Terrorism: US Interests in Somalia - Research Paper Example

The paper "Terrorism: US Interests in Somalia" is a wonderful example of a research paper on politics.Since September 11 attacks, there has been a significant alteration in the global relations, and terrorism has become the most imperative and foremost concern of most of the countries, especially the United States that resulted in the commencement of the War on Terror against terrorist organizations such as Al-Qaeda, Jundallah, etc. After the attacks on 9/11, Afghanistan was the first country that confronted the retribution of the United States followed by Iraq, and since few years, it is an observation that the United States is putting enormous efforts to invest its resources, forces, and money in carrying out its military and non-military operations against terrorists in African country of Somalia.

According to experts, after Afghanistan, Somalia has now become the haven for various terrorist organizations that pose a great threat to the United States, and thus, it has now become very imperative to handle such risk factors to preserve the interests of the USA.Before understanding the justification of US involvement in Somalia, it is imperative to understand the scenario of Somalia itself. In specific, Somalia is an under-developed poor Muslim country that is lacking a federal government, and such absence has been the major factor that encourages the terrorist organizations to consider Somalia as their hideout (McCrummen, 2009).

From this aspect, experts have indicated that Somalia is a fertile land for terrorism, and in the past, reports have pointed out that Somali radicals received the support of Al-Qaeda during the 1990s that is another reason of Somalia being the favorite hideout for Al-Qaeda and other terrorist organizations after Afghanistan. Although Somalia is a huge country similar to Afghanistan, however, various experts believe that Somalia lacks hiding landscapes that exist in Afghanistan, but still, malfunctioning of the central government is the most significant issue that allows violence, terrorism, and other illegal factors flourish in the country.

From this understanding, it is evident that establishment of a central government and its proper functioning is the most urgent task that can play a critical role in acquiring optimistic outcomes in the War on Terror (McCrummen, 2009). In other words, establishing a proper government system in Somalia will be discouraging for the terrorist organizations and will not allow them to acquire hideouts in the country. For this purpose, as earlier mentioned, the United States is endeavoring to establish the central government in the Horn of Africa that poses great threats to the security of the United States and other countries as well.

In this regard, since a year, there has been a noteworthy increment in activities of US forces, especially U.S. navy that is constantly monitoring sea traffic, whereas, US airplanes fly across Somalia frequently to investigate any terrorism-related activities in the country. In such efforts, Ethiopia has become the major ally of the United States in carrying out the military, as well as non-military operations. According to some experts, besides the USA, Ethiopia has been benefiting enormously from such attempts of the USA by using the same justification of terrorism-related threats that seem unjustifiable according to various experts.

Still, USA has been arranging meetings with leaders of different tribes existing in Somalia that can be the most important tools for the US government to establish a central government in Somalia and will be very fruitful for the War on Terror. According to the New York Times (Gettleman, 2009) and few other experts on international relations, in this era, various countries have remained without a government for so long; however, now, it is almost impossible for the US government to ignore the absence of government in Somalia that seems to become the second haven for Al-Qaeda and other terrorist organizations after Afghanistan.

Although the US government carried out military operations against Somalia in the past, however, it confronted harsh blow from Somali militiamen during early 1990s in the form of ‘Black Hawk Down’ (Gettleman, 2009). Since then until now, it is an observation that the USA is focusing primarily on planning and inclining its strategy more towards non-military operations and endeavoring more for the government in the country. Such strategy will be an efficient way of restricting the development of warlords in Somalia that has been occurring in the absence of any government through various training camps of terrorist organizations in the country, and subsequently, beneficial for the War on Terror directly, and for the US interests indirectly.

Conclusively, from this discussion, it is evident that in the midst of terrorist attacks on various countries and during the War on Terror, it will be foolish to ignore occurrences in Somalia. Thus, the US government is playing a crucial role in endeavoring to establish a new government in Somalia that will give a huge blow to the Al-Qaeda and related organizations that will then have to search a non-existing new haven for themselves and will be beneficial for the US interests as well.