In his testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on May 21, 2009, Admiral Michael Mullen, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, set a broad agenda for Afghanistan from which Senator Corker interpreted that Mullen was calling for "nation-building".Mullen was asked why the US was focusing on Afghanistan while al-Qaeda has spread its wings throughout the region, including Yemen and Somalia.Mullen responded that Afghanistan is critical because that is where it all began.Mullen's response played more to domestic political considerations on what the US public will support rather than strategic thinking about dealing with the problem at hand.The unanswered question is what Washington can and should do in order to reduce the threats stemming from other stateless countries such as Somalia?US policy toward Somalia has been a continual failure since 1978 when Zbigniew Brzezinski, the then US national security adviser, declared that the Cold War was being lost on the sands of the Ogaden desert when Soviet-supported troops were helping its ally Mengistu Haile Mariam, the president of Ethiopia, to defeat the Somali army that had captured the Ogaden region.During President Bill Clinton's era Operation Restore Hope was turned into the nightmare known today as Black Hawk Down.Under George W. Bush outsourcing the 'war on terror' to warlords to assassinate al-Qaeda operatives in Somalia backfired - forcing the Islamists to unite under the Islamic Courts Union (ICU), which brought order to the country but disorder to Washington's counter-terrorism tactics.The US also supported Somalia's warlords by providing money, information and legitimacy even though the Somali government had pleaded with Washington for help. ..more..
http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/2010/01/2010169116862851.html
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