The Washington Post published on 4 December 2020 an article titled "Trump Orders Departure of Majority of 700 U.S. Troops in Somalia" by Alex Horton.
The Associated Press published on 4 December 2020 a similar article titled "Trump Orders Most American Troops to Leave Somalia" by Robert Burns.
The New York Times published on 5 December 2020 its account of this development titled "In Somalia, U.S. Troop Withdrawal Is Seen as Badly Timed" by Declan Walsh.
Before leaving office on 20 January 2021, the Trump administration plans to remove most of the 700 strong American force from Somalia to Kenya and other locations. Most of the Americans were training the elite Somali Danab force.
Comment: This is a strange decision in the waning days of the Trump administration that seems designed to preempt any policy the Biden administration has in mind for Somalia. It is unclear if military professionals had any role in the decision, although they may have been instrumental in convincing Trump not to remove the force entirely from the region and relocate part of it in Kenya. One wonders, however, if the training of Danab can be done as effectively from neighboring Kenya.
