Understanding the US Role in Somalia and Niger

FEATURING STEPHEN ZUNES – The United States announced on Friday that it hit Somalia with a drone strike a few miles southwest of Mogadishu on Monday. The Somali capital was the site of a horrific deadly bombing just a day before the US drone strike when a truck bomb killed more than 300 people and injured nearly 400.

A former Somali army soldier who defected to the militant group Al Shabab was reportedly responsible for the devastating truck bomb. There is now speculation that a joint US-Somali air raid in August that killed ten civilians including 3 children may have been the provocation for the Mogadishu bombing a week ago.

Meanwhile questions are emerging around US involvement in Niger where four US Special Forces were recently killed. The Trump administration is keeping quiet about what US troops are doing in that country.

Dr. Stephen Zunes is a Professor of Politics and International Studies at the University of San Francisco, where he serves as coordinator of the program in Middle Eastern Studies. He also serves as a senior policy analyst for Foreign Policy in Focus, a project of the Institute for Policy Studies. He is also an associate editor of Peace Review.