I was saddened to hear about the recent terrorist attack in Somalia. Claiming the lives of 23 people in a cowardly act of terror, the Islamic terror group in Somalia known as Al-Shabaab has taken responsibility. As you know, these despicable acts don’t just reside in Somalia. All across Africa, Islamic militant groups form territory with relative ease. This is in part because of the state of African governments. Many are fragile, corrupt, and wildly ineffective. Terrorist organizations such as Boko Haram, Al-Shabaab, and ISIS have been able to rise under these corrupt systems and establish elusive enclaves that pose great difficulty wiping out. In Africa’s Sahel region, UN Peacekeepers and US troops alike have been killed in engagements with Boko Haram. The French are requesting more UN support for the African coalition while the US is opposing this request. I personally agree with the US advocates. The UN is wildly ineffective and usually gets in the way of operations. With strict rules of engagement, they can many times not return fire when attacked. I believe that the coalition to fight terrorist organizations should be led by leading nations like the US and France with cooperation from African countries. But I do not believe the UN has a place in the fight itself, rather just backing and support from the rear. We need to strategically wipe out these organizations in decisive strikes while training local forces to handle bigger and bigger tasks. The coalition is a good start. But if we eventually succeed and completely eradicate terrorism in Africa, what then? The governments of many of those nations are dangerous in their own way. Should we wipe them out, too and try to establish new, democratic institutions? I would argue, no, we tried that in Iraq: We eliminated the evil Saddam Hussein and attempted to establish a wildly ineffective democracy which gave rise to ISIS. I am unsure what course of action there is to fix Africa, if any, but I do know one thing: Africa sits on a landmine of natural resources and history. Just look at the discoveries we have made in that region of the world (ancient history, dinosaurs, science, etc.). If the governments of Africa would invest more interest in these kinds of endeavors I believe they could drastically improve their economies and livelihood.
