For years, the FBI has been closely watching al-Shabab — the Somali Islamist group that has claimed responsibility for the Nairobi massacre and recruited numerous Americans to fight and die, often as suicide bombers, for its cause.
Al-Shabab has already attacked most of the major actors trying to end the chaos in Somalia — the UN, Uganda, aid groups, the Somali government and now Kenya.
The US has spent hundreds of millions of dollars bank-rolling anti-Shabab operations for years, and there is growing fear that the group could turn its sights on American interests more directly, one of the reasons the Obama administration is committing so many resources to the investigation in Kenya.
“We are in this fight together,” said Robert F. Godec, the American ambassador to Kenya.
“The more we know about the planning that went into this, the way it was conducted, what was used, the people involved, the better we can protect America, too.”
Less than a day after the bloody standoff ended, more than 20 FBI agents wearing flak jackets and helmets were combing through the wreckage strewn across the steps of the mall. Dozens more will be headed to Nairobi, American officials say.
Some are members of the New York Joint Terrorism Task Force squad that investigates extremist groups operating in the Horn of Africa, a law enforcement official said.
In the next few days, agents, including a full Evidence Response Team, will be collecting DNA, fingerprints and other biometric information, poring through surveillance footage and examining guns, laptops, cameras and computers — anything to gain insights into how the attack was carried out and the hierarchy, planning and structures behind the group, especially if they have any ties back to the US.
American officials are mindful that Kenya, one of its closest allies in Africa, has become a precarious buffer zone between the US and Islamist militants, who have declared foreigners legitimate targets in their war.
The American government has learned the hard way what happens if it does not contain groups responsible for faraway attacks. In 1998, the then-relatively unknown group, Al-Qaeda simultaneously attacked the US embassies here and in Tanzania, killing hundreds and following up a few years later with the 9/11 terror attacks.
BATTLE-HARDENED
The Shabab militant group, which has pledged allegiance to Al-Qaeda and taken responsibility for killing more than 60 civilians at the mall, is considered an especially dangerous threat because more than two dozen young American men are already learning terrorist tactics in Somalia.
So far, this has been a one-way pipeline, but the fear is that some battle-hardened militants could come home with their American passports to strike on American soil.
- Daily Nation
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