US President Joe Biden has ordered the redeployment of hundreds of ground troops to Somalia,

official set on Monday.

It's a move that largely reverses a withdrawal carried out by Biden's predecessor Donald Trump.

Prior to that removal, the US had around 700 troops in Somalia.

We're approaching counterterrorism in a manner tailored to the particular terrorist threats

that we see emerging from particular countries.

In Somalia, we face Al-Qaeda's largest and wealthiest global affiliate and one that holds substantial territorial safety.

All right. I'm glad to be joined on BadBath podcast today by Samar Al-Balushi,

who is on faculty at UC Irvine, her areas of research specialty,

our geopolitics imperialism, militarism, policing, East Africa, the Horn of Africa, etc.

which is really germane to what we're talking about today, which is Somalia, how we ended up there,

and why we are upping our troops on the ground, and the last couple of weeks welcome to the show professor.

Hi, Brianna. It's great to be here with you today.

It's great to have you. So I know that some listeners are going to share my confusion

as to why we are in East Africa in the first place, and amany on the left,

are very attuned to US imperialism and are frustrated by the lack of discourse

around how many troops are currently on an ongoing basis in Africa.

There is a real media void when it comes to talking about what is happening on that continent.

So I'm hoping that you can give us a little background and perspective

and help us understand on the first instance why US troops ended up in Somalia in the first place.

Absolutely. So I think Americans tend to think of the war on terror

as something that's been occurring primarily outside of Africa.

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