Somalia is seeing an increase in lethal U.S. drone strikes, with 47 attacks killing 326 people over the last third of 2018 (New York Times, 3/10). These terror bombings are an essentially defensive response by a weakening U.S. imperialist state trying to counter the ascendant superpower China in East Africa. While both factions of the U.S. ruling class know they must try to contain China’s influence, the bosses’ main wing, the finance capitalists, should know that bombing with no boots on the ground is not a winning formula.
This U.S. is targeting al-Shabab, a band of small capitalists who use religion to justify their own bombings and murders of Somalians and Kenyans (see box). The U.S. is backing the current Somali regime against the al-Shabab insurgency to keep its imperialist toehold in the country. President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed is a dual Somali and U.S. citizen who until recently worked at the New York State Department of Transportation in Buffalo. He is seen as a willing collaborator with the U.S. (Politico, 2/19/17).
Somalia is a desperately poor country with huge geopolitical importance. It is located in the Horn of Africa, a gateway to the Red Sea, the Gulf of Aden, and the Indian Ocean. Besides controlling possibly the longest stretch of coast in Africa, Somalia borders Djibouti, where the Chinese are building a military base for 10,000 troops. Just across the Gulf of Aden lies the devastation of Yemen, where the U.S.-backed Saudis are waging a vicious war on Yemeni workers to maintain control of the Arabian peninsula. Close to five million barrels of crude oil move each day through the Bab el-Mandeb Strait between Yemen and Djibouti and Eritrea. The narrow strait is a potential chokepoint for goods on the trade route between Asia and Europe, including critical energy supplies (bloomberg.com, 7/26/18). This on the cheap strategy to prop up Mohamed as a U.S. puppet, and bomb Al-Shabab won’t be enough to defeat Chinese imperialism.
Horn of Africa eyed by rival imperialists
The New York Times, U.S. finance capital’s leading mouthpiece, claims that “the intensifying bombing campaign undercuts the Trump administration’s intended pivot to confront threats from great powers like China and Russia, and away from long counterinsurgency and counterterrorism campaigns.” Instead of increased bombing, main-wing analysts like the Atlantic Council’s Bronwyn Bruton are arguing for:
Negotiation with al-Shabab, which is expanding the territory under its control.
Ending support for the Somali government, which has a long history of corruption.
Partnering with Gulf States like Qatar and Saudi Arabia, which are already training Somalia’s military, and allowing them to negotiate with al-Shabab as well (Michigan Daily, 3/13/19).
This liberal counterstrategy exposes the growing weakness of the U.S. position in East Africa. Gone are the days when the U.S. had unlimited resources to impose its will throughout the world. The Vietnam Syndrome, the U.S. bosses’ inability to mobilize worker’s support for land-based military incursions, is alive and well. The rulers’ choices today? Ineffectual bombing or simply staying out of the way to regroup for an inevitable World War III.
Meanwhile, China has increased its trade with Africa by 226 percent over the past 12 years and tripled its foreign direct investment between 2011 and 2016 (Economist, 3/7). In December 2018, the Chinese bosses made a two-year deal for exclusive fishing rights in Somalia’s rich waters. They have also agreed to lend money to the Somali government to rebuild the Mogadishu seaport (Daily Sabah, 2/19). More and more, the Horn of Africa looms as the site of a potential proxy war between China and the U.S.
Second-tier imperialist powers are also vying to continue to exploit and control Africa. French President Emmanuel Macron recently made his tenth visit to the continent in two years, stopping at the French military base in Djibouti as well as Ethiopia and Kenya. The French bosses are allied with the U.S., at least for now. Macron recognizes that “Beijing is aiming to reshape the global order in its interests” and has “made countering China’s growing economic and military power a priority for this year”(Bloomberg, 3/12).
U.S. strategy looks like a loser
Over the past 15 years, drone strikes have become a favored option for the U.S. to flex its military might while minimizing the need for ground troops. Barack Obama bombed multiple countries with drones, including Somalia, during his eight years in office. Donald Trump is continuing this strategy while hiding it from view. The State Terrorist in Chief recently declared that the CIA would no longer make public the number of drone strikes or related fatalities (BBC, 3/7).
In 2017, the U.S. suspended military aid to most Somali units as Trump authorized the first deployment of regular U.S. troops to the country since 1994. There are now approximately 500 U.S. military personnel stationed there (Council on Foreign Relations, 1/31)—nowhere near the number needed to consolidate control of Somalia or challenge the growing Chinese presence in Djibouti. Trump’s minimal troop mobilization, coupled with the dramatic increase in bombings of forcibly recruited teenagers in al-Shabab, is hardly a strategy to win the hearts and minds of Somali workers.
A lose-lose conflict for workers
As Somali workers are bombed by terrorists on both sides, from above by U.S. drones and on the ground by al-Shabab suicide bombers, their only solution is communist revolution. The only way to stop imperialist slaughter is by building a red army to seize state power in all the countries of the world. All power to the international working class!