US Military Will No Longer Announce Deaths in Somalia Strikes

In the latest in a series of moves by the Trump Administration to add more opaqueness to America’s global military interventions, African Command (Africom) has announced they will no longer provide any data on who is killed in American attacks in Somalia.

This comes amid a soaring number of US airstrikes against targets in Somalia. In 2018, the number of strikes dramatically went up, and that increase was even more dramatic at year’s end. Already, there have been multiple strikes in 2019, with large death tolls.

Officials provided no indication what led them to decide to stop telling the American public how many Somalis they are killing. While it is in keeping with President Trump’s reluctance to release specifics, the Pentagon has also been said to like publicizing body counts for Trump’s benefit, and Somalia has had no shortage of gaudy death tolls.

It remains to be seen how this will operate in practice, as officials said they will not provide details “on fighters killed or damage done,” but apparently do still intend to announce that there were airstrikes.