Dirty Wars

by Jeremy Scahill

  On June 3, 2007, a Toyota Land Cruiser packed with explosives burst through the security gates in front of Prime Minister Gedi’s house in Mogadishu and detonated just outside his residence. The suicide attack killed six of his guards and wounded scores of others. After the attack, witnesses found severed limbs almost a mile from the scene. “They targeted me, and they sent a suicide bomb packed with more than two hundred kilos of explosives. They blew up my house,” Gedi told me. “It was the start of the suicide bombing in Mogadishu, targeting the leaders and the government.” It was the fifth assassination attempt against Gedi. Later that year, he resigned.

  Although Ethiopia’s prime minister, Meles Zenawi, proclaimed the invasion a “tremendous success,” that was simply not true. If Somalia was already a playground for Islamic militants, the US-backed invasion blew open the gates of Mogadishu for al Qaeda. Washington was giving Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda an opportunity to achieve a status in Somalia that it had repeatedly failed to attain on its own. “I think when they [started to have] real power was when Ethiopia invaded,” said Aynte. Fazul and Nabhan “had become the bridge between al Shabab and al Qaeda, tapping into the resources of al Qaeda, bringing in more foreign fighters, as well as financial resources—more importantly military know-how: How to make explosives, how to train people, and so on. So that’s when they have gained the biggest influence that they needed.”

  While Aweys and his allies, including Indha Adde, vowed to continue the struggle against the Ethiopians and the Somali government, Sheikh Sharif intensified his cooperation with the Transitional Federal Government (TFG) and the US government. Al Shabab watched and waited, and in the power struggle saw opportunity.

  On February 26, 2008, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice officially designated al Shabab a terrorist organization and JSOC intensified its hunt. On March 2, 2008, the United States carried out missile strikes against a suspected al Shabab house believed to be housing Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan, the senior al Qaeda leader in East Africa. Some reports indicated that he had been killed, but when the rubble cleared, the death toll was several civilians, some cows and a donkey, but no Nabhan.

  On May 1, after three months of strikes that seemed to be killing more innocent people than intended targets, JSOC hit its mark. At 3:00 a.m., five Tomahawk cruise missiles rained down on the town of Dhusa Mareb in central Somalia, blowing up a house that CENTCOM alleged was used by “a known al-Qaeda operative and militia leader.” The mission, military officials said, was the result of weeks of surveillance and tracking. Witnesses in the area described seeing the dead bodies of sixteen people. One of them was that of al Shabab’s military commander, Aden Hashi Ayro. Although the US intelligence had been wrong several times about killing al Shabab leaders, this time there was little room for doubt. After the strike, al Shabab released a statement confirming Ayro’s death, praising him as a hero. Attached to the release was the first publicly available photo of Ayro and a bio of their slain leader. Just before Ayro’s death, according to a US diplomatic cable, the al Shabab leader had met with Indha Adde, a member of his Ayr clan, perhaps to broker a deal. US officials hoped his killing would isolate al Shabab from its former ICU allies and would lead to a “short-term disruption of terrorist operations.” The strike may have deterred Indha Adde from deepening his alliance with al Shabab, but the assassination also emboldened al Shabab and made a martyr of Ayro.

  THE ETHIOPIAN OCCUPATION began to wind down, following an agreement signed in Djibouti in August 2008 between Sheikh Sharif’s faction and officials from the TFG. In reality, the al Shabab insurgency had bled the Ethiopians out, but the diplomatic charade served as a face-saving cover. The “Djibouti Agreement” paved the way for Sheikh Sharif to assume the presidency in Mogadishu. To veteran observers of Somali politics, Sharif’s reemergence was an incredible story. The United States and Ethiopia overthrew his government, only to later back him as the country’s president. When I met Sheikh Sharif at the presidential offices in Mogadishu, he refused to discuss this period of his career, saying only that it was not the right time. Ironically, Sheikh Sharif, who once declared himself a warrior against foreign occupation, would rely entirely on the US-backed African Union force that replaced the Ethiopians to keep his nominal grip on power.

  When some members of the ICU and the Somali government merged following the Djibouti Agreement, Aweys and al Shabab predictably rejected it, believing that the ICU “had submitted themselves to the infidels,” according to Aynte. Fazul and Nabhan were “fundamental in convincing the Shabab not to join the Djibouti Agreement. Because, if the Shabab had joined the Djibouti Agreement that brought about the current government under the leadership of Sheikh Sharif, Fazul and other al Qaeda players would not have been [able to remain] in Somalia. So I think it was a personal interest of al Qaeda figures, to make sure that that doesn’t happen.” Al Shabab’s Somali leader, Ahmed Abdi Godane, declared Sharif an apostate and a “favorite puppet” for the “infidels.” As the new government formed, al Shabab prepared to widen its insurrection, vowing to take down the new coalition government and to expel the US-backed African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) forces that had replaced the Ethiopians.

  With much of the ICU leadership dead, exiled or bickering over who would control what cabinet positions within the newly installed US-backed government, al Shabab capitalized on the disarray. The group welcomed the disillusioned fighters who felt that they had been sold out by the leadership of the Courts. Aside from its commitment to carry on the jihad, what separated al Shabab from the Somali government was its indigenous diversity. Its leadership consisted of figures from Somalia’s four major clans, but it also put members of minority clans in influential positions. Also, true to its name, al Shabab began recruiting young Somalis whom it could easily indoctrinate. It gave them a sense of empowerment in a landscape once again dominated by brutal warlords and clan politics.

  In 2008, al Shabab evolved into a broad-based movement and significant social force. While keeping up its military offensive, it began establishing itself in the south, by projecting soft power and cultivating popular support. Al Shabab members would make diplomatic “visits,” as they called them, to towns, bringing with them food, money, and “mobile Sharia courts” to settle local disputes. Reminiscent of the ICU’s approach, the Islamist militants would spend time moderating speedy court proceedings in each town, settling local disputes and sentencing criminals. Many of these takeovers of Somali towns were bloodless, involving lengthy negotiations with clan elders to convince them of al Shabab’s noble intentions.

  Al Shabab followed up on this diplomacy with popular social programs. One very important move was the further dismantling of roadblocks and checkpoints, a process the ICU had begun during its time in power. These checkpoints were historically used by warlords as tools of extortion rather than security. “The perception that [al Shabab] and other Islamist insurgent groups are a rag-tag army of crude fanatics whose first instinct is to use force and terror to impose their radical vision is a caricature,” noted a report by the International Crisis Group. “Their tactics have been well-adapted and more effective than those of their adversaries. They have largely succeeded in casting themselves as true Somali patriots opposed to the Ethiopian-allied TFG. As a result, they have been gaining popularity in central and southern Somalia, just as they did before the Ethiopian invasion in December 2006.”

  At the same time that it engaged in its version of a hearts-and-minds campaign, however, al Shabab also implemented policies reminiscent of the Taliban: banning popular Bollywood films, forcibly shaving the heads of men with “inappropriate” hairstyles and imposing harsh sentences for infractions against the al Shabab interpretation of Sharia law. By early 2009, al Shabab would control of most of southern Somalia. “In many areas al-Shabab is the only organization that can provide basic social services, such as rudimentary medical facilities, food distribution centers, and a basic justice system rooted in Islamic law,” concluded a report for th
e Senate Foreign Relations Committee. “Western diplomats fear that al-Shabab will continue to win converts by providing services similar to the way Hamas found success in the Gaza Strip. Experts strongly caution that there is little the United States can do to weaken al-Shabab.” Further bombing by the United States or increased foreign military intervention, the report warned, could make al Shabab stronger.

  While al Shabab consolidated local support, on the global scene, al Qaeda could now use the jihad in Somalia to recruit. In this narrative, a Christian nation, Ethiopia, backed by the United States—the root of all evil—had invaded Somalia and slaughtered Muslims. Jihadists had risen up and repelled the invasion, making Somalia a front-line battleground against the crusade bin Laden had long alleged the United States was waging. When the Ethiopians withdrew, according to Aynte, al Shabab “emerged far more popular and powerful than ever,” transforming “its domestic, irredentist struggle into a global Jihadist dictum.” Foreign fighters began pouring into Somalia in far greater numbers. Bin Laden released an audio address titled “Fight on, Champions of Somalia,” amplifying calls for the overthrow of Sharif’s “apostate” government. Al Shabab began easily taking territory throughout southern Somalia and soon found itself in control of a far greater swath of territory than the Somali government, despite the latter being backed by thousands of African Union forces funded and trained by the United States and other Western nations. Al Shabab would emerge as the premier jihadi force in Somalia—and would soon control more land than any other al Qaeda–affiliated group in history. US policy had backfired spectacularly, transforming a ragtag group of relative nobodies in Somalia, in just a few short years, into the new heroes of al Qaeda’s global struggle.

  “If Your Son Does Not Come to Us, He Will Be Killed by the Americans”

  YEMEN, 2007–2009 —During Anwar Awlaki’s time in solitary confinement in a Yemeni prison, al Qaeda in Yemen had made a comeback. While the Bush administration’s civilian leadership largely ignored the resurgence, JSOC was tracking al Qaeda’s new organization in Yemen closely. On March 27, 2007, a Yemeni military unit in the province of Hadramaut discovered a US spy drone that had washed up on the shore of the Arabian Sea. The “Scan Eagle” was an unarmed aerial reconnaissance vehicle that had been launched off the USS Ashland, which deployed to the area in early 2007 to support Combined Task Force 150’s counterterrorism operations in the Horn of Africa. Human rights groups also alleged that the Ashland was being used by US forces as a floating prison to hold al Qaeda suspects picked up in the region. The day after the Yemeni military recovered the aircraft, President Saleh spoke to the US chargé d’affaires in Yemen, who tried to assure Saleh that the Scan Eagle had crashed in the sea and had not entered Yemeni territory. Saleh told the US official he didn’t buy that story but promised that Yemen would not “turn this into an international incident,” according to a US diplomatic cable sent after the phone call, and “would instruct [Yemeni] government officials not to comment.” Instead, Saleh’s government put out a cover story that helped bolster Saleh’s propaganda campaign against Iran. On March 29, official Yemeni media outlets reported that the Yemeni military had shot down an Iranian “spy plane” after consulting with “multinational forces” in the region. Saleh “could have taken the opportunity to score political points by appearing tough in public against the United States, but chose instead to blame Iran,” according to the US cable. The crashed drone was an omen of things to come.

  As al Qaeda regrouped in Yemen, it began to carry out a series of small-scale actions, primarily in Marib Province, the site of the 2002 US drone strike that killed Harithi, including suicide attacks against oil and gas facilities. In March 2007, they assassinated the chief criminal investigator in Marib, Ali Mahmud al Qasaylah, for his alleged role in the drone strike. In an audiotaped message, Wuhayshi’s deputy, Qasim al Rimi, announced that Wuhayshi was officially the new head of al Qaeda in Yemen. In the message, Rimi vowed the group would continue to take revenge on those responsible for the US drone strike. Two weeks after Rimi’s tape was released, suicide bombers attacked a convoy of Spanish tourists in Marib, killing eight of them, along with two Yemeni drivers.

  After eighteen months in prison, Awlaki reentered a world in which the US wars he had grown to militantly oppose had spread. Now, it seemed, war was coming to Yemen. As JSOC and the CIA intensified their operations, Awlaki’s story became like a mirror image. When Awlaki was freed in late 2007, he did not go into hiding, as the US government alleged. He went home to his family in Sana’a and tried to figure out a way to support them and to continue his preaching.

  In an interview days after his release, Awlaki was asked if he would return to the United States or Britain to preach. “Well, I would like to travel. However, not until the US drops whatever unknown charges it has against me,” he replied. “The truth of the matter is I am not banned from return to the US. I left the US on my own accord and refuse to return by my own choice,” Awlaki said later. “In fact the opposite is true. The US consul encouraged me to return to the US during his visit to me while I was incarcerated. Alhamdulillah [thanks be to God], Allah has blessed me with living in a blessed land by the witness of Rasulullah [the prophet]. Why should I replace that with life in the US? But I refuse to even visit the US because the US government is not to be trusted as they are liars just like their media.” As to what he would do next, Awlaki said, “I have a few opportunities open at the moment and I haven’t chosen yet among them. I’m still sort of studying the situation at the time being.”

  In early 2008, the Internet became Awlaki’s digital mosque, where he could reach Muslims across the globe. In February, he established his own website, www.Anwar-AlAwlaki.com, titled “Imam Anwar’s Blog.” He set up a Facebook page, which drew thousands of subscribers. “In the old times it used to take a few days to travel, for example, from Makkah to Madina which are only 450 km apart. Now we can communicate all over the globe within seconds; text, audio and video, all within seconds. So I would like to tell all of the brothers out there whom I personally know and whom I spent memorable time with: Assalamu alaykum and insha Allah I will never forget you,” Awlaki wrote in his first blog post. “And to those whom I grew to know through these modern means of communication but the circumstances have separated me from meeting them, nevertheless, I still feel a bond with them and I love them for the sake of Allah because they have chosen to follow Islam: Assalamu alaykum, and if we don’t meet in this world then we ask Allah to make us of those who would meet while reclining on the thrones of Paradise.”

  Awlaki’s website had a vibrant comment section, and he built up a large online community to whom he was very responsive. The humanity—and an attention to mundane discussion—Awlaki showed in these discussions complicated the cartoonish descriptions of him in Western media and helped to explain his appeal, particularly to some Western Muslims. In one post headlined “Do You Like Cheese?” Awlaki posed a question: “Cheese is great. So if you are a fan of cheese you might be asking yourself the question, is cheese made by non-Muslims allowed or not?” In another blog post, Awlaki addressed Koran-compliant financial practices for Muslims living in the United States and warned against taking out home mortgages. “If you are a person whom Allah has bestowed wealth upon then you should avoid owning property in the US and you should diversify out of the dollar into gold and silver,” he wrote. “In addition to this being the prudent thing to do from a financial point of view, it is also the recommended thing to do Islamicly. Muslims should not be supporting the economy of a nation that is fighting them. Finally, for those who are contemplating purchasing a home in the US based on mortgage which is a clear form of Riba (usury) they should fear Allah.”

  But Awlaki’s posts also bristled with hostility to the United States and showed a clear radicalization of his own politics. Completely gone was any moderate tone about the United States or democracy. “Muslims do not try to infiltrate the system and work from within. It is just not our way. I
t is the way of the Jews and the munafiqeen (hypocrites) but not the way of the Muslims,” he wrote in an August 2008 blog post. “As Muslims we should not subject Islam to the whims of the people, if they chose it we implement it, if they don’t we accept the choice of the masses. Our position is that we will implement the rule of Allah on earth by the tip of the sword whether the masses like it or not. We will not subject sharia rule to popularity contests. Rasulullah (the prophet) says: I was sent with the sword until Allah alone is worshiped. That path, the path of Rasulullah, is the path we should follow.” He added: “Today the Muslim world is under occupation and the statements of our scholars are clear that it becomes fardh ayn (a binding duty) on every able Muslim to fight to free the Muslim land. When something is fardh ayn it is fardh ayn. You cannot theorize or hypothesize otherwise. The ruling is clear and the implications of it are clear.” Awlaki praised the Taliban in Afghanistan and the Islamic Courts Union in Somalia as two “successful examples, even though far from perfect,” of a system of Islamic governance. Jihad, he wrote, “is what [military theorist Carl von] Clausewitz would refer to as ‘total war’ but with the Islamic rules of engagement. It is a battle in the battlefield and a battle for the hearts and minds of the people.”

  Awlaki began urging followers in the United States to break with its government and society and to withdraw from any participation in the political process:

  Today America is the home of an interesting assortment of sins that are handpicked from all over the nations that existed before us: the obstinacy of the people of Nuh; the arrogance of the people of Aad; the rejection of Allah’s signs by the people of Thamud; the sodomy of the people of Lut; the financial deviance of the people of Shuayb as America is the biggest dealer and promoter of the interest based economy; the oppression of Abu Jahl et al; the greed, deception, love of the temporal life, and the bogusness of the children of Israel; along with the arrogance of the Pharaoh who had the misled notion that just because he is the leader of the most powerful nation on earth and is at the top of the greatest army of his time he can somehow defeat the servants of Allah.