Somalia Insurgents Vow To Seize US Weapons

Leader Of Radical Islamic Group Says He'll Steal Obama Administration's Shipment To Government

(CBS/AP)  A spokesman for radical Islamic insurgents says his group will seize weapons the U.S. has supplied to Somalia's embattled government.

Sheik Hassan Ya'qub of al-Shabab says the weapons shipments will escalate violence in war-wracked country. He was speaking late Sunday in reaction to U.S. officials' statements last week that the Obama administration was supplying arms and providing military training to the shaky government.

The U.S. officials say the goal is to stem Islamic insurgent advances in the Horn of Africa region.

Islamic insurgents have been trying to topple the government for more than two years. Somalia has not had an effective central government for 18 years.

An administration review of U.S. policy toward Somalia found an urgent need to supply the Somali government with ammunition and weapons as it struggles to confront increasingly powerful Islamic militants.

Alarmed by terrorists' gains in Somalia, the administration decided it needed to do more to support Somalia's transitional federal government, officials said.

Officials said the U.S. would not conduct the training and that the U.S. military would not be in Somalia. The U.S. would provide logistical support for the training, and provide arms to the Somalis. The U.S. officials spoke about the emerging plan on condition of anonymity because the details have not yet been finalized.

But even with the administration's careful effort not to leave an American footprint in a country wracked by violent upheaval, the move amounts to a budding foreign complication for the U.S. as its own armed forces wage two distant wars, in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The effort to bolster Somalia's tattered military and police forces faces heavy odds. Somalia has been in chaos for nearly 20 years, and the current U.N.-backed government there controls only a few blocks of the capital and comes under regular attack from increasingly powerful Islamic insurgents.

State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said Thursday the administration was concerned about continuing unrest in Somalia. Kelly confirmed that the U.S. organized an arms shipment made to the Somali government earlier this month, but did not confirm the plans to train Somali forces in Djibouti. One official said the shipment was ammunition delivered to Mogadishu. The Washington Post first reported the arms shipment Thursday.

[tautomer]

The longer Obama is in power, the more wars are popping up and resurfacing. Everyone knows they can pull the wool over Obama's eyes. Obama will have us in Kenya and Sudan soon, as well.

All Obama has brought us is more and bigger wars, bigger deficits, higher unemployment and increased wealth destruction.

[woeisme1]

Why does this stir in me memories of the Iran Contra Affair?

[mysteriousjz]

There would have been no fighting, no enmity, if there was ni US meddling around the world. There would have been no South or North Korea; No Taliban existence, no war in Iraq, Afghjanistan, and Pakistan, and now Somalia; soon Yemen, and worse Sudan; There would have been no Israle-Palestine conflict if US did not meddle; consequently there would have been no 9/11, and with caution no security problem for US/Attacks..........

You are all over because you have enemy; Wrong! You have enemy because you are there. Dont look for enemy elsewhere; Just look in the mirror.......

[ToolMangler1]

Quite the dreamer, aren't you??
You are partially right, If the US had stayed out of Europe half the entire world would be speaking German and Heel clicking stiff-arm slautes to Da Fuhrer. China would be speaking Japanese and Russia would not exist.
ssssahhhheeeeeeesssshhhh!!!!


BTW: Please learn to speak english,

[tautomer]

Told you Obama would get us tangled up in African wars!!! LMAO

[hclinton2012]

A couple of Nuclear Bombs should take care of the whole situation? One less country on the African Coastline won't be missed?

[ToolMangler1]

Thats a bit of overkill, don't ya think!!!!
Just wait till they overrun the Munitions dump and drop a couple of "Daisey Cutters" on the dump and you 'kill several hundred birds with one stone'

[leeanna59]

We should just blow the friggin Somalians off the map and get it over with.

[nikosk11]

Photo

In this Dec. 8, 2008, file photo armed Al-shabab fighters just outside Mogadishu, Somalia, prepare to travel into the city in pickup trucks after vowing there would be new waves of attacks against Ethiopian troops. Ethiopia had announced it would withdraw its troops by the end of 2008, leaving Somalia's government vulnerable to insurgents. (AP Photo/Farah Abdi Warsameh)

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(CBS/AP) A spokesman for radical Islamic insurgents says his group will seize weapons the U.S. has supplied to Somalia's embattled government.


I am OK with that. Let them fight each other to death and let us stay out of it. Send more weapons, but NO troops.

[No_More_Neocons]

It is sad that we must return to this dirtball of a country. I was in Somalia in 93, during the Bloody Sunday disaster. The current situation is the direct fault of the then Republican majority Congress which cut off military funding, funny how the same jerks cried and whinned about doing the same to Iraq in 06. Well it looks like more American servicemen's lifes will have to be put in harms way to correct yet another Republican bright idea that like all others are half baked and not well planned.

[No_More_Neocons]

Well Stuart2021 obviously you do not remember that 13 US Rangers and 2 Delta Force members were killed on Sunday Raid in Mogadishu. Did you not watch the movie Black Hawk Down? To those of us that lived through that and most of all members of the military that served during that time we referred to it as Bloody Sunday.

[Joe_NY_15]

What a bold-faced lie !!!! It was Clinton that refused to send the Armored units that the rangers requested....The lack of armor (Tanks) led to the Black-Hawk Down disaster.....Les Aspen, Clinton's Defense Secretary Resigned over this incident.....how you could pretend that it was the Republican congress that did this is beyond rediculous.

[No_More_Neocons]

Joe_NY_15 were in my statement did I say anything about refusing to send armored units. I did not. I stated that the reason we have the continued situation in Somalia is directly due to the Rebpublican Congress not funding the military action. I know you will hate the answer but the facts are the facts. Nice try attempting to change the subject and deflect blame to somewhere it did not belong.....Oh and just FYI...the reason Les Aspen could not send armored units was because he could not afford to after the Republican Congress cut his proposed budget the year prior.....

[Joe_NY_15]

Again, that's just false, the reason they didn't send armor units, is because Bill Clinton didn't want it to look like a war, so he refused the requested equipment.....WHY DO YOU THINK THE DEFENSE SECRETARY LES ASPEN RESIGNED ?? BECAUSE REPUBLICANS DIDN'T PROVIDE FUNDING ?? NONSENSE !!! your "re-writing" of history, doesn't even make sense.

[No_More_Neocons]

Joe first off I was there and experienced the horror in person and followed very closely the movements of Washington. It is you that is re-writing history...just like a good little Republican.... The bottom line truth to all this and final word from me is that the Republican Congress sold the military out so they could have political advantage over the Democrats. It worked until 2006 and then America woke up and realized that the Republican Party is nothing but a bunch of liars and thieves. Keep listening to their propaganda of hate and fear.... the rest of us will move on to better things....

[zonkzilla]

We should design weapons with an electronic firing pin and a hidden circuit welded into the barrel that can be disabled by a remote satellite signal causing the weapon to not work, that way we can make them inoperable anytime we want to.
But I do agree with people on this board that the US provides weapons to both sides.
I think I heard where there were newly discovered oil reserves in Somalia, need I say more?
Anyone else notice that Al Qaeda always shows up in countries that have oil and they never run out of money to fund their worldwide operations?
Who do you think Al Qaeda is really working for?
The oil companies and OPEC of course.
Al Qaeda is nothing but a group of oil company mercenaries that either take control of oil countries to control the amount of oil exported or stir up trouble to keep oil prices high.
Does anyone really believe we could never find Bin Laden?

[fedupredneck]

Why are we supplying guns and ammo to another country when I can't find ammo for my guns? This sux.

[johninpennsyl]

Make sure you send in weapons before you send in your troops,by then the insurgents will have the guns and can shoot our guys with the stuff we paid for.
How many times has this happened?
How many DEA agents were killed by M16s supplied to the Mexican government and lost to the drug cartels?
How many soldiers killed in Afganistan by weapons supplied by the US in the 80s?
We never friggin learn.