Somalia: the Next Challenge

Major terrorism threat against US interests looms in Horn of Africa, according to new report.

Even the most assiduous news consumer would be hard pressed to find much mention of Somalia in discussions this election year about either foreign policy or counterterrorism. Indeed, most current attention is on Pakistan and Afghanistan as the epicenter of planning and organizing of jihadist attacks on US interests. A new report by the Washington, DC based think-tank Center for American Progress and Enough, a Brussels, Belgium based human rights group, however, argues that Somalia is fast and alarmingly becoming an incubator for a new generation of terrorists, in part due to self-defeating strategies of US counterterrorism efforts there.

The report, titled Somalia: A Country in Peril, a Foreign Policy Nightmare, is authored by Ken Menkhaus, a Davidson College professor who is regarded as one of the foremost US experts on the Horn of Africa. It portrays Somalia in a condition of rapid humanitarian, political and military meltdown. The fallout from this meltdown, Menkhaus believes, is likely to be an epidemic of Islamist extremism. Click here to see full report. ....