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STUTTGART, Germany— The United States carried out an airstrike Sunday against ISIS in Somalia, killing two militants, U.S Africa Command said.
The attack, the second against ISIS this month, hit a target in the northeastern part of the country that serves as a stronghold for the militant group.
“Degrading ISIS and other terrorist organizations’ ability to plot and conduct attacks that threaten the U.S. homeland, our partners, and civilians remains central to U.S. Africa Command’s mission,” the command said in a statement Monday.
AFRICOM said no civilians were harmed in the strike.
The airstrike comes on the heels of a Feb. 1 operation that targeted a cave network in northeastern Somalia used as hideouts by ISIS leadership. Fourteen militants were killed in those strikes, AFRICOM said.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, speaking at AFRICOM headquarters in Stuttgart last week, said the Feb. 1 airstrike was an example of commanders now having more decision-making authority on such matters.
“That’s a reflection … of pushing authority down [and] untying the hands of warfighters,” Hegseth said. “[Such decisions] should be made at the four-star level or at the Secretary of Defense level more quickly based on the ability to degrade the enemy,” he said.
Over the years, airstrikes against ISIS militants in Somalia have been relatively rare when compared to those against the al-Shabab group, the largest terrorist organization in Somalia. However, there are indications that ISIS in Somalia is expanding.
ISIS in Somalia was formed in 2015 by a group of defectors from the al-Qaida-aligned al-Shabab group. By 2019, there were estimated 300 militants in its ranks.
Now some estimates of ISIS in Somalia’s size stand at roughly 1,000 members.
