The US has launched two more airstrikes in Somalia, according to press releases from US Africa Command, as the Trump administration is keeping up the bombing campaign in the country amid the US-Israeli war against Iran.
AFRICOM said that one strike was launched on March 15 and targeted al-Shabaab in the vicinity of Mubaraak, a town in southern Somalia about 37 miles west of Mogadishu. The command offered no other details about the attack,
The US-backed Somali Defense Ministry announced a military operation that same day, but in an area further south than where the US claimed the strike. The ministry said that the operation, which involved support from local clans, “neutralized” nine al-Shabaab militants.
AFRICOM said in a second press release that its forces launched an airstrike on March 16 in Somalia’s northeastern Puntland region against the local ISIS affiliate. It said the strike was launched about 28 miles southeast of the Gulf of Aden port city of Bossaso, and offered no other details.
The two airstrikes bring the total number of US airstrikes in Somalia this year to 46. There’s been a slight decrease in the rate of US bombings in the country following the start of the war with Iran, but the Trump administration is still on pace to break the record for annual US airstrikes in Somalia, which it set last year at 124.
According to New America, an organization that tracks the air war, the US launched more airstrikes in Somalia in 2025 than were conducted during the administrations of Joe Biden, Barack Obama, and George W. Bush combined. Despite the unprecedented bombing campaign, the US air war in Somalia receives virtually no media coverage in the US.
