While the Obama Administration has been focussed mainly on the so-called “AfPak” problem, the violence in Somalia has escalated to the point where it now ranks as one of the world’s most dangerous crises. The conflict became even worse this weekend, with the radical group al-Shabab carrying out an Iraq-style suicide bomb attack in Mogadishu. In the past two weeks, 150 people have been killed and 57,000 displaced. According to the Somalia’s titular president - a former leader of the Islamic Courts Union, now reviled by his old Islamist allies for “selling out” to the West - the country is attracting foreign jihadists in much the same manner as Iraq and Afghanistan did in the past.

Somalia is a regional problem. In the same way that 17th century European powers like France and Austria used to compete to dominate weak states like Spain and Germany, Somalia has become a focal point for other East African states with regional ambitions. Ethiopia and Eritrea fought a vicious border war in the 1990s, and both fear that whoever controls Somalia will be able to use it as launching pad to undermine other states in the region. They have fought a proxy war in Somalia for several years now, with Ethiopia invading the country in 2006 to prop up the Transitional National Government, and Eritrea sponsoring insurgent groups like al-Shabab. Ethiopia has now convinced the African Union to take its side, with the AU making an absolutely unprecedented call for UN sanctions (and even a naval blockade) against Eritrea.

The chaos has created various other problems, one of which is the seemingly insoluble wave of piracy in the Gulf of Aden. But even though it’s clear that Somalia is now a major international problem, it’s not at all clear what anyone can or should do about it. Policing threats to the international trade system is one of the reasons why multilateral security organisations like the UN Security Council were invented in the first place; but few countries aside from the United States have enough resources to actually intervene in Somalia, and Barack Obama has little incentive to risk his far-reaching domestic agenda for a foreign adventure that would most likely fail. The previous three US administrations all intervened in Somalia to varying degrees, and all of them were burned by the experience. Right now, the best policy suggestions may be those that are least ambitious, and most cognisant of the limitations of what international intervention can achieve. Jeffrey Gettleman makes this point in Foreign Policy:

The hardest challenge of all might be simply preventing the worst-case scenario. Among the best suggestions I’ve heard is to play to Somalia’s strengths as a fluid, decentralized society with local mechanisms to resolve conflicts. The foundation of order would be clan-based governments in villages, towns, and neighborhoods. These tiny fiefdoms could stack together to form district and regional governments. The last step would be uniting the regional governments in a loose national federation that coordinated, say, currency issues or antipiracy efforts, but did not sideline local leaders. Western powers should do whatever they can to bring moderate Islamists into the transitional government while the transitional government still exists.

This is hardly inspiring stuff; sewing together a disparate patchwork of clan leaders, former warlords and Islamists in the hope of establishing some sort of civil order (the term “government” might be a bit of a stretch here). Even so, the current situation is so bad that even moderate improvements to the status quo should probably be pursued vigorously.