Remember When?

As we see the anti-Ethiopian Islamist insurgency in Somalia continue to pick up steam, even prompting Ethiopian troops to deploy the legendarily successful counterinsurgency tactic of “return[ing] fire with artillery and heavy machine-gun fire throughout the night,” can we ask once again what the United States policy in the Horn of Africa has accomplished. None of the terrorists allegedly being harbored by the Islamic Courts Movement have been captured. The Ethiopians cannot (of course) effectively control the country. It seems that hundreds of Somali civilians have died in various kinds of fighting. And we’ve effectively opened up another branch campus of Jihad University.