Defense experts in the US are coming forward to suggest the piracy problem with Somalia might require something like stabilizing the country, DefenseLink reported yesterday.

Whether it’s humanitarian aide to Somalia or possible military training to Somalis, [Pentagon spokesman Bryan] Whitman said, there’s no shortage in ways and means the United States and international partners could approach the piracy issue and Somalia’s lack of a legitimate government. The pure size of the region presents difficulties, he added.

“Clearly, it’s a big challenge when you’re talking about a coastline and body of water as large as it is, and you’re dealing with a country that is largely ungoverned — that certainly is a complicating situation,” Whitman said.

I have mentioned before that the US most likely wanted to destabilize the region for purposes of keeping open access to suspected terrorists. In short, sovereignty of a newly forming Islamic state with historic animosity towards the US would have made strategic anti-terror missions far more difficult in the Horn. Thus, as Somalia was on the verge of stabilizing, the US appeared to undermine the new rulers rather than support them.

Fearing the influence of militant factions within the Islamic Courts, the United States backed a loose coalition of warlords who had the savvy to dub themselves the Alliance for the Restoration of Peace and Counterterrorism. Somali women took to the streets to protest the U.S. policy.

“Many women supported the Islamic Courts in Mogadishu because they received security,” said Alia Adem Abdi, who chairs the Hiran Women Action on Advocacy for Peace and Human Rights Organization, based in Somalia’s restive central Hiran region. “They had an access to move freely in the capital city. Also the children had access to go to school. But not now.”

Last Christmas, a weak Transitional Federal Government stormed Mogadishu with backing from neighboring Ethiopia and tacit support from the United States, sending the coalition of jihadis and militias who backed the Islamic Courts underground.

Perhaps the US did not anticipate the growth of an uncontrolled piracy market as a result of their alliance with Ethiopia and military operations in this region. On the other hand, perhaps the prior administration felt the the risks and side-effects to shipping were an acceptable cost for their anti-terror doctrine. In either case I see a change in policy regarding risk management and Islamic state relations, rather than a new approach to piracy as a result of the Maersk incident.