Issue No. 973

Turkey’s Dangerous Somalia Gambit

Turkey yesterday crossed a perilous threshold in Somalia when it used its military air assets not for counterterrorism purposes but as a partisan tool in local Somali political warfare. 

The airstrike targeting the Doolow residence of former Custodial Corps chief General Mahad Abdirahman—which may have fatally harmed close family members while the general survived—signals a chilling escalation. Reports that the general’s home was hit twice—a "double-tap" in military parlance, either by an Akinci drone or an F-16—could constitute a direct war crime.

By deploying its aerial hardware to eliminate domestic political rivals of President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud's administration, Ankara has moved beyond its counter-insurgency mandate and directly entangled itself in intra-Somali clan and power struggles, a move that raises serious reputational risks for Ankara.

Villa Somalia’s increasing reliance on Ankara’s F-16s and drones to enforce its domestic authority risks routinising a dangerous precedent where Somali elites use external armies for domestic repression.

The strike targeted non-combatants in a private residence with no obvious military value, with no attempt made to avoid civilian casualties—despite NISA's pathetic attempt to cast Abdirahman, dismissed by critics as "Taliye Shuub," as a "terrorist." That is arguably a war crime, and it crosses a dangerous threshold, suggesting that political figures and their families are now fair game for targeted killings, wherever they may be.

15-year anniversary

The Doolow incident comes just a few days after Turkey and Somalia marked 15 years of “strategic partnership” on 22 August. During the special anniversary event held at Villa Somalia, Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud (HSM) delivered a speech lauding Ankara for teaching Somalis how to fish.

To illustrate his point, the President stated:

"They could have given us the money from the multimillion-dollar investments. We would have spent that too, and tomorrow we would need it again. Right now, our own personnel are being trained for oil. As a result, Türkiye has taught us how to fish."

Far from a simple victory lap, the defensive nature of the speech highlights a relationship that is becoming increasingly complex and fraught for Villa Somalia. 

The deployment of this fishing metaphor and cliché by the Somali President was a calculated attempt to push back against critics. However, it also subtly hints at a deeply transactional relationship that is now proving increasingly difficult for Villa Somalia to manage and sell as beneficial for Somalia.

Cautionary tale

Turkey has manoeuvred itself into a position of pre-eminence in Somalia in just 15 years, eclipsing many traditional foreign powers who had been established in the country much longer. Ankara frequently promotes this deeply embedded relationship as the definitive model of its broader engagement strategy across Africa. However, given the compounding domestic blowback and the asymmetric nature of the resource-extraction agreements, it might be more accurate to hold up the Somalia experiment as a cautionary tale of strategic overdependence.

Security actor

The Doolow airstrike did not occur in a vacuum; it is a clear signal that Ankara is asserting full control over Somalia’s military and security architecture. TURKSOM continuously churns out thousands of troops under a training ethos consistent with the institutional changes enacted within the Turkish military under Erdogan. This philosophy treats the armed forces primarily as an instrument of executive power rather than a constitutionally bound entity. This reflects Turkey’s own post-coup military transformation, which dismantled the traditional secular officer corps and elevated Imam Hatip graduates—a process of subtle Islamisation that serves primarily to centralise military command under the executive. The resulting military and ideological fusion between Ankara and Mogadishu fundamentally undermines the traditional liberal military framework promoted by Western partners for nearly two decades.

Furthermore, Turkey is not financing the long-term upkeep of these Somali troops. Instead, it is building an unsustainably bloated army that external donors or local revenues will ultimately be forced to fund. An expanded military apparatus lacking a steady, institutionalised system of upkeep and long-term sustainment is highly volatile, carrying a severe risk of degenerating into a predatory force against the very population it is meant to protect.

Institutionalisation

Turkey’s muscular enforcement of President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud’s diktat is deceptive; all signs indicate that Ankara is already looking beyond the current incumbent. Turkish state media has begun heaping praise on the new Speaker of the Somali Parliament, Abdulkadir Nur Jama, who has been educated and groomed as a Turkish ‘agent of influence’ for many years. Ankara's media apparatus is gleefully and prematurely framing him as the country's next president.

Jama recently triggered a sharp diplomatic row when he appeared to openly endorse Turkish recognition and geopolitical claims over northern Cypriot territories. Although the Speaker was ultimately forced to take down his post on X (formerly Twitter) following external and domestic backlash, he continues to strut the political stage like a king-in-waiting, biding his time with a slight, knowing smile tugging at his lips.

Control of the northern strategic periphery

To consolidate its power and influence in Somalia, Ankara is aligning its position with HSM’s re-centralisation of the Somali state. The recent attempted destabilisation of Puntland bears distinct Turkish fingerprints, an assessment underscored by multiple official statements issued by Garowe in recent months.

Turkey is believed to be highly keen to establish a firm foothold in Galmudug, a strategic region just south of Puntland. Multiple credible reports suggest that the Turkish Navy has a vested interest in the Port of Hobyo on the Indian Ocean, which is currently under construction. Reinforcing this ambition, a Turkish company, Metag Holding, has already been granted an extraordinary 80-year lease to modernise and manage the port infrastructure. Ankara’s broader plan is to build Hobyo into a major maritime hub to rival Berbera, thereby undercutting Somaliland’s push for international recognition and offering the port to Ethiopia as a viable alternative trade route for the landlocked state.

Another coastal enclave in the disputed Sanaag region on the Gulf of Aden has been touted as an area of critical strategic interest for the Turkish Navy: Las Qorey (Laas Qorey). The dominant clan inhabiting Las Qorey is the Warsangeli, who share close genealogical ties with the Majerteen clan dominating Puntland. 

Turkey is reported to be seeking to capitalise on these intricate clan dynamics and territorial divisions to establish a naval outpost in the area. This presence would allow the Turkish Navy close proximity to both Berbera and the vital Bab el-Mandeb strait, while simultaneously fragmenting Somaliland's sovereign claims over the territory and bolstering Puntland's local territorial leverage.

Ultimately, Turkey's long-term ambition is to gain a commanding foothold in the north to displace the UAE in a region considered far more strategic owing to its immediate proximity to the Red Sea’s critical maritime corridor, choke points, and global waterways.

To conclude, Ankara’s rapid transition from a provider of humanitarian aid to a partisan belligerent in Somalia's domestic political warfare represents a dangerous strategic overreach that risks igniting a new civil strife.

By weaponising its advanced aerial assets to target HSM’s local political rivals and exploiting intricate clan divisions to seize control of the strategic maritime periphery, Turkey is no longer stabilising the state; it is actively accelerating its fragmentation. 

To avert a catastrophic escalation, international partners holding diplomatic and economic leverage must act immediately to rein in Ankara, demanding a swift return to its strict counter-insurgency mandate before its short-sighted policies set Somalia ablaze.