How The War On Terror Pushed Somalia Into The Arms Of al-Qaeda -- Times Online
It has been the forgotten debacle of the Bush years. But anarchy in the Horn of Africa may soon haunt the West
As President Bush prepares to leave office, the pundits will start to produce their balance sheets. It is hard to know what they will list under “achievements”, but easy to predict their “disasters”: Iraq, Afghanistan, economic meltdown, soaring debt and America's loss of global stature.
One other debacle should feature prominently in that second column, but probably won't because it has occurred in a faraway country that most Westerners know only through the film Black Hawk Down - or from recent reports of rampant piracy including the seizure early on Sunday of a Saudi tanker, carrying more than two million barrels of oil, which had an immediate effect on crude prices.
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My Comment: I disagree with the tone and opinion of this article .... but his comments on Somalia are way over the top. Somalia is a failed state in every sense of the word. No infrastructure. No government. No law. A culture of religious extremism and intolerance. Hell incarnate on earth for those who live in the country. Even the food agencies are targets for kidnapping and murder.
To become militarily and economically involved in this country .... that would have been a disaster. The best that we can do is monitor the situation for Al Qaeda's presence, provide material assistance, and support Somalia's neighbors in containing the situation. Anything more than that would be a waste of time, energy, and valuable resources.