Kenya’s high stakes Shabaab offensive

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By Paul Cruickshank, CNN Terrorism Analyst, and Zain Verjee

 

http://security.blogs.cnn.com/2011/10/24/kenya%E2%80%99s-high-stakes-shabaab-offensive/

 

 

The Threat to Kenya

 

But regional observers say the Kenyan mission carries high risks. Al Shabaab has threatened to launch retaliatory attacks in Kenya if their military operation continues.

 

"The Kenyan public must understand that the impetuous decision by their troops to cross the border into Somalia will not be without severe repercussions," the group stated last week.

 

Al Shabaab has an extensive presence in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, home to an estimated quarter million Somalis, and operates a network of safe houses in the Eastleigh district of the city known as "Little Mogadishu" because of its high concentration of Somalis.

 

According to Ken Menkhaus, an expert on the terror group, Al Shabaab "has the capacity to launch terrorist attacks in Nairobi but has opted not to, because Kenya has been so important to the group for recruitment, logistics, and fundraising."

 

Menkhaus, professor at Davidson College and author of "Somalia: State Collapse and the Threat of Terrorism told CNN: "This is a dangerous moment. What we’re seeing is a level of brinkmanship that we’ve not seen before."

 

"But launching attacks in Kenya would be very risky for al Shabaab because a crackdown by law enforcement on Somali interests in Kenya would be devastating to the Somali business community," he says.

 

Even so, a Kenyan assault on Kismayo would raise the stakes for al Shabaab. "Then you might see Al Shabaab lash out because that’s an existential threat to them – at that point I’d be very nervous about what might happen in Nairobi," Menkhaus told CNN.

 

Al Shabaab’s control of Kismayo is critical to the group’s revenues. According to the UN every year the group collects an estimated $35-50 million in custom tolls and taxes on businesses in Kismaayo – and two secondary ports higher up the coast – about half its entire estimated annual income stream in Somalia in recent years. Al Shabaab needs such funds more than ever because the acute famine in central and southern Somalia has reduced its ability to tax and extort money from the local population, according to Somalia analysts.

 

Al Shabaab attacks against Kenya could take two forms, according to Somalia analysts. The group could mount direct attacks using Somali operatives. "They could easily tear apart Nairobi," Michael Taarnby, a Danish al Shabaab expert at the University of Central Florida told CNN.

 

The second is a reprisal attack from home-grown Kenyan Islamist militants inspired and mentored by Al Shabaab. A report issued by the UN Monitoring Group on Somalia and Eritrea in July 2011 found that while "in the past al Shabaab’s presence in Kenya was concentrated primarily within the ethnic Somali Community, since 2009 the group has rapidly expanded its influence and membership to non-Somali Kenyan nationals."

 

The UN Monitoring Group says that a Nairobi group called the Muslim Youth Centre, which was founded in 2008, openly supported al Shabaab and now had chapters in several Kenyan cities including Mombasa. "Members of the group openly engage in recruiting for Al-Shabaab in Kenya and facilitate travel to Somalia for individuals to train and fight for ‘jihad’ in Somalia," the report stated.

 

"A serving MYC member independently informed the Monitoring Group that members have been returning to Kenya from Somalia since late 2010, with a view to conducting possible operations in Kenya," the UN report said. The Monitoring Group said it was investigating whether the MYC had a role in a trio of suicide bombings claimed by al Shabaab that killed 79 in Kampala, Uganda in July 2010.

 

Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki acknowledged the threat last week – saying "Our security forces have begun operations within and outside of our borders against militants who have sought to destabilize our country."

 

Monday's edition of the Daily Nation in Kenya reported that detectives comprising bomb experts and anti-terror officers visited parts of Nairobi in a covert operation to flush out terror suspects.