JBeukema
Rookie
- Banned
- #1
Somalia's Spreading Cancer - Politics - The AtlanticA decade into the bloody civil war, which began in 1991 (the second phase of which involved U.S. ground forces as depicted in Mark Bowden's Black Hawk Down), a group called the Islamic Courts Union seized power in southern Somalia and promptly declared Sharia Law (sound familiar?). A Transition Federal Government regrouped and pushed back, unseating the ICU, which promptly splintered into a handful of nastier militant Islamic sects. Al-Shabaab, an Al Qaeda connected faction with ideas that make the Taliban seem Jeffersonian, waged a brutal and effective war against the TFG and international forces. Last year, the TFG relented and formed a coalition with "moderate" elements of the ICU (sound familiar?) and promptly reimposed Sharia law.