Since the mid-2000s, the United States has provided military support to the Ethiopian National Defence Force, African Union troops, the Somali Transitional Federal Government (TFG) and its successor, the Federal Government of Somalia (FGS), in their conflicts with Somali Islamist non-state actors.
U.S. military involvement in Somalia dates back to the 1990s with the UNITAF and UNOSOM II operations. With the global war on terror in the early 2000s, renewed U.S. military action was framed as counterterrorism. Successive administrations under George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Donald Trump, and Joe Biden have conducted airstrikes, special forces missions, intelligence operations, and training programs against Islamist groups in the country.
In the early 2000s, the Islamic Courts Union (ICU) emerged as a major political and military force, becoming the de facto government over much of southern Somalia by mid-2006 after defeating a CIA-backed coalition of warlords. The U.S. backed the Ethiopian invasion of Somalia aimed at regime change against the ICU and installing the weak Ethiopian backed Transitional Federal Government in its place. U.S. aircraft, special forces and intelligence assets were covertly deployed in support of Ethiopian troops advancing on Mogadishu in 2006. Following the overthrow of the ICU government, an Islamist insurgency emerged in 2007 and brought the Ethiopian military occupation to an end in early 2009, during which the al-Shabaab evolved into a powerful insurgent actor.
U.S. support for the Ethiopian invasion resulted in the growth of an intense anti-American sentiment. The war had significantly increased popular hostility to both the United States and Ethiopia, while strengthening the Islamic movements' most radical elements. By the US military's own assessment, the war had been poorly prosecuted. American forces have been engaged in counterinsurgency operations against the al-Shabaab throughout the present post-Ethiopian occupation phase of the Somali Civil War (2009–present).
In late 2020, President Donald Trump announced the withdrawal of most US troops from Somalia. In May 2022, President Joe Biden redeployed US soldiers. The Somali government has asked for U.S. involvement support on numerous occasions in recent years. The United States Army stationed in Puntland's Bari region are currently supporting the ongoing anti-ISIS campaign. During 2025 the Trump administration drastically escalated the number of airstrikes.
Amnesty International concluded that the actual number of U.S. airstrikes conducted in Somalia exceeded officially reported figures, and that AFRICOM has repeatedly misclassified Somali civilians killed in these strikes as "terrorists".
Background Since 2007, the United States Africa Command has targeted Islamist groups, mainly al-Shabaab, within Somalia using airstrikes and special forces operations. These have included targeted drone strikes and United States Navy missile strikes. Special forces teams have conducted raids and acted as advisors.
Ethiopian invasion of Somalia (2006)
The rise of the Islamic Courts Union (ICU) during the early 2000s, along with the growing insurgency in the Ogaden waged by the Ogaden National Liberation Front, raised Ethiopian concerns of an eventual renewed drive for Somali unification. A strong Somali state not dependent on Addis Ababa was perceived as a security threat, and consequently the Ethiopian government heavily backed the formation of the Transitional Federal Government (TFG) in 2004 on the grounds that it would give up Somalia's long standing claim to the Ogaden.
During the early years of the war on terror, the U.S. government perceived the rise of an Islamic movement in Somalia as a potential terror risk. From 2003 onwards, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) initiated covert operations against the Islamic Courts Union, aiming to depose them from power. After taking over Mogadishu from warlords in 2006, the ICU leadership sent a cable to Washington stating that they were not a "Taliban-type" movement and had no interest in being enemies with the United States.
Channel 4 acquired a leaked document detailing a confidential meeting between senior American and Ethiopian officials in Addis Ababa six months prior to the full scale December 2006 invasion. Participants deliberated on various scenarios, with the 'worst-case scenario' being the potential takeover of Somalia by the Islamic Courts Union. The documents revealed that the US found the prospect unacceptable and would back Ethiopia in the event of an ICU takeover. Journalist Jon Snow reported that during the meeting ‘the blueprint for a very American supported Ethiopian invasion of Somalia was hatched’. No Somali officials were involved in the discussions.
Before the invasion, United States Assistant Secretary of State issued a statement openly accusing the ICU leadership of being members of Al-Qaeda. Herman Cohen, the US Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, noted the US decision making had been influenced by false Ethiopian intelligence. According to Ted Dagne, an Africa specialist for the US Congressional Research Service, the Islamic Courts had committed no act or provocation to initiate the Ethiopian invasion. American historian William R. Polk observes that the invasion had been unprovoked.Approximately 50,000 to 60,000 Ethiopian National Defence Force (ENDF) troops backed by tanks, helicopter gunships and jets had been involved in the offensive against the Islamic Courts Union during December 2006. During the invasion phase of the war, US Special Forces, CIA paramilitary units, and Marine units, supported by American AC-130s and helicopter gunships, directly intervened in support of the ENDF. The US Bush administration doubted Ethiopia's ability to effectively use new equipment it had provided for the invasion. As a result, it decided to involve US Special Forces and CIA agents in the campaign. Pentagon officials and intelligence analysts reported that the invasion had been planned during the summer of 2006 and that US special forces were on the ground before the Ethiopians had intervened.
The participation of the US ground and air forces provided the ENDF with massive military superiority over the ICU. Ali Gedi, then prime minister of the TFG and a participant in planning for the invasion noted that, “The Ethiopians were not able to come in without the support of the US Government...American air forces were supporting us." In an interview with Al-Jazeera, head of the Islamic Courts Sharif Sheikh Ahmed later reported that after achieving a string of battlefield victories, ICU troops had come under unexpected bombardment from US aircraft. US operations during the invasion took place in a media vacuum, with no images or footage appearing of American forces.
Ethiopian military occupation (2007–2009) During January 2007, American gunships, including helicopters and the AC-130, flew out of Dire Dawa and Diego Garcia to provide air support for Ethiopian troops. The USS Dwight D. Eisenhower carrier battlegroup (Carrier Strike Group Eight) was dispatched to the Somali coast to provide further air support and aerial surveillance. US Special forces and CIA paramilitary units also participated.
As the Islamic Courts Union withdrew deep into southern Somalia US Lockheed AC-130 gunships covertly flying out of Ethiopia struck ICU convoys. American forces reportedly killed hundreds of Somali fighters and civilians in a 'killing zone' between the Kenyan border, the Indian Ocean and advancing US backed Ethiopian troops. US airstrikes focused on decapitating the ICU leadership, in one instance killing Sheikh Abdullahi Nahar, a popular leader of the movement. Cruise missiles were fired at ICU positions on 8 January 2007. Local residents in the Afmadow district of southern Somalia reported witnessing AC-130's pursuing and killing ICU troops. In one airstrike carried out by an AC-130 gunship operating from an airbase in eastern Ethiopia, US forces targeted the ICU governor of Jubbaland, Ahmed Madobe. Madobe survived the airstrike but was later captured by American and Ethiopian forces who landed by helicopter. American air power was used against villages in southern Somalia, resulting in significant civilian casualties and displacement. In one attack seventy-three nomadic herders and their livestock were killed in a US air strike and in another, US aircraft bombed a wedding ceremony.
The United States admitted to conducting a strike against targets that they claimed were suspected Al-Qaeda operatives. An admission to a second air attack was made later in January. The Pentagon's announcement of air attacks in Somalia during the Ethiopian offensive confirmed the belief of many analysts that the US was involved in the invasion. Initially, the US claimed that it had successfully targeted Al-Qaeda operatives responsible for the 1998 embassy bombings, but later downgraded those who had been killed in the attacks as being 'associates with terrorists' instead. United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon publicly expressed concern that the American attacks would escalate the conflict. After American involvement in the invasion became public knowledge, the Ethiopian government halted US AC-130 attacks from its military bases.
US airstrikes during the invasion failed at getting any Al-Qaeda operatives alleged to be present, instead killing civilians and Islamic fighters who had never been accused of any crime. Richard Cornwell, a senior research fellow at the Institute for Security Studies in Pretoria criticized the American airstrikes on the grounds that it was "highly hypocritical" to launch attacks on alleged terrorists regardless of Somali civilian casualties.
Rise of Al-Shabaab In March 2007, a White House study found that "despite the ouster" of the Islamic Court Union, Somalia was a growing regional security threat and "safe haven for terrorists". As a result of the US supported invasion, Al-Shabaab morphed from a fringe movement to a serious insurgent force. Many Islamic Courts Union affiliates had been killed during the invasion, leaving a vacuum for the small group of several hundred youth that served as the ICU's Shabaab militia to gain prominence. During the military occupation, Al-Shabaab garnered substantial support from the Somali population, cutting across clan lines. The Ethiopian invasion was the group's primary catalyst for mobilization among the population. Despite its strict ideology, the group was widely perceived as a genuine resistance force against Ethiopian occupation by many Somalis, and while not universally popular, it was widely acknowledged for its effective training and formidable capabilities in pushing out Ethiopian troops. Heavy handed tactics and blatant disregard for civilian life by Ethiopian troops rallied many Somalis to support the Al-Shabaab as it successfully branded itself as the most determined and uncompromising resistance faction.
A sharp increase in radical recruitment in Somali diaspora in Europe and the United States since 2007 has been linked with the overthrow of the ICU and the Ethiopian military occupation. This later resulted in the first ever American suicide bomber carrying out an attack in Somalia during October 2008.
During June 2007, the USS Chafee fired a dozen rounds and possibly one cruise missile at the coast of Bargal, in northern Somalia. The strikes targeted 35 militants that had landed on the coast and had begun to fire on local forces. U.S. officials told The New York Times that U.S. operatives were on the ground, leading to the American warship firing in self-defense. Eight to twelve militants, including foreign fighters, were killed.
2008