Team Infidel
Forum Spin Doctor
This is pretty cool
New York Post
January 15, 2007
By Niles Lathem, Post Correspondent
WASHINGTON — A controversial U.S. general and a Somalian warlord whose father was responsible for the infamous “Black Hawk Down” violence in 1993 are now allies in the war against al Qaeda-connected fanatics in East Africa.
In an extraordinary set of circumstances, Lt. Gen. William Boykin, deputy undersecretary of defense, and warlord Hussein Farah Aidid, have been intimately involved in covert operations on the Horn of Africa that resulted in the rout of Islamic fanatics from Somalia earlier this month.
Boykin, who set up the current Somalia operation, commanded the Delta Force unit that lost 18 men in the notorious “Black Hawk Down” incident.
Aidid is the son of Mohammed Farah Aidid, whose 4,000-member militia battled U.S. troops and dragged the bodies of two U.S. soldiers through the streets of Mogadishu.
Boykin — who once got into trouble for making disparaging remarks about Muslims — was wounded during the 1993 clashes.
Hussein Aidid was a Marine reservist in the Gulf War. But he assumed control of his father’s militia after the elder Aidid died in a 1996 gun battle and praised those who fought U.S. soldiers and desecrated their bodies.
But Aidid is now interior minister of the U.S.-backed Transitional Somali Government, which took power in the wake of this month’s Ethiopian rout of the Islamic Courts, the al Qaeda-connected group that tried to establish a Taliban-style government in Somalia.
Intelligence sources told The Post that Aidid’s powerful Habr Gedir clan has received covert funding and support from the United States for several months.
New York Post
January 15, 2007
By Niles Lathem, Post Correspondent
WASHINGTON — A controversial U.S. general and a Somalian warlord whose father was responsible for the infamous “Black Hawk Down” violence in 1993 are now allies in the war against al Qaeda-connected fanatics in East Africa.
In an extraordinary set of circumstances, Lt. Gen. William Boykin, deputy undersecretary of defense, and warlord Hussein Farah Aidid, have been intimately involved in covert operations on the Horn of Africa that resulted in the rout of Islamic fanatics from Somalia earlier this month.
Boykin, who set up the current Somalia operation, commanded the Delta Force unit that lost 18 men in the notorious “Black Hawk Down” incident.
Aidid is the son of Mohammed Farah Aidid, whose 4,000-member militia battled U.S. troops and dragged the bodies of two U.S. soldiers through the streets of Mogadishu.
Boykin — who once got into trouble for making disparaging remarks about Muslims — was wounded during the 1993 clashes.
Hussein Aidid was a Marine reservist in the Gulf War. But he assumed control of his father’s militia after the elder Aidid died in a 1996 gun battle and praised those who fought U.S. soldiers and desecrated their bodies.
But Aidid is now interior minister of the U.S.-backed Transitional Somali Government, which took power in the wake of this month’s Ethiopian rout of the Islamic Courts, the al Qaeda-connected group that tried to establish a Taliban-style government in Somalia.
Intelligence sources told The Post that Aidid’s powerful Habr Gedir clan has received covert funding and support from the United States for several months.