US officials are claiming that one of the three men they killed today in a drone strike against the Somali town of Bardhere was suspected to have been involved in al-Shabaab’s planning for a 2013 attack on the Westgate Mall in Nairobi, Kenya.
The 2013 Westgate attack saw four members of al-Shabaab attack the mall with machine guns, killing 67 people. US officials have since made much of their desire to kill anyone even tangentially involved.
The slain suspect was identified as Adan Garar, who Kenyan officials also claimed was believed to have been behind a failed 2014 attack in Uganda. US officials did not mention that part.
The other two people killed in the drone strike were totally unidentified, and it isn’t clear if they were even intended targets or just collateral damage in the US attack.