The Mogadishu Line is the point at which foreign involvement in a conflict shifts from peacekeeping or diplomacy to combat operations. [1] The term often comes about in reference to the reluctance of international actors to intervene militarily in another state for humanitarian reasons. This reluctance comes about from fears that meaningful political changes may not be achievable without military actions, but that the military actions would be at odds with the diplomatic or humanitarian purposes and may become a bloody debacle. [2]
The term was a reference to the external intervention in the Somali Civil War in which several opposing factions engaged in a struggle to seize control of Somalia. In April 1992, calls for action by UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali prompted the UN Security Council to approve the commencement of humanitarian operations into Somalia, which initially involved a small contingent of UN-approved troops (UNOSOM), followed in December by a US-dominated military force UNITAF. However, these humanitarian and nation-building efforts were stymied by the nation's various clans refusing to share power and the violent clashes which ensued.
In March 1993, the UN Security Council authorized a new mission, UNOSOM II, which was endowed with enforcement powers under Chapter VII of the UN Charter to establish a secure environment throughout Somalia. However, operations turned sour after the Battle of Mogadishu on October 3, 1993, when US forces attempted to launch an attack on the Olympic Hotel in search of Mohamed Farrah Aidid. [3] The subsequent combat resulted in the deaths of 18 US soldiers and a further 83 casualties. After the battle, the bodies of several US casualties of the conflict were dragged through the streets of Mogadishu by crowds of local civilians and members of Aidid's Somali National Alliance.
After the disastrous battle, pressure immediately built for a withdrawal of US troops. US President Bill Clinton said in a few days later that "our mission from this day forward is to increase our strength, do our job, bring our soldiers out and bring them home." He announced that troops would be withdrawn by mid-1994. [4]
The concept of the Mogadishu Line became ingrained in international relations discourse after the Cold War. Fear of a repeat of the events in Somalia shaped US policy in subsequent years, with many commentators identifying the graphic consequences of the Battle of Mogadishu as the key reason behind the US failure to intervene in later conflicts such as the 1994 Rwandan Genocide. [5] According to the former US deputy special envoy to Somalia, Walter Clarke, "The ghosts of Somalia continue to haunt US policy. Our lack of response in Rwanda was a fear of getting involved in something like a Somalia all over again." [4]
Clinton also refused to mobilize US ground troops in fighting the Bosnian Serb Army in Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1995 and the Yugoslav Army in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (specifically, the province of Kosovo) in 1999.
In the 1990s, General Michael Rose, the head of the United Nations Protection Force, insisted that the United Nations would never "cross the Mogadishu Line." [1] However, his replacement, Rupert Smith, came to the conclusion that the Protection Force's humanitarian mandate was insufficient.
In 2003, Keane stated that changes in US policy toward Liberia suggested that the Mogadishu Line had been "erased." [5]
Mohamed Farrah Hassan Aidid was a Somali general and diplomat. Educated in both Rome and Moscow, he served as a chief in the Italian colonial police force and later as a brigadier general in the Somali National Army. He would eventually became chairman of the United Somali Congress (USC), and soon after the Somali National Alliance (SNA). Along with other armed opposition groups, he succeeded in toppling President Siad Barre's 22 year old regime following the outbreak of the Somali Civil War in 1991.
The Battle of Mogadishu, also known as the Black Hawk Down incident, was part of Operation Gothic Serpent. It was fought on 3–4 October 1993, in Mogadishu, Somalia, between forces of the United States—supported by UNOSOM II—against the forces of the Somali National Alliance (SNA) and citizens of south Mogadishu. The battle was part of the broader Somali Civil War that had begun in 1991. The United Nations had initially become involved to provide food aid to alleviate starvation in the south of the country, but in the months preceding the battle, had shifted the mission to establishing democracy and restoring a central government.
Black Hawk Down: A Story of Modern War is a 1999 book by journalist Mark Bowden. It documents efforts by the Unified Task Force to capture Somali faction leader Mohamed Farrah Aidid in 1993, and the resulting battle in Mogadishu between United States forces and Aidid's militia. One of the key events is the downing of two United States MH-60 Black Hawk helicopters, from which the book derives its title, and the attempt to rescue their crews. United States forces included 3rd Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment; 160th SOAR; Delta Force; 24th Special Tactics Squadron; DEVGRU Navy SEALs; 10th Mountain Division; as well as Malaysian and Pakistani United Nations peacekeeping forces.
Operation Gothic Serpent was a military operation conducted in Mogadishu, Somalia, by an American force code-named Task Force Ranger during the Somali Civil War in 1993. The primary objective of the operation was to capture Mohamed Farrah Aidid, a Somalia clan leader who was wanted by the Unified Task Force in response to his attacks against United Nations troops. The operation took place from August to October 1993 and was led by US Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC).
United Nations Operation in Somalia II was the second phase of the United Nations intervention in Somalia and took place from March 1993 until March 1995, following the outbreak of the Somali Civil War in 1991.
Operation Provide Relief was part of a United Nations-endorsed initiative called the Unified Task Force (UNITAF) to secure and facilitate the delivery of humanitarian relief during the Somali Civil War. This effort was assisted by the UNOSOM I mission, in light of a severe food crisis initiated and exacerbated by ongoing factional fighting. The operation was spearheaded by the United States and other troop-contributing Western nations. However, most of the relief supplies were looted by militants shortly upon arrival. This prompted the UN to pass Resolution 794, which paved the way for the more robust, multinational Operation Restore Hope.
The Somali Civil War is an ongoing civil war that is taking place in Somalia. It grew out of resistance to the military junta which was led by Siad Barre during the 1980s. From 1988 to 1990, the Somali Armed Forces began engaging in combat against various armed rebel groups, including the Somali Salvation Democratic Front in the northeast, the Somali National Movement in the northwest, and the United Somali Congress in the south. The clan-based armed opposition groups overthrew the Barre government in 1991.
Non-interventionism or non-intervention is a political philosophy or national foreign policy doctrine that opposes interference in the domestic politics and affairs of other countries but, in contrast to isolationism, is not necessarily opposed to international commitments in general. A 1915 definition is that non-interventionism is a policy characterized by the absence of "interference by a state or states in the external affairs of another state without its consent, or in its internal affairs with or without its consent".
The Unified Task Force (UNITAF) was a United States-led, United Nations-sanctioned multinational force which operated in Somalia from 5 December 1992 until 4 May 1993. A United States initiative, UNITAF was charged with carrying out United Nations Security Council Resolution 794 to create a protected environment for conducting humanitarian operations in the southern half of the country.
United Nations Operation in Somalia I was the first part of a United Nations (UN) sponsored effort to provide, facilitate, and secure humanitarian relief in Somalia, as well as to monitor the first UN-brokered ceasefire of the Somali Civil War conflict in the early 1990s.
Abdi Hasan Awale or Abdi Qeybdiid is a Somali politician.
The 2006 Islamic Courts Union offensive is the period in the Somali Civil War that began in May 2006 with the Islamic Courts Union's (ICU) conquest of Mogadishu from the Alliance for the Restoration of Peace and Counter-Terrorism (ARPCT) and continued with further ICU expansion in the country. Following the outbreak of the war on December 21, 2006; by December 24, direct Ethiopian intervention in the conflict in support of the Transitional Federal Government (TFG) was no longer denied by the Ethiopian government. The Eritrean government denied any involvement despite Ethiopian claims to the contrary.
United Nations Security Council resolution 837, adopted unanimously on 6 June 1993, after reaffirming resolutions 733 (1992), 746 (1992), 751 (1992), 767 (1992), 775 (1992), 794 (1992) and 814 (1993), the Council condemned the attacks on the United Nations Operation in Somalia II in which 24 Pakistani troops deployed in the Unified Task Force were killed and 56 injured, including 1 Italian and 3 American soldiers.
Presidential Decision Directive 25 (PDD-25), is an executive order issued by President of the United States Bill Clinton on May 3, 1994 following a year-long executive agency policy review and bilateral consultations among dozens of members of Congress and the executive branch.
The Somali National Alliance was a political alliance formed on 16 June 1992 by four different rebel groups that had been in opposition to the regime of Somali dictator Siad Barre. The alliance would include one of the two factions of the United Somali Congress (USC), the Somali Patriotic Movement (SPM), the Somali Southern National Movement (SSNM) and Somali Democratic Movement (SDM).
Many factions opposed to Siad Barre set aside tribal and political differences to unite in purpose to overthrow his regime. After the collapse of Siad Barre's government in 1991 the nation fell into a long period of increasingly chaotic conflict between forces of clans, militias, warlords, separatist, religious functions and rebellion movements, other nations, and even the United Nations peacekeepers.
United Nations Security Council resolution 775, adopted unanimously on 28 August 1992, after reaffirming resolutions 733 (1992), 746 (1992), 751 (1992) and 767 (1992) considering a report by the Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali on the ongoing civil war in Somalia, the Council decided to increase the strength of the United Nations Operation in Somalia I by an additional 3,000 personnel.
The Abdi House raid or Operation Michigan, better known to Somalis as Bloody Monday, was a United Nations military operation that took place in Mogadishu on 12 July, 1993, during the UNOSOM II phase of the UN intervention in the Somali Civil War. The raid, carried out by American QRF troops on behalf of UNOSOM II, was at the time the single deadliest incident in Mogadishu since the start of the war and marked a decisive turning point in the UN operation, as it inflamed anti-UN and anti-American sentiments among Somalis, which contributed immensely to the scale of resistance that the US military faced during the Battle of Mogadishu three months later.
The June 5th 1993 attack on Pakistanis was a major confrontation that occurred concurrently in different parts of the Somali capital of Mogadishu, between Somali citizens & militias against the Pakistani peacekeeping contingent of UNOSOM II. The event marked a seminal moment for the United Nations operation in Somalia. It was the deadliest loss of UN peacekeepers since the Congo in 1961 and would consequently lead to UNOSOM II being primarily characterized by the hunt for General Mohammed Farah Aidid. This would result in an escalating cycle of violence which led to the 13 June 1993 killings of Somali protestors by Pakistani troops, the 12 July 1993 Bloody Monday raid and 3-4 October 1993 Battle of Mogadishu.
On 13 June 1993, an element of the Pakistani contingent of UNOSOM II opened fire with a machine gun onto a crowd of protestors in Mogadishu, Somalia, shooting approximately 70 Somalis. At least 20 people were killed in the attack, including women and children, and more than 50 others were wounded. The shooting took place in the aftermath of the 5 June 1993 attack on the Pakistanis a week prior.
