thedrifter
01-10-07, 07:12 AM
January 10, 2007
Embassy bomb planner killed in airstrike, official says
The Associated Press
MOGADISHU, Somalia — The suspected al-Qaida militant who planned the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings in east Africa was killed in an American airstrike, a Somalian official said Wednesday.
“I have received a report from the American side chronicling the targets and list of damage,” said Abdirizak Hassan, the Somali president’s chief of staff. “One of the items they were claiming was that Fazul Abdullah Mohammed is dead.”
Mohammed, 32, allegedly planned the attacks on the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania that killed 225 people.
He is also suspected of planning the car bombing of a beach resort in Kenya and the near-simultaneous attempt to shoot down an Israeli airliner in 2002. Ten Kenyans and three Israelis were killed in the blast at the hotel, 12 miles north of Mombasa. The missiles missed the airliner.
Mohammed, one of the FBI’s most wanted terrorists, who has evaded capture for eight years, is thought to have been the main target of an American helicopter attack Monday afternoon on Badmadow island off southern Somalia.
Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman declined to comment specifically on Mohammed.
He said the assault was based on intelligence “that led us to believe we had principal al-Qaida leaders in an area where we could identify them and take action against them.”
A U.S. official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, credited the Ethiopian military, with the intelligence tip.
“We acted on time-sensitive intelligence and made the strike in cooperation with the Ethiopians,” he said.
It seemed clear the U.S. was not packing up to leave the area any time soon, but he would say just how far the U.S. operation might go.
“We recognize the importance of working with our allies to seek out, to identify, to locate, to capture and if necessary kill perpetrators of terrorist acts,” Whitman said.
Hassan said Wednesday that American airstrikes in Somalia would continue.
“I know it happened yesterday, it will happen today and it will happen tomorrow,” he said.
The Navy’s 5th Fleet sent the aircraft carrier Dwight D. Eisenhower from the Persian Gulf region to the coast off Somalia, joining four other warships already there. A Navy official said the Eisenhower was there only in a supporting role.
“The U.S. Navy hasn’t participated in any military action yet, other than to have ships off the coast,” the official said.
In Djibouti, just north of Somalia, about 1,300 U.S. sailors and about 400 U.S. Marines are assigned to Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa, a defense official said.
Now under command of Rear Adm. Richard Hunt, the task force came into being in 2002 to help combat terrorism and energy piracy in the area. The task force has played a more prominent role in the region, as forces there build up its capabilities and improve the facilities there. Djibouti is seen as a possible command headquarters should the U.S. proceed with plans to create an “Africa Command,” a new combatant command for the entire continent.
Although the task force has been engaged across East Africa, it has appeared to take a hands-off approach regarding Somalia. U.S. and United Nations forces attempted to combat famine in the country in the early 1990s but got mired in fighting between Somali clan leaders. The U.S. engagement largely ended in 1993 after a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter was shot down during a mission to take out a senior warlord; 18 Americans were killed in a devastating blow to U.S. policy there.
But the country, which has not had a strong, functioning central government since 1991, remains vulnerable. As an Islamic extremist group suspected of harboring terrorists attempted to oust the weak government there, Ethiopian and Somali troops forced them out in a brief operation that began last month.
The U.S. is not actively fighting the Islamic militia, known as the Council of Islamic Courts, but by proxy appears to be actively supporting forces that are. About 100 U.S. personnel are in Ethiopia.
There appears to be no chance soon that the U.S. would send ground forces into Somalia, but a senior defense official speaking recently to defense reporters did not rule out the possibility.
Army Gen. William “Kip” Ward, deputy commander of U.S. European Command, focuses on African issues but has no authority over the region in East Africa where the current operations are ongoing. Speaking in Washington Jan. 5, before the strike in Somalia was carried out, Ward, who served in Somalia in 1992-93 as a brigade commander with the 10th Mountain Division, said it’s too soon to know just what the U.S. might do militarily there.
“I don’t see it now,” Ward said of the idea of U.S. ground troops going back to Somalia. “But again, what we say is, situations change.”
AP also said the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi reissued a terror warning Tuesday to Americans living in or visiting the Horn of Africa.
Staff writer Gordon Lubold contributed to this article.
Ellie
Embassy bomb planner killed in airstrike, official says
The Associated Press
MOGADISHU, Somalia — The suspected al-Qaida militant who planned the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings in east Africa was killed in an American airstrike, a Somalian official said Wednesday.
“I have received a report from the American side chronicling the targets and list of damage,” said Abdirizak Hassan, the Somali president’s chief of staff. “One of the items they were claiming was that Fazul Abdullah Mohammed is dead.”
Mohammed, 32, allegedly planned the attacks on the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania that killed 225 people.
He is also suspected of planning the car bombing of a beach resort in Kenya and the near-simultaneous attempt to shoot down an Israeli airliner in 2002. Ten Kenyans and three Israelis were killed in the blast at the hotel, 12 miles north of Mombasa. The missiles missed the airliner.
Mohammed, one of the FBI’s most wanted terrorists, who has evaded capture for eight years, is thought to have been the main target of an American helicopter attack Monday afternoon on Badmadow island off southern Somalia.
Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman declined to comment specifically on Mohammed.
He said the assault was based on intelligence “that led us to believe we had principal al-Qaida leaders in an area where we could identify them and take action against them.”
A U.S. official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, credited the Ethiopian military, with the intelligence tip.
“We acted on time-sensitive intelligence and made the strike in cooperation with the Ethiopians,” he said.
It seemed clear the U.S. was not packing up to leave the area any time soon, but he would say just how far the U.S. operation might go.
“We recognize the importance of working with our allies to seek out, to identify, to locate, to capture and if necessary kill perpetrators of terrorist acts,” Whitman said.
Hassan said Wednesday that American airstrikes in Somalia would continue.
“I know it happened yesterday, it will happen today and it will happen tomorrow,” he said.
The Navy’s 5th Fleet sent the aircraft carrier Dwight D. Eisenhower from the Persian Gulf region to the coast off Somalia, joining four other warships already there. A Navy official said the Eisenhower was there only in a supporting role.
“The U.S. Navy hasn’t participated in any military action yet, other than to have ships off the coast,” the official said.
In Djibouti, just north of Somalia, about 1,300 U.S. sailors and about 400 U.S. Marines are assigned to Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa, a defense official said.
Now under command of Rear Adm. Richard Hunt, the task force came into being in 2002 to help combat terrorism and energy piracy in the area. The task force has played a more prominent role in the region, as forces there build up its capabilities and improve the facilities there. Djibouti is seen as a possible command headquarters should the U.S. proceed with plans to create an “Africa Command,” a new combatant command for the entire continent.
Although the task force has been engaged across East Africa, it has appeared to take a hands-off approach regarding Somalia. U.S. and United Nations forces attempted to combat famine in the country in the early 1990s but got mired in fighting between Somali clan leaders. The U.S. engagement largely ended in 1993 after a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter was shot down during a mission to take out a senior warlord; 18 Americans were killed in a devastating blow to U.S. policy there.
But the country, which has not had a strong, functioning central government since 1991, remains vulnerable. As an Islamic extremist group suspected of harboring terrorists attempted to oust the weak government there, Ethiopian and Somali troops forced them out in a brief operation that began last month.
The U.S. is not actively fighting the Islamic militia, known as the Council of Islamic Courts, but by proxy appears to be actively supporting forces that are. About 100 U.S. personnel are in Ethiopia.
There appears to be no chance soon that the U.S. would send ground forces into Somalia, but a senior defense official speaking recently to defense reporters did not rule out the possibility.
Army Gen. William “Kip” Ward, deputy commander of U.S. European Command, focuses on African issues but has no authority over the region in East Africa where the current operations are ongoing. Speaking in Washington Jan. 5, before the strike in Somalia was carried out, Ward, who served in Somalia in 1992-93 as a brigade commander with the 10th Mountain Division, said it’s too soon to know just what the U.S. might do militarily there.
“I don’t see it now,” Ward said of the idea of U.S. ground troops going back to Somalia. “But again, what we say is, situations change.”
AP also said the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi reissued a terror warning Tuesday to Americans living in or visiting the Horn of Africa.
Staff writer Gordon Lubold contributed to this article.
Ellie