The Somali National Army: an assessment

Defense & Security Analysis ISSN: 1475-1798 (Print) 1475-1801 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/cdan20 The Somali National Army: an assessment Colin D. Robinson To cite this article: Colin D. Robinson (2019) The Somali National Army: an assessment, Defense & Security Analysis, 35:2, 211-221, DOI: 10.1080/14751798.2019.1600805 To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/14751798.2019.1600805 Published online: 15 Apr 2019. Submit your article to this journal Article views: 130 View Crossmark data Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=cdan20 DEFENSE & SECURITY ANALYSIS 2019, VOL. 35, NO. 2, 211–221 https://doi.org/10.1080/14751798.2019.1600805 The Somali National Army: an assessment Colin D. Robinson Independent Researcher ABSTRACT KEYWORDS To engage properly with the Somali National Army, to understand it in the hope of improving stability and the lives of over 12 million Somalis, good basic information on its composition and characteristics is necessary. Authoritative accounts on the subject have been scarce for over 25 years. This account seeks to detail the army’s dispositions across southern Somalia, and, more importantly, the brigades’ clan compositions and linkages. Clan ties supersede loyalties to the central government. The army as it stands is a collection of former militias which suffer from illdiscipline and commit crime along with greater atrocities. Estimates of numbers are unreliable, but there might be 13,000 or more fighters in six brigades in the Mogadishu area and five beyond. Somalia; security sector reform; army reconstruction; security & justice In southern Somalia, south of the Puntland border, the thirty-year old civil war continues. In Puntland and Somaliland there is relative calm, built upon sub-clan agreements with each other, with the exception of the fighting in the border zone between them. But south of the Puntland border, conflict continues, with al-Shabaab controlling much of the countryside and disputes between sub-clans frequent. Looking on are the major world powers which desire greater stability in the region, and newer regional powers (such as Turkey, the UAE, and Qatar) who are gaining considerable influence. Despite a growing acknowledgement of the powers of non-state actors, and the bitter and uneven progress of the U.S.-led state-building and reconstruction project in Afghanistan and Iraq, the current state-building orthodoxy continues to place significant emphasis on security sector reform (possibly now better conceptualised, more loosely, as security and justice programming).1 Despite growing questions about the practice,2 building effective, if not necessarily accountable, military forces for fragile states remains a major priority. To this end, enormous outside efforts for many years have been made to build-up the Mogadishu central government’s army. In 2016 and 2017, the major powers’ thinking has been changing, as the Federal Government of Somalia remains as weak and divided as ever, and the Somali Federal Member States’ (FMSs) formation process continues. Nevertheless, whether as the security priority or not, Mogadishu’s Somali National Army remains an important player in this changing security landscape. To engage properly with this force, to understand it in the hope of improving stability and the lives of over 12 million Somalis, good basic information on its composition and characteristics is necessary. Recent scholarship reiterates the importance of an understanding CONTACT Colin D. Robinson [email protected] © 2019 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group 212 C. D. ROBINSON of fragile states’ situation and linkages with non-states networks.3 But beyond some in Somalia itself and a small network of international actors in Mogadishu, Nairobi, and beyond, even the basic characteristics of the Somali National Army have remained unclear for many years. In 2014 this author undertook an assessment mission to Somalia, visiting Mogadishu (and, briefly, Beletweyne) in conjunction with UNSOM’s military advisors. At the time, publicly accessible information on the SNA was limited to newspaper reports, relevant extracts from the UN’s Somalia and Eritrea Monitoring Group (SEMG) reports, and some other scattered data points. In July 2016 this author’s historical account of the rise and fall of the Somali National Army from 1960 to 2012 was published.4 But this historical account did not endeavour to detail the army’s dispositions across southern Somalia, nor the brigades’ clan compositions and linkages, which are more important than their formal characteristics. This field report sets out to fill that gap. It draws upon interviews and documents accessed since July 2014, but is not intended as an up-to-date description of the army as it stands at the time of publication. The situation is changing too quickly. It is generally valid as of the end of 2016, although information is specifically dated where possible. The origin of the present army lies in the 2009 Djibouti Agreement. The agreement, finally concluded on 19 August 2008, stipulated that the Transitional Federal Government (TFG) and the Alliance for the Re-liberation of Somalia (Djibouti) were to merge. On this basis the new merged force comprised officers of the former 1960–1990 national army which remained in Mogadishu,5 and former Islamic Courts’ militia. Also part of the mix were clan and especially warlord militias (many grouped under the ARS-D banner). Ages ranged from 40 upwards (the youngest of the ex-national army soldiers) to 20–30.6 The force numbered around 5000, in 450-man battalions, organised into three brigades. Clan loyalties, in general, supersede loyalty to any central government; for most Somalis, clan ties are the only guarantees they can rely on.7 The army as it stands is a collection of former militias deeply split along clan lines. Its behaviour reflects this, with ill-discipline and significant levels of crime and greater atrocities being committed. Outside Mogadishu the government has had little choice for several years but “to negotiate command and control arrangements with local forces, providing them with logistical support, financial support and legitimacy in exchange for a degree of loyalty.”8 This is why much of the fighting against Al-Shabaab is being done by clan militias and regional Daraawiish9 forces, because the SNA is not trusted to fight Al-Shabaab beyond Mogadishu and its environs. Command and control is often publicly described as weak. Informed observers say that in the units there tends to be one strong leader; most commanders have little training but much militia experience, and lead personnel of the same clan. It appears rare to find whole units of the armed forces acting in the interests of a clan; rather, fragments of units – former militia bands – may or may not fight for clan reasons, as circumstances dictate.10 Most officers are old, with 960 so-called “grey soldiers” from Said Barre’s generation listed in 2010. There are many older officers with formal military education, who graduated from military academies, but do not operate well because they are leading troops from different subclans, both in Mogadishu, but throughout south-central Somalia more generally. One expert said that “less than 50” were younger. “There is almost a generation of middle leadership missing from the military.”11 The older officers find it difficult to lead the young fighters, physically and mentally.12 International advisors admit that the SNA “isn’t really an army.” DEFENSE & SECURITY ANALYSIS 213 Armed forces will operate best if they are given agreed and clear aims. Current security and justice development best practice advocates that these aims be stipulated in a state security strategy, often titled a national security strategy. But the day-to-day struggle to exist and prosper in Somalia can make short-term imperatives far more important to Somalis than clear long-term goals. Western advisors have sometimes pressed the need for long-term planning upon the Somali leadership, but long-term priorities are sometimes simply not important enough. In some cases, as implied by the wording of the 2015 SEMG report, Somali military leaders may have succumbed to the widespread Somali government practice of personally embezzling funds meant for the SNA.13 It was reported to this author that former SNA chiefs, after finishing their term of office, must leave the country for their own safety, relocating abroad. If this is true, they would not be able to earn comparable salaries after they leave office. Given this situation, and knowing they will probably serve for only a short period of time, assuring their future income begins to appear a logical, if illegitimate and criminal, course of action. The essential point here is that under current conditions, individuals in government positions often do not appear to be able to plan for the long term, rather only for the day-to-day challenge of keeping their essential activities afloat. It is also important, before starting to describe the current army’s groupings, to emphasise how uncertain all the numerical estimates are. On the “demand” side, as the SEMG rightly says, SNA fighters play multiple roles, of which the two most prominent are state solder, and clan militia fighter.14 But in some units, SNA fighters also routinely misuse their authority to extort monies at checkpoints. In some cases, SNA members have acted as facilitators or fighters for al-Shabaab, or masqueraded as “al-Shabaab” in order to prey on communities for financial gain, as some of the original “sobels” did in Sierra Leone in the mid-1990s. Most of these additional roles are induced by sub-clan imperatives. Thus, an SNA fighter may have real reasons to be absent from the frontline. On the “supply” side, there are no regular roll-calls held by the Sector “12 April” units in the wider Mogadishu region except where stipends or salary are to be distributed,15 and at least in one outlying sector, in the Bay/Bakool/Gedo region, there has been continuing confusion during pay periods as to which fighters are SNA and which are part of the regional Daraawiish paramilitary. There are also numerous SNA fighters who are only “on call” freelancers; whether they show up depends on local conflict dynamics, threat levels, and payment of salaries and stipends.16 All this creates significant uncertainty about personnel numbers even for the SNA hierarchy itself. Inability for any involved party to accurately report numbers of SNA fighter represents a sticking point in further lifting of the arms embargo. Nevertheless, numbers of soldiers are a key indicator of military capability. Thus this author will make the best judgments possible, laid out below, of the number of fighters associated with each SNA unit in 2016. In most cases they err on the low-side, to avoid overestimating the strength and residual potency of any formed Somali fighting force. Those paid, especially around Mogadishu and in the Gedo-Bay-Bakool region, may be supplemented by fighters operating in or with formal units, yet not officially on pay lists. In certain cases, unique local circumstances may also allow for strengthening and reinforcement of units if significantly threatened. In 2016 the SNA divided its forces into four divisions, loosely corresponding with the AMISOM sector structure. Around Mogadishu was SNA Division “12 April” (covering 214 C. D. ROBINSON now-AMISOM Sectors 1 and 5). Forces in Division 12 consisted of six brigades, the first formed in 2009, Battalion 60 at Villa Somalia (610 fighters estimated in 2014), and the guard battalion at Villa Gashandiga, the location of the Somali Ministry of Defence (456 fighters estimated in 2014).17 There was also a logistics unit at Villa Baidoa (499 fighters estimated in 2014) and the “Xisbirga” sector headquarters battalion (376 fighters estimated in 2014). The Danab commando battalion at Baledogle was also worthy of note. It was envisaged initially as a purely multi-clan unit. The Danab battalion is intended to destroy entrenched Al-Shabaab hold-outs, in close partnership with AMISOM. A private military contractor, Bancroft Global Development, ran training at the former military airfield at Baledogle, which was seen as a relatively clan-neutral location which had had a military function for decades.18 In 2016–17, the UAE established a special forces unit for the SNA in Mogadishu, hundreds strong.19 The groupings in Division “12 April” were the most well-reported on units of the SNA. But these brigades were some distance from the coherent military formations which answer to that title elsewhere in Africa. Formally there were supposed to consist of three 450-man battalions, and, one would imagine, should be cohesive formations capable of acting with one will. Actually “battalions” can be as weak as a hundred plus, and be splintered collections of former militia acting for their own, varying reasons Table 1. Brigade 5 came under significant Al-Shabaab pressure in early July 2016, and its base was entered and infiltrated. It appears, through reporting is contradictory, that some senior SNA officers colluded with Al-Shabaab to allow the seizure of the camp. In any event, the camp was seized, with the loss of a number of vehicles, on 11 July 2016.20 The brigade’s fighters were dispersed and the brigade itself later formally disestablished. The total estimated numbers in the six brigades from the UNSC reporting in February 2014 was 6978 personnel. The sector headquarters battalion added an additional 376 (totalling 7354). The Somali Security and Justice Public Expenditure Review, estimating Table 1. Federal government brigades around Mogadishu. Brigade Location Commander (July 2014) Brigade 1 Brigade 2 Jowhar Pasta Factory, North Mogadishu Ibrahim Yusuf Nur Abdi Nur Mohamed Brigade 3 Guwariasha (Guulwadayaasha?) compound near Villa Gashandiga Brigade 4 Xoosh Brigade 5 Lanta Buur, in Lower Shabelle Brigade 6 Baledogle, Lower Shabelle Mohamed Roble Jimale “Gobale” killed 2016 Colonel Abdullah Diire Abdallahi Ali Warsame (2016) Ibrahim Adan Yarow (2012) Clan Makeup Hawiye/Abgaal Hawiye/Habar Gedir Hawiye/Habar Gedir/Ayr Battalions, strength (Feb. 2014) 4; 1393 personnel 2; 973 personnel 2; 805 personnel Hawiye/Abgaal, others Hawiye 3; 962 personnel Hawiye/Abgaal 3; 1434 personnel 3; 1411 personnel. Somali National Armed Forces, ‘Presentation In Support Of AMISOM’ 9 December 2013, slide 14. Attachment #5, SNA Sector 12, as of 5 February 2014, submitted to the Security Council in accordance with UN Security Council Resolution 2093 (2013), 6 March 2013, Para 39. “Govt denies Al shabaab in control of Lanta Buro area,” Shabelle News, March 23, 2016, accessed at http://shabellenews. com/?p=27828, March 2016. Somali Armed Forces, “Submit the list of SNA commanders,” letter to U.S. Embassy, Nairobi, 10 March 2012. The commander of Brigade 6 is drawn from this 2012 source; the current commander is not publicly available. DEFENSE & SECURITY ANALYSIS 215 Division “12 April” numbers in 2016, came down on a total figure of 6970. However, wellinformed observers emphasise that none of the figure available for Division “12 April” are very reliable; it is very hard for the counting tools available to actually capture the number of fighters reliably with the groupings on a regular basis. Fighters within the brigades have repeatedly become involved in clan warfare alongside other, non-Army militias from their own clans, targeting weaker clans in Lower and Middle Shabelle. It appeared that Habar Gedir militias may work with Brigade 3 depending on the particular situation of the minute.21 Much of the cause is conflict over land between the original clans holding the territory (such as the Biimaal), and the major Hawiye sub-clans now preeminent around Mogadishu.22 Elements of Brigade 3 have been operating as clan militias in Lower Shabelle, trying to hold onto valuable riverine land at the expense of local clans such as the Biimaal.23 The brigade aims to make profits by dominating the area’s economy, including agriculture and businesses. Credible testimony linked Brigades 1 and 3 to allegations of indiscriminate attacks by Abgaal and Habar Gedir fighters on civilians leading to killing and wounding, rape, looting and burning of villages, and extrajudicial executions. This occurred during November-December 2013 in the Jowhar area and K50/K60 in Lower Shabelle between September-December 2013.24 The SEMG reports that Habar Gedir militia were regularly supported by SNA fighters and assets in continued Lower Shabelle fighting in 2015–16.25 The SNA’s southern sector, covering the Interim Juba Administration (IJA) area, has been given the designation Division 43. However, the major forces in the sector are the IJA’s Daraawiish, under Sheikh Ahmed Islam “Madobe,” who became IJA leader in May 2013. Efforts began, through the National Commission for the Integration of the Somali Armed Forces (NCISAF) to incorporate within the SNA an agreed 2880 fighters from the IJA’s territory, with 50% to come from serving militia and IJA aligned forces, and 50% to come from nonaligned groups and new recruits.26 At the end of July 2016, Brigadier General Ismail Sahardid replaced Brig General Sid Abdulle.27 On 27 July 2015 a swearing in ceremony took place for 1517 new SNA fighters from Lower Juba and Kismayo. The NCISAF reported that multiclan battalions had been formed. Very little support or even no support was provided to this group, located at the old Kismayo Airport, in the twelve months to February 2016.28 Stipends payments figures for the final months of 2015 were 1321. By January 2016 it appeared that up to 500 had drifted away, dropping out of the integration process,29 and by mid-2016 numbers were down to approximately 850, with only 100 weapons. In January 2016 there were plans for new integration sites in Baardhere (Gedo) (after Baardhere was retaken from al-Shabaab in July 2015) and also Dobley on the border with Kenya. Both locations host clan militia numbered in the hundreds that are proxies for the Kenya Defence Forces. Colonel Abbas Ibrahim Gurey, the previous commander of the Maarehan militia at El Waaq, was appointed the military commander in the Gedo region by Madobe in early August 2015. Division 43 showed evidence of some of the most significant disparities in salary disbursement across the entire SNA in 2013–5. Despite there being no reliable SNA troops in the Sector until the July 2015 swearing in ceremony in Kismayo, SNA official sources consistently reported 3034 personnel, from Stipends Committee (December 2013), SNAF Operations Branch figures given to this author at Villa Gashandiga in July 2014, and reporting to the UN Security Council, relayed in October 2015.30 It seems quite possible that the salary payments covered by the 3034 figure have been exaggerated or even being wholesale diverted into private hands. 216 C. D. ROBINSON The SNA Division 60 corresponds with AMISOM’s Sector 3. The “Division 60” designation dates at least to the mid-1980s.31 It was reestablished on 1 July 2013. It covers Gedo, Bay, and Bakool, and is dominated by Ethiopia. Ethiopia is constantly ready to deploy further forces across the border depending upon threat levels in Somalia. From the Ethiopian incursion into Somalia in 2006, unilateral operations continued until Ethiopia joined AMISOM in January 2014. Ethiopia continued to maintain troops under national command in the area, crossing back and forth across the border according to need. While there were eight SNA battalions in the sector in May 2014, “the most in one battalion is probably 250 and the least is about 150.”32 This is because two battalions of different clans cannot be amalgamated as yet into a mixed-clan battalion. This parallels British Special Air Service experience with the Omani firqat during the Dhofar war of the 1970s.33 There are indications that some army personnel, especially in Baidoa, may be Ethiopian, or Ethiopian-speaking Somalis.34 This author was told of three brigades, at Garbaharrey (Brigade 9, about 950 personnel, mostly made up of the Darod (Marehan), and Rahanweyen), Baidoa (Brigade 7, possibly 1200, probably Rahanweyen),35 and at Huddur (Brigade 8, of about 700–800 personnel, Rahanweyen, though with Auliyahan (Ogadeen) representation) in July 2014. The brigade at Garbaharrey appears to have originated from a U.S.-funded pilot programme to build up the SNA that was originally launched in the second half of 2012.36 The State Department chose Gedo as the pilot region over the advice of SNA HQ. Some 610 Sufi ASWJ and 875 Marehan Barre-era SNA were regularised into units from a planned 1500. The U.S. initially funded stipends; uniforms and boots; food and water; medical supplies; and radios and vehicles. The programme did not go well enough to be expanded to the initially proposed total of 6000 troops across multiple regions. By 2016 the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) was paying SNA fighters in the Division 60 area. Fighters are supposed to receive $100/month, but often payments are delayed, and on occasion $200 after a two-month period has been disbursed.37 In late March 2016, a FCO pay run was carried out, which paid 3040 people attributed as SNA in ten different locations.38 These ten locations’ forces remained reporting to the Brigades 7, 8, and 9. With two exceptions, in localities where 71 and 147 people were paid, numbers ranged from 215 to 350. In both Bardhere and Xuddur, 350 people were paid (totalling 700 in these two towns). These ten locations resemble the eight “battalions” described by the Ethiopians in 2014, and Carstens’s descriptions of village militias.39 They cannot be moved a great distance from their home locations, and during the March 2016 pay run, there was some difficulty trying to identify which were SNA and which were regional Daraawish. Confusion over whose personnel are loyal to who mirrors the situation to the north in Sector 21 (4), though the situation there is worse. While the FCO are paying SNA stipends in Sector 60, the Ethiopians and the Interim Southwest Administration were paying the regional Daraawiish (which later became the South West State – Special Police Force (SWS-SPF)), who have more legitimacy than the SNA there. The SNA commander in Sector 60, General Ibrahim Yarrow,40 controlled who is listed as SNA, and is thus eligible for payment. The SNA’s Division 21, covering Hiraan and Galgaduud, corresponds to the AMISOM Sector 4. Abdifatah Hussein Afrah’s Hawiye/Hawadle Shabelle Valley State group seized Beletweyne in December 2011. He then divided his militias, part becoming police but the other part destined to form the SNA in the region. Troops from Djibouti arrived in DEFENSE & SECURITY ANALYSIS 217 Hiraan Region in June 2012. After Djibouti trained two battalions of militia, Brigade 10, with its headquarters at Beletweyne, was created in December 2012. Under Colonel Tawane Ahmed Gurey, Brigade 10 had a claimed strength of three battalions, each of around 300 personnel, in 2014. Many of these were probably part-time “freelancers.” The original SNA formation in the region was Division 21. Division 21 was first formed in the 1970s, and upgraded to a sector or corps, and by the late 1980s was controlling several weak divisions.41 It dissolved amid the fighting of the Hawiye-led United Somali Congress rebellion in 1989–1991. On 30 August 2013, Division 21 was re-established at Dhuusamarreb, under the command of Colonel Sulub Ahmed Dirie. The division’s primary task was to reintegrate the Ahlu Sunna Waljama’a (ASWJ) Sufi militia in Galgaduud into the army. In early 2014, ASWJ refused further integration, and the division shrank to the relatively inactive Brigade 11 of under 700 personnel.42 In June 2015 ASWJ took over Dhuusamareb.43 The brigade’s fighters took refuge in Adado, just over a hundred kilometers to the north-east. There were reports of fighting in Adado in August 2016 between Somali military personnel over lack of pay.44 By mid-2016, however, the UAE was paying a total of 2918 personnel, at Beledweyne, Ceel Buur, and Adado. It is important however to treat the 2918 figure with extreme care, as no one really knew at the time which armed people were SNA, which were “Galmudug” forces, and which were regional militias. For example, Awale Qeybdiid, at that time president of Galmudug, maintained his own militias. Yet they may act as SNA one day, “Galmudug” the next day, “police” the next day, and back to Qeybdiid’s side the next. From mid-2015 Puntland and then Galgaduud both offered 3000 fighters each (a total of 6000) to the federal army. By December 2016 no effective action had been taken on either offer. However, the United Nations was seeking a method to support the fighters, as advisors were conscious that both regions faced threats from Al-Shabaab themselves. Across the four SNA division areas, the total number either paid or on hand appeared to be approximately 13,000. With Division “12 April” (AMISOM Sectors 1 and 5) numbering maybe 5970 approximately, Division 43 (2) approximately 850, Division 60 (3) approximately 3040, and Division 21 (4) approximately 2918, the total from the various 2016 pay and strength estimates was 12,778.45 This number can only be treated as a guide; the SEMG rightly says that no actor, including SNA officials, can give a precise strength figure. The pastiche of former militias – unreliable armed men – patchily pasted together with elderly officers from the Barre era, remains split, with a variety of divided loyalties. So what did this all mean in military-strategic terms? It means that the Federal Government has no reliable sword to control or pacify the country, and that in many cases, influencing significant areas is beyond its grasp. Much of the countryside is effectively under al-Shabaab control. It showed the failure of much international aid directed at Somali security institutions, and it meant that major Western powers such as the U.S. and UK have made little progress, despite significant efforts, to stabilise the country. In political terms, it emphasised the importance of regional centres of power in southern Somalia, along with the FMS formation process. Reestablishing the state’s monopoly of violence in the long run will have to be a collective effort, rather than just something that Mogadishu can do alone. The army’s future did not appear bright in 2016. All the army’s units, in common with virtually all other armed groupings in southern Somalia, remained very vulnerable to 218 C. D. ROBINSON pressure from their home sub-clans who had provided the vast majority of their fighters. Sub-clan pressure has had a crippling effect on military cohesion. Units would have severe trouble operating away from the home areas of their sub-clans. Scarcity and large-scale diversion of resources also presents a major challenge. Together these issues mean that the fighters of Division “12 April” around Mogadishu were frequently more of a threat to security than a provider of it. Careful disarmament, demobilisation, and reintegration remains important. If the resources were made available to create tailored, real, alternative livelihoods, it remains possible to extricate SNA fighters from the sub-clan imperatives that bind them to their destructive, destabilising behaviour. But in late 2016 no individualised programme of this nature had even been formulated, let alone properly considered.46 The regional paramilitary Daraawiish have more potential to fight al-Shabaab, in both South West State and in Jubaland, because of their closer links to their regions and their resultant higher legitimacy. If one skips forward for a moment to briefly cover political developments in 2017, new signs of hope did initially become apparent. These were visible in the agreement on the national security architecture, released as part of the London Conference conclusions of mid-May 2017. The agreement, made in Mogadishu originally on 16 April 2017, was refreshingly realistic.47 A real partnership was required between the FMS and the central government to gain control over the countryside and to carry the war properly to regions that al-Shabaab still holds. It was clear that Puntland and Galmadug forces had a real chance of integration, but much more importantly, that the Federal Government had accepted that a centralised model was impractical and that the FMS Presidents and their security departments (including their Daraawiish) had to be given real input into security forces’ operations in their areas. The regional security councils, headed by the FMS Presidents, were to “enforce implementation,” and gain “operational control responsibilities” for operations against major internal threats. The deadlines for reorganising the fighting forces were unrealistic. Initially, the National Security Council agreed to establish a technical committee to consolidate the various FMS and central forces together. However, the continual disagreements between the FMSs themselves and between the FMSs and the centre, mean the integration process moved into limbo. The NSC first met with the FMSs on 5–10 July 2017. For a period in early October 2017, the FMSs suspended cooperation with the Federal Government. A major political and security consultative meeting in Mogadishu then took place in October-November, in which all parties took part,48 and the NSC met again with the inclusion of the FMSs in early December 2017. On 6 December 2017, the UN Security Council emphasised the importance of “implementing the National Security Architecture fully and without delay.”49 A January 2018 statement strengthened their views, stressing the need to accelerate implementation of the integration process.50 The Security Council was clearly keen that the reorganisation and consolidation of the forces actually began to move forward. An Operational Readiness Assessment was also launched in late 2017 to gage the status of the various SNA groupings, with significant foreign advisor input. Resulting opinions were not complementary to the SNA. But with political agreement between the various southern Somali governments dependent on the issues of the hour, progress may appear slow. Politics remains the key factor in counter-insurgency campaigns. DEFENSE & SECURITY ANALYSIS 219 *IRIN. ‘Shortages, clan rivalries weaken Somalia’s new army,’ May 28, 2014. http:// www.irinnews.org/report/100141/shortages-clan-rivalries-weaken-somalia-s-new-army (accessed June 2014). Notes 1. See Erwin Van Veen, ed., Improving Security and Justice Programming in Fragile Situations: Better Political Engagement, More Change Management, No. 3, (OECD Publishing, March 2016), and Mark Sedra, Security Sector Reform in Conflict-Affected Countries: The Evolution of a Model (London: Routledge, 2016), 285, for a discussion on how alternative labels for SSR were not just semantics. 2. Sedra, Security Sector Reform in Conflict-Affected Countries. 3. Bagayoko, Niagale, Eboe Hutchful, and Robin Luckham. ‘Hybrid Security Governance in Africa: Rethinking the Foundations of Security, Justice and Legitimate Public Authority’, Conflict, Security and Development 16, no. 1 (January 2016). 4. Colin Robinson, ‘Revisiting the Rise and Fall of the Somali Armed Forces 1960–2012’, Defense and Security Analysis 32, no. 3 (2016). 5. International Crisis Group, Somalia: To Move Beyond the Failed State, Africa Report No. 147, 23 December 2008, p.9 6. Confidential source, October 2011. 7. Alice Hills, ‘Security Sector or Security Arena? The Evidence from Somalia’, International Peacekeeping 21, no. 2 (2014): 173. 8. IRIN, “Analysis: Somali security sector reform”, 13 May 2013, http://www.irinnews.org/ report/98028/analysis-somali-security-sector-reform (accessed January 2016). 9. The Daraawiish term has its modern origin in the mobile element of the Somali Police Force from 1960. It usually now denotes armed groupings (usually former clan or village militias) under FMS authority. While often described as police, there is often little distinction in role or equipment in much of southern Somalia, beyond Mogadishu, between police and military forces. An exception is the DfID-funded Re-establishing Basic Policing in Somalia Programme (RBPP) underway since June 2014 in Baidoa and Kismayo, which is building toward a police force of 600 in both towns. See documents accessible via Re-establishing basic policing in Somalia [GB-1-204276], accessible via https://devtracker.dfid.gov.uk/ projects/GB-1-204276/documents (accessed July 2, 017). 10. Confidential source, interview Nairobi, 7 August 2014. 11. Rule of Law and Security Institutions Group. ‘Review of Priorities for Training the Somalia Armed Forces,’ United Nations Assistance Mission in Somalia, July 2013. 12. Confidential sources, corroborated by International Crisis Group, ‘Somalia: To Move Beyond the Failed State.’ Africa Report No. 147, 23 December 2008, 9. 13. United Nations, Report of the Somalia and Eritrea Monitoring Group (S/2015/801), 24. 14. United Nations, Report of the Somalia and Eritrea Monitoring Group (S/2016/919), Appendix 7.5, p.161. 15. Ibid., Appendix 2.1, p.74. 16. Ibid., 74. 17. Attachment #4, SNA General Structure, as of 5 February 2014, submitted to the Security Council in accordance with UN Security Council Resolution 2093 (2013), 6 March 2013, Para 39. The strengths and weaknesses of this mechanism are well explained in Report of the Monitoring Group (S/2016/919), Appendix 8.1, 180–183. 18. U.S. State Department official, Somalia Unit, interview Nairobi, 24 July 2014. 19. Some further details have now become publicly available. See International Crisis Group, A Dangerous Gulf in the Horn: How the Inter-Arab Crisis is Fuelling Regional Tensions, 3 August 2017, https://www.crisisgroup.org/middle-east-north-africa/gulf-and-arabian-peni nsula/dangerous-gulf-horn-how-inter-arab-crisis-fuelling-regional-tensions (accessed 220 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29. 30. 31. 32. 33. 34. 35. 36. 37. 38. 39. 40. 41. 42. 43. C. D. ROBINSON January 2018). The training programme was suspended following a very public split between the UAE and the FGS in April 2018. Interviews in Nairobi and contacts in Mogadishu, late 2018. United Nations source, interview, Nairobi, August 2014. Wayne Fulton and Muktar Mohamed. ‘Somalia: Perpetuation of the Labeled Failed State,’ AFRICOM Knowledge Development Newsletter, II, no. 11, November 2013, 10. U.S. academic e-mail, 27 June 2014, and United Nations source, Nairobi, August 2014. These seizures of land from rival lineages have many historical antecedents: see Ken Menkhaus, “Calm Between the Storms? Patterns of Political Violence in Somalia, 1950–1980”, Journal of Eastern African Studies 8, no. 4 (November 2014), 561. United Nations, 2014. Letter dated 6 February 2014 to the Chair of the 751/1907 Sanctions Committee, S/AC.29/2014/COMM.13, 6, and Report of the Somalia and Eritrea Monitoring Group (S/2014/726), 31. United Nations, Report of the Somalia and Eritrea Monitoring Group (S/2016/919), 160–161. United Nations, Report of the Somalia and Eritrea Monitoring Group (S/2015/801), 280, para 75. United Nations, Report of the Somalia and Eritrea Monitoring Group (S/2016/919), 181, footnote 511. Information regarding lack of support is from consultation with well-informed observers in East Africa, March 2016. UNSOM military advisor, telephone call 17 January 2016, and e-mail 21 January 2016. United Nations, Report of the Somalia and Eritrea Monitoring Group (S/2015/801). Defense Intelligence Agency, Military Intelligence Summary, Vol. IV, Part III, Africa South of the Sahara, November 1987, Somalia page 12. IRIN, ‘Shortages, Clan Rivalries Weaken Somalia’s New Army’, May 28, 2014. http://www. irinnews.org/report/100141/shortages-clan-rivalries-weaken-somalia-s-new-army (accessed June 2014). Ken Connor, Ghost Force: The Secret History of the SAS (London: Orion Books Ltd, 1998), 241. Stig Hansen, Al-Shabaab in Somalia: The History and Ideology of a Militant Islamic Group, 2005–2012 (London: Hurst and Company, 2013), 69; Bronwyn E. Bruton and Paul D. Williams, ‘Counterinsurgency in Somalia: Lessons Learned from the African Union Mission in Somalia, 2007–2013,’ (Joint Special Operations University Report 14-5, September 2014), 94; and a confidential source. Somali National Army officer, interview, 28 July 2014 (27, 28). Senior Military Advisor UNPOS, “Update to CDF’s Coordination Committee (CCC) Members 28 August 2012,” pp. 2, 13-14. Consultation with well-informed observers, 4 March 2016. Consultation with well-informed observers, 24 March 2016. Roger Carstens, ‘Analogue War’, ForeignPolicy.com, October 7, 2013 http://foreignpolicy. com/2013/10/07/analog-war/ (accessed January 2016). Yarow was for a period in 2015–16 replaced as Division 60 commander by General Bile Ibrahim Adan, and for that period served as chief of intelligence, SNAF, Mogadishu. Yarow’s reappointment has improved matters in the division area. Bile was transferred back to Monrovia as chief of finance ‘to manipulate the lists and play the wider salaries/stipends/rations game.’ Confidential sources, May and October 2016. Defense Intelligence Agency, Military Intelligence Summary, Volume IV, Part III, Africa South of the Sahara, November 1987, 12. See Attachment #6, SNA Structure – Sector 21, as of 5 February 2014, submitted to the Security Council in accordance with UN Security Council Resolution 2093 (2013), 6 March 2013, Para 39. A. Abdirahman, ‘Somalia: Moderate Islamist Rebels Seize Control of Central town’, Horseed Media, June 7, 2015 https://horseedmedia.net/2015/06/07/somalia-moderate-islamist-rebelsseize-control-of-central-town/ DEFENSE & SECURITY ANALYSIS 221 44. Shabelle Media Network (Mogadishu), Somalia: Four Killed as Army Forces Exchange Gunfire in Adado, August 14, 2016, http://allafrica.com/stories/201608140382.html (accessed May 31, 2017). 45. The Sectors 1 and 5 figures are drawn from the 2016 SJPER estimate, with 1,000 deducted after the disappearance of Brigade 5; the Sector 2 figure is a mid-2016 estimate of the number of fighters remaining at the Kismayo University site, from a confidential source; the Sector 3 figure is the FCO early 2016 pay-run figure referred to above (paid fighters); the Sector 4 figure is from a confidential source with knowledge of UAE payments in mid-2016 (paid fighters). The SNA also pays orphans; 3052 were paid in December 2015. 46. Such a program might have parallels with then-Land Mine Action’s tailored program for rehabilitating former Liberian civil war fighters after 2003. See International Crisis Group. ‘Liberia: Uneven Progress in Security Sector Reform.’ Africa Report No. 148, 13 February 2009, annexes. 47. London Somalia Conference 2017: Security Pact, 5-7. https://www.gov.uk/government/ publications/london-somalia-conference-2017-security-pact (accessed July 6, 2017). 48. Report of the Secretary-General on Somalia, December 26, 2017, S/2017/1109, United Nations, reissued January 9, 2018, p. 2. 49. Security Council Press Statement on Somalia Security Conference, Inaugural Somalia Partnership Forum, December 6, 2017 https://www.un.org/press/en/2017/sc13104.doc.htm (accessed January 2018). 50. Security Council Press Statement on Somalia, SC/13181, January 25, 2018. Disclosure statement No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author. Notes on contributor Dr Colin D. Robinson has worked in Timor Leste, Liberia, Georgia, and in Somalia, as well as in London and Washington, DC. He gained his doctorate from Cranfield University in 2012.