Although toppled from power in Mogadishu, the Somali jihadists are still active. One Pentagon spokesman says below: "This is a global war on terror and the U.S. remains committed to reducing terrorist capabilities when and where we find them." This is good. It needs to be done now on a much more thoroughgoing level, with attention given to the ways in which Islamic supremacism is being advanced through peaceful means.
But before that can happen, there will have to be a sea change in the way Administration, State Department, and military officials view this conflict, and that does not look to be in the offing.
"Report: U.S. hits militants' Somali base," by Mohamed Olad Hassan for Associated Press, with thanks to all who sent this in:
MOGADISHU, Somalia - At least one U.S. warship bombarded a remote, mountainous village in Somalia where Islamic militants had set up a base, officials in the northern region of Puntland said Saturday.The attack from a U.S. destroyer took place late Friday, said Muse Gelle, the regional governor. The extremists had arrived Wednesday by speedboat at the port town of Bargal.
Gelle said the area is a dense thicket, making it difficult for security forces from the semiautonomous republic of Puntland to intervene on their own.
A local radio station quoted Puntland's leader, Ade Muse, as saying that his forces had battled with the extremists for hours before U.S. ships arrived and used their cannons. Muse said five of his troops were wounded, but that he had no information about casualties among the extremists.
A task force of coalition ships, called CTF-150, is permanently based in the northern Indian Ocean and patrols the Somali coast in hopes of intercepting international terrorists. U.S. destroyers are normally assigned to the task force and patrol in pairs.
CNN International, quoting a Pentagon official, also reported the U.S. warship's involvement. A Pentagon spokesman told The Associated Press he had no information about the incident.
"This is a global war on terror and the U.S. remains committed to reducing terrorist capabilities when and where we find them," Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said.
"We recognize the importance of working closely with allies to seek out, identify, locate, capture, and if necessary, kill terrorists and those who would provide them safe haven," Whitman said. "The very nature of some of our operations, as well as the success of those operations is often predicated on our ability to work quietly with our partners and allies."
But before that can happen, there will have to be a sea change in the way Administration, State Department, and military officials view this conflict, and that does not look to be in the offing.
I have one big question how do we know that they are not just using the islamic form of double speak?
What do you think would happen to the "Western forces" if they came out in the open and said the problem is "Islam" and or the "kkKoran". You would have a rain of screams, threats, from liberals in the UN,EU, Arab nations ect. I would rather they name the enemy but you see how when Bush named three countries as enemies, Iran, Iraq, and N.Korea he was jerred and labelled a war monger by the Democrats, and rest of liberal and Muslim appologists. If the actions are used to control islamist expansion, and results can be the same wheter he labels Islam/Koran or not as threats to world peace how much does it really matter. You can lead a horse to water but you cannot make him drink it, so as a sleepy liberal canot be made to see Islam as the enemy when they are not ready to see it, and those that will be ready when the time comses.
ZWP is right. If we say this is a war against Islam, then its a crusade and our enemies multiply or become more active. But our actions in Kosovo show we still don't get it.
This is a global war on terror and the U.S. remains committed to reducing terrorist capabilities when and where we find them."
This is good
This is bad! "Reducing" and "destroying" mean different things; "terrorist" and "enemy" are different things.
"This is a global war on terror and the U.S. remains committed to reducing terrorist capabilities when and where we find them," Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said.
Bryan, this is just "gobbally-goop" diplomatic rhetoric that is ill defined and is meaningless in practical terms
"We recognize the importance of working closely with allies to seek out, identify, locate, capture, and if necessary, kill terrorists and those who would provide them safe haven," Whitman said. "
Look, special-ops does this thing all the time, I understand that; but special-ops does not win the damned war!
Special-ops came out of WW2 and did things like prepare the way for the D-day invasion for example. The OSS as it was called in those days were an important function and contributed to WINNING THE WAR!
Green Berets, working in small groups, work with locals in training etc before the big push; and they do a splendid job.
The problem is the Green Berets don't win wars! They can't! It's NOT their function or purpose.
We need to have a mentality change in the leadership to IDENTIFY THE ENEMY; and commitment to WINNING THE WAR.
At this point, all you are doing is misusing the excellent skills of special ops forces because you have NO OBJECTIVES.
Sure, special ops is trained to work in that environment where there are no absolutes, no rules, supress resistance, recon, etc, etc, etc; and that is wonderful!
However, that is a "containment and managementof the enemy" mentality on the part of the political leaders and NOT the mentality of winning and getting the conflagration concluded!
The goal should be to give the special ops personnel the opportunity to go home; no to provide a lifetime of employment except as trainers BACK HOME!
Kosovo should of been solved by Europeans, it is in their backyard, now their bedroom.
I think I’m getting it now:
Hamas: Bad
Fatah: Good
Shia: Good
Sunni: Good
Al Sadr: Bad
Al Qaeda: Really, really bad
Islam: Good
Somalia: Good
Terrorists in Somalia, Preferably in Remote Villages: Bad
Qu’ran: Good
Intolerance: Bad
Pakistan: Good
Iraq’s Sharia Constitution: Good
Oppression of Minorities: Bad
I hear there is an opening at State.
Nah; The war on terrorism is just a bumper sticker slogan. The twin towers were not knocked down by the 19 hijackers, because the US Government did it. Would you want to be lead or influenced by people like Michael Moore,or John Edwards or Rosie O'Donnell? These people represent the blame America first crowd and refused to recognize that there is an ever encroaching enemy coming toward us. Even the Republicans candidates for president have a blame America first candidate by the name of Ron Paul.
Almost everybody knew and understood who the real enemy was soon after 9-11 but over the past 6 years, complacency has crept into the American psyche, and the hate America crowd has gotten more traction than the average small town American does. The American Family Association poll that was seen on Jihadwatch yesterday demonstrated to us that the American people are not as stupid as the elites of Hollywierd,the MSM,or a few leftwing politicians think that they are. The fact is that this fight is being fought at times almost silently on many fronts because the MSM chooses to ignore it. Somalia is just one place that has gotten very little press over the years and yet it was also one of the smoking guns that let us know who and what we were dealing with I E (blackhawk down). Al Qaeda is showing its head everywhere, Lebanon,Palestinian Terror-tories,Syria,Iraq,The Phillipines, and you name it.
Tony Blair asked; what the Muslims had to “feel angry about” when we had removed “two utterly brutal and dictatorial regimes” and replaced them with “a UN-supervised democratic process” and he wondered why they were angry at us, but not at the people doing the killing.
Tony Blair: "This extremism can be defeated. But it will be defeated only by recognizing that we have not created it; it cannot be negotiated with; pandering to its sense of grievance will only encourage it; and only by confronting it, the methods and the ideas, will we win."
"At least one U.S. warship bombarded a remote, mountainous village in Somalia where Islamic militants had set up a base, officials in the northern region of Puntland said Saturday."
Surely it won't be long before the US is condemned for bombarding "innocent civilians" who were defenseless against a US warship. We'll probably hear from a dozen or more people (courtesy of CNN and the BBC) who say they only wanted the US to protect them from the militants but this action has driven them to join the other side.
Damned if we do, damned if we don't.
"The twin towers were not knocked down by the 19 hijackers, because the US Government did it."
The theories continue to grow in insanity. Today there was "more proof that George Bush did it":
Tom Ridge was governor of PA (did the PA National Guard bring down Flight 93?).
George Pataki was governor of NY.
Mitt Romney was governor of MA (from whence two of the planes took off).
Headline on Al-Jzz calling this an attack on a wedding party in 5...4...3...2...
Forget the black flag of Islam flying over Westminster, before it can do that it must fly over every official residence of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. And that will never happen.
For a start Her Majesty is the head of the Church of England and Commander in Chief of Her Majesties Armed Forces. She also accepts oaths of allegiance from every Member of Parliament. If your not mad keen on Her Majesty then fine, but you will not sit in the Houses of Parliament. Sinn Fein won’t pledge the oath and they don’t get to sit.
Her Majesty also enjoys the power to dissolve any government she sees unfit. Tie that into the loyalty of the oath and shilling that every soldiers accepts and we have a powerful antidote to Islamic rule that America does not enjoy.
Trevor Brookes claims that some made up fella called Allah owns Britain, but even if he does exist, he doesn’t command the British Army. The Queen does.
If Trevor is dreaming of a seat in parliament then he needs to swear allegiance to the Queen. Or get rid of the Queen. The British Army says the Queen wins.
"... the U.S. remains committed to reducing terrorist capabilities when and where we find them."
How about the hundreds of mosques across the US and the tens of thousands of muslims in the US who support terrorism?
The first report I read of this, said that the destroyer fired one five inch cannon, once, to try and kill one man. I cant remember the source, but now I see there may be a lot more to it than that.
Good news!!!
Defending Ethiopia region from jihad is crucial in East Africa global front. Ethiopia is large and important country, it has strong military, ancient culture, they managed to overcome hunger, they are on the way of progress and they are Ortodox Christians, who were fighting jihad before America was discovered.
If only Americans would be so kind to extend their military involvement against islamistic jihad in other parts of the world, notably, in Balkans, Europe... Double standards won't win us this war.
"We recognize the importance of working closely with allies to seek out, identify, locate, capture, and if necessary, kill terrorists and those who would provide them safe haven,"
There are already allies in Balkans who would be more than happy to join in this endevour.
A pissant destroyer?! I'm being sarcastic. I presume the weapons were missiles.
Wallsofbyzant,
The US cannot fight Islamism all over the world. We don't have the manpower and we don't have the connections. It's up to the locals.
Why would we waste our men when the people who are begging for our help today will turn on us the moment one of their own gets hit? What do we need with all the Europeans demonstrating against "occupation"?
Double standards won't win us this war, either. They're European double standards. They're UN double standards. They're African and Asian double standards.
Double standards are when Saudi Arabia is allowed to kill anyone who even looks the wrong way at the king while the US is expected to handle with kid gloves people who want to blow up our airports.
Double standards are when Hamas is allowed to fire on Israeli cities while Israel faces international condemnation for retaliating.
Europeans have become peaceniks. Islamic terrorism is the price they pay for thinking they're so much better than the violent, militaristic US. (Now you want us to use our military to benefit Europe?) It's the price the US is going to pay for its political correctness. We won't call a spade a spade because we might hurt someone's feelings. We brought this on ourselves.
Why not build up your own armies? No one's stopping you.
(Sorry Walls, for taking out my frustrations on you, but European moral superiority has begun to wear on me. Nothing personal.)
Europeans have become peaceniks.
Evidence please?
Infact PMK I'll let you take your frustrations out on my Dhimmi European Ass.
Fire away.
Britain is amazing in so many ways that you can't win your argument for the Islamists. And I mean your argument, the American prejudice. I have met too many people who hate the Islamists and class us second only to the Muslims on the most hated list. I say so what?
You take our help as we asked for yours and you bite your tongue, or you ferret up your own arse and disappear into obscurity. But you can’t ask us to help you and then expect us to lick your bits because some Arab blew you up.
Some people on this site need to choose sides. Choose your pistols and defeat my loyalty to the Crown.
Of course I don’t need defeating because I’m a European so I must be a helpless victim.
The truth is I doubt most Americans would turn over in bed at the Islamification of Britain if it didn’t mean that the whole of Europe was under the Caliphate and looking west.
No need for apologizing, PMK...
Basicly, You're right. Everything you said was truth. For me, Europe is lost. Only because of that I was calling for USA reaction.
I don't want to discus about USA image in the world. Some of the criticism is in place, some isn't. But, on the issue in hand, it's all irrelevant. USA are the only ones that can make a difference in fighting jihad. Maybe Russia is the other one, but to a far lesser extend, because it has more pressing problems, and its institutional capacity was mostly destroyed or obsolete. But they have will, and critical know-how.
Fight on, my friend.