Saving Somalia

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But nailing terrorists is one thing; building a nation where none exists is another. "We are starting from scratch," the head of Somalia's new government, Prime Minister Ali Mohammed Gedi, told me in an interview in Mogadishu. Given Somalia's penchant for clan warfare and inhospitableness toward foreign armies--just go out and rent a copy of Black Hawk Down--it's tempting for Western policymakers to wash their hands and wish Gedi luck. But Somalia's strife has repercussions beyond its borders. The country is victim to the worst ravages of man and nature. Instability there has the potential to engulf the entire Horn of Africa in war, with neighboring countries Ethiopia and Eritrea jockeying for influence and pirates using the lawless coast as a base to launch attacks on the freighter traffic headed for the Suez Canal. Some of the Islamists have vowed a guerrilla war against the new government, which they deride as a puppet of Ethiopia and the U.S. On top of all that, a double disaster of summer drought followed by December floods has left more than 500,000 Somalis dependent on foreign aid for their livelihoods.

If any government is to succeed, it's going to need help. During my seven-day stay in Mogadishu this month, I caught a glimpse of the country's dysfunction. Somalia has atomized into its ancient form--a collection of hundreds of clans. Taxation has been replaced by protection rackets ranging from clan gangsters who collect weekly "rent" to garbage collectors who dump rubbish in a street and demand money to remove it.

Most Somalis have grown accustomed to such anarchic conditions. But what's ironic is that before the Islamists were expelled by the Ethiopians, they had managed to impose a semblance of law and order on the capital. During its six-month tenure, the Islamic Courts Union (I.C.U.), an alliance run by Muslim clerics and several warlords, with the backing of key clans, had lifted roadblocks and cracked down on crime. Even Gedi admits that the I.C.U.'s restoration of security "attracted the support of the people."

Many Somalis fear that when the Ethiopians kicked out the Islamic Courts, they threw out any hope of security too. The new government counts several warlords in its ranks, and their rivals are rearming. I visited one, Mohamed Qanyere, at a villa on the southern outskirts of Mogadishu. In the forecourt were parked a collection of artillery and pickups mounted with heavy-caliber machine guns. Qanyere claimed to have 1,500 men. Asked about a government decree ordering national disarmament, he scoffed, "If you have two people and you take a weapon from one and I keep mine, what will happen? I will kill you."