The U.S. government has conducted two “self-defense” airstrikes in southern Somalia because of an “imminent threat” against American troops in the East African country, Pentagon spokesman Capt. Jeff Davis told reporters Tuesday.
The airstrikes happened late Monday evening and early Tuesday morning against an Al-Shabaab camp north of the town of Kismayo in southern Somalia, according to a U.S. defense official.
Further details about the strikes weren’t immediately available.
The U.S. military has been helping Somali government and African Union forces battle Al-Shabaab, an al Qaeda-affiliated militant group that has been waging an insurgency in Somalia for about 10 years with the aim of turning the country into a fundamentalist Islamic state.
The Islamist extremist group hasn’t confined its terror or ambitions to Somalia, as evidenced by other horrific attacks like last year’s massacre at Kenya’s Garissa University College and a 2013 siege of Nairobi’s upscale Westgate Mall.
Last month, U.S. special operations forces and Somali commandos killed at least one senior Al-Shabaab leader and captured an undisclosed number of high-value Al-Shabaab figures during a joint nighttime raid on one of the terror group’s camps, the Somali government said.
