The hurriedly convened Contact Group meeting in New York yesterday represents an effort by the State Department to piece together a new policy for dealing with Somalia after more than a decade of neglect.
Diplomats are asserting more control over Somalia policy from the CIA, on grounds that courting Somali warlords has been counter-productive.
That reality came into stark relief last week when US-backed warlords fighting a proxy war for the US against Islamists believed to be harboring al-Qaeda operatives were run out of Mogadishu, the capital, by those same Islamists.
For the US, the lawless place that spawned Black Hawk Down was suddenly back, this time as a potent symbol of faltering US counterterrorism efforts.
Somalia has not had an effective central government since 1991, when largely clan-based warlords overthrew the country's dictator, Mohamed Siad Barre, and then turned on one another. An interim government, formed with the support of the UN, has not even been able to get into Mogadishu, and has instead been stuck in Baidoa, about 200km away.
"We need to have legitimate actors inside Somalia with whom we can work," Henry Crumpton, the State Department's top counter-terrorism official, told a Senate committee on Tuesday.
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