Somalia 1993: Snafu Americana
The US troops' Mogadishu beach-landing was a PR comedy of Forrest Gump proportions, ending in tragic PR disaster – but it was again, more an effort, initially, at peacekeeping than imperial aggression.
The capital of Somalia had totally imploded, and had been in complete anarchy for many months. So again, in the absence of an effective UN army which the post cold-war world so badly needs – not one more blue-beret detachment to monitor buffer zones – some force would sooner or later go in and try to restore basic order.
Remember, the implosion of Mogadishu was in no way the immediate or even medium term fault of any outside power. It happened like this: sub clans of the Hawiye – the main original clan of the city and surrounding countryside – having driven out president Siad Barre and his Marehan clan and their allies, in weeks of brave house-to-house and street battles, after years of increasing oppression – started to turn their RPGs and their AK47s against each other as soon as Siad Barre had disappeared over the horizon!
This was because Mohamed Farah Aideed of the Habr Gidr clan of the Hawiye clan family, came into the city and clashed over leadership with Ali Mahdi Mohamed of the Abgaal clan of the Hawiye family, who had led much of the city resistance and overthrow of Siad.So it came about, in the following months, that Hawiye Habr Gidr pummelled and killed Hawiye Abgaal. Abgaal Hawiye fought Habr Gidr Hawiye, until they had reduced much of the capital they had triumphantly and bravely taken, to rubble. The two main rivals, both Hawiye, now dominated different ruined quarters of Mogadishu. The streets and surrounding countryside moved into some kind of Mad Max scenario. And areas of famine bloomed.
It was into this mess that the US force landed. The problem, as in Iraq, lay in what they didn't do (or were congenitally incapable of even conceiving). They failed above all to work sensitively alongside one of the most hopeful UN initiatives for peace ever, which was embarked on under UN special representative Mohamed Sahnoun, a former Algerian diplomat and OAU senior official, and a man greatly respected by our liberation movements over the struggle years.
Sahnoun was in the middle of sensitive negotiations with clan elders, as a way of bringing the warlords to the peace table, when he was swept aside by UN Secretary-General Boutros Ghali, at the behest of the Americans. The US government didn't have a clue how to deal with the situation, and didn't give a bugger, any more than they did in Iraq or in Viet Nam – or do now.
Of course the US government usually ends up promoting the interests of the worst elements – that's what it is usually geared to do. But it was the Somalis, having been messed up in the early 1970s by US imperialism interfering with the possibility of a socialist alliance between Somalia, Ethiopia and South Yemen, who now, 20 years later, shot themselves in the foot. Only then came pax Americana – or rather, snafu americana.
Tony Hall
Eve Hall, working for the UNHCR followed later by Tony Hall working for the UNDP, spent almost a decade in Somalia.
The US troops' Mogadishu beach-landing was a PR comedy of Forrest Gump proportions, ending in tragic PR disaster – but it was again, more an effort, initially, at peacekeeping than imperial aggression.
The capital of Somalia had totally imploded, and had been in complete anarchy for many months. So again, in the absence of an effective UN army which the post cold-war world so badly needs – not one more blue-beret detachment to monitor buffer zones – some force would sooner or later go in and try to restore basic order.
Remember, the implosion of Mogadishu was in no way the immediate or even medium term fault of any outside power. It happened like this: sub clans of the Hawiye – the main original clan of the city and surrounding countryside – having driven out president Siad Barre and his Marehan clan and their allies, in weeks of brave house-to-house and street battles, after years of increasing oppression – started to turn their RPGs and their AK47s against each other as soon as Siad Barre had disappeared over the horizon!
This was because Mohamed Farah Aideed of the Habr Gidr clan of the Hawiye clan family, came into the city and clashed over leadership with Ali Mahdi Mohamed of the Abgaal clan of the Hawiye family, who had led much of the city resistance and overthrow of Siad.So it came about, in the following months, that Hawiye Habr Gidr pummelled and killed Hawiye Abgaal. Abgaal Hawiye fought Habr Gidr Hawiye, until they had reduced much of the capital they had triumphantly and bravely taken, to rubble. The two main rivals, both Hawiye, now dominated different ruined quarters of Mogadishu. The streets and surrounding countryside moved into some kind of Mad Max scenario. And areas of famine bloomed.
It was into this mess that the US force landed. The problem, as in Iraq, lay in what they didn't do (or were congenitally incapable of even conceiving). They failed above all to work sensitively alongside one of the most hopeful UN initiatives for peace ever, which was embarked on under UN special representative Mohamed Sahnoun, a former Algerian diplomat and OAU senior official, and a man greatly respected by our liberation movements over the struggle years.
Sahnoun was in the middle of sensitive negotiations with clan elders, as a way of bringing the warlords to the peace table, when he was swept aside by UN Secretary-General Boutros Ghali, at the behest of the Americans. The US government didn't have a clue how to deal with the situation, and didn't give a bugger, any more than they did in Iraq or in Viet Nam – or do now.
Of course the US government usually ends up promoting the interests of the worst elements – that's what it is usually geared to do. But it was the Somalis, having been messed up in the early 1970s by US imperialism interfering with the possibility of a socialist alliance between Somalia, Ethiopia and South Yemen, who now, 20 years later, shot themselves in the foot. Only then came pax Americana – or rather, snafu americana.
Tony Hall
Eve Hall, working for the UNHCR followed later by Tony Hall working for the UNDP, spent almost a decade in Somalia.
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