Now the U.S. is going to war in Somalia

Now the Bush administration has taken the United States into war on four fronts--Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran, and Somalia. This is off the New York Times:

NAIROBI, Jan. 11 -- A small team of American military personnel entered southern Somalia to try to determine exactly who was killed in a U.S. airstrike Monday that targeted suspected al-Qaeda figures thought to be hiding in swampy mangrove forests along the Indian Ocean, U.S. sources said Thursday.

So far, "no one can confirm a high-value target" among the dead, said one U.S. source, who spoke on condition of anonymity. But items recovered at the strike site -- a piece of bloody clothing and a document -- indicated that Aden Ayrow, head of the military arm of the deposed Islamic Courts movement, had been at the scene.

The strike killed eight to 10 people suspected of terrorist links, according to another source, a high-ranking U.S. official in the region who spoke Thursday and declined to be identified. The people were fleeing with remnants of the Courts movement, which was swept from power last month by invading Ethiopian forces who installed in its place the country's U.S.-backed transitional government.

The search team marks the first known case of U.S. military boots hitting Somalian soil since a disastrous mission to stabilize the country ended in 1994 after Somali militiamen downed two Black Hawk helicopters and killed 18 U.S. soldiers in the capital, Mogadishu. It was unclear Thursday if the search team remained inside Somalia.

The air attack was carried out early Monday by a U.S. Air Force AC-130 gunship flying from a base in Djibouti, a tiny Horn of Africa country, as U.S. Navy ships patrolled offshore. By one official's account, the strike was triggered by a cellphone intercept and targeted a convoy of vehicles.

The U.S. military has worked closely with Ethiopian ground and air forces operating in Somalia and has shared intelligence and target lists. But American decision-makers have been cautious about sending U.S. personnel into Somalian territory. In the aftermath of the AC-130 attack, it was seen as a necessary risk in the effort to positively identify the casualties.

Now I'm guessing this joint US-Ethiopian was a one-time operation to take out these suspected al Qaeda targets, and that the U.S. would get involved in another attack with Ethiopia, if the opportunity presents itself. But the timing of this attack disturbs me, coming right on the week that President Bush gave his surge speech, and that the U.S. attacked an Iranian consulate in northern Iraq. I get the impression here that the U.S. has become an aggressive, war-like nation, under these Bush neocons. And the world is starting to strike back against war-like nature of the United States--especially with the bombing of the U.S. embassy in Athens, Greece. If we continue down this destructive road of violence and war, we're going to see even more attacks against our citizens, our diplomatic staff, and our military forces.