The Daily Nation has a summary of al-Shabaab’s newest media release, which focuses on its mid-January mass raid on an AMISOM base in Somalia where the group claimed to kill over 100 Kenyan soldiers.

Al-Shabaab dedicates notable segments to what it claims is a “campaign of disinformation” by the Kenyan government to hide details of the attack, including how many were killed.

The video also shows forced interviews of Kenyan hostages — which are by far some of the most disturbing parts of the piece. Just hours after the attack, al-Shabaab already had quickly released audio of some of the Kenyan hostages, whose fate is unknown.

As Daily Nation notes:

“[The hostages] were ordered to narrate how the attack took place. All of them admit the enemy overran the camp, with one of them appealing to President Uhuru Kenyatta to withdraw the troops from Somalia. Government spokesman Eric Kiraithe on Sunday said he could not comment on the video because he had not viewed it.”

Lastly, according to an expert observer, al-Shabaab exhibited highly questionable military tactics during the raid but was successful due to the fact that the KDF’s preparation and response was worse.

• The attack was conducted slowly over open ground, disregarding tactical basics like fire and movement and how to cross open terrain in a tactically sound manner.
• Virtually no noteworthy resistance by the Kenyans is seen although the militants were basically sitting ducks for the duration of most of the attack. Well placed machine guns and heavy weapons like mortars could have stopped the attack, and as can be seen later, both seem to have been available to the Kenyan troops. However one should not forget that we are dealing with a propaganda video here, so resistance could have been consciously cut out by the makers.
• It seems that the Kenyans also made no use of armored vehicles like APCs (armored personnel carriers).

The full analysis can be read here.

Categories: al-Shabaab