists to launch attacks beyond its borders.

 

Meanwhile, a major war — promoted by Osama bin Laden — looms between Somalia and Ethiopia, threatening a regional conflagration likely to draw more foreign extremists into the Horn of Africa.

 

Pointing fingers

 

Among administration officials, Congress, U.S. allies and other interested and fearful parties, there is a rising sense that Somalia is rapidly spinning out of control. And events there have led to a wave of finger-pointing and a feeling that there are few good ideas and little time for turning the situation around.

 

Interviews and commentary this month provided assessments that differed only in their degree of bleakness and apportionment of blame.

 

"The Council of Islamic Courts is now controlled by ... East Africa al-Qaida cell individuals," Assistant Secretary of State for Africa Jendayi Frazer said of Mogadishu's new rulers.

 

Early hopes of a power-sharing deal with secular politicians have dissipated as Courts Chairman Hassan Dahir Aweys — put on the U.S. terrorist list in 2001 as the head of a militant group accused of having links to al-Qaida in the 1990s — and Aden Ayrow, who heads the Courts' military arm, have increased their power. Moderates remain within the Courts, a coalition of local Islamist groups and militias that drove CIA-supported warlords out of Mogadishu, Frazer said.

 

Islamists have ignored U.S. insistence that they turn over three al-Qaida operatives — the core of what is called the East African cell — who the administration says took refuge in Somalia after terrorist attacks in Africa, including the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania.

 

Bin Laden's call for battle

 

In a taped statement released in July, bin Laden called on Somalis to begin preparing for regional war. U.S. intelligence officials described the statement at the time as part of bin Laden's failing claim to the leadership of a worldwide Islamic movement, despite the dispersion of the al-Qaida network by the U.S. terrorism fight. Now they are not so certain.

 

Still, the intelligence community is not prepared to fully endorse Frazer's conclusions about the level of al-Qaida's control of the Courts. Somalia "has come back on the radar screen only fairly recently," and the question is whether the Islamist government "is the next Taliban," John Negroponte, director of national intelligence, told the Washington Post. "I don't think I've seen a good answer."

 

But a U.S. counterterrorism official, while reluctant to dispute Negroponte's assessment, cited intelligence reporting that "people with links to al-Qaida are assisting with training and weapons."

 

"If the situation heats up," said the official, who was not authorized to discuss the issue on the record, "it could draw in more jihadists from abroad."

 

The United Nations reported last month that Ethiopia has sent thousands of troops to help prop up the two-year-old transitional government in Baidoa. The same report said Eritrea, whose 1970s war with Ethiopia is still smoldering over an unsettled border dispute, has deployed thousands of troops to train and fight alongside the Islamists.

 

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/world/4422522.html