You might not have heard of their name, but you should welcome al-Shabaab’s latest meeting with the U.S. military. A U.S. airstrike on Monday killed approximately 60 al-Shabaab terrorists.
While some claim that U.S. actions against the Somalia-based group are beyond the interest of American national security, al-Shabaab does in fact need to be confronted militarily.
The basic point here is that al-Shabaab represents a particularly pernicious blend of criminality, Salafi-Jihadist ideological absolutism, and violent intent. Whether massacring students in schools, or shoppers in malls, the group has repeatedly shown its capacity to carry out bloody and brutal attacks. The U.S. alone has the intelligence and targeting means to provide Somalia with the means to confront al-Shabaab. And that’s exactly why this latest attack was carried out: to support Somali forces on the ground and help the government confront an exigent regional threat. While these operations are regular, they do reflect an interest from the Somalia government to prevent their territory being used as a safe haven.
What’s also important to note here is that al-Shabaab has been weakened by the relentless U.S. pressure it faces. That pressure has forced the group to question its own personnel, for example, fostering tensions which have led to various splits and divergences in the group’s leadership. And by constantly dangling the threat of airstrikes over the head of al-Shabaab operations officers, the U.S. has been able to force them to act more cautiously, less openly, and with less freedom of activity. Again, this is a critical factor in the restraint of any terrorist group.
Finally, there’s the question of what would happen if the U.S. stopped confronting al-Shabaab with military force. Because I believe that the result would be al-Shabaab’s improved ability not simply to carry out scaled-attacks against civilians in the region, but to destabilize Somalia further and turn that nation into a projecting base for international attacks.
Put simply, some bombings are good. And that’s certainly the case here.
