libya as well as somalia. yeah. i think that s concerning both places. al shabaab will not just take this. they will try to mount some sort of retaliation. now, what capability do they have to react against the navy s.e.a.l.s? that might not be so great, but they could launch another attack inside kenya aimed at the west, aimed at the kenyan government. the united states and kenya have a very close working relationship, so they may go after these soft targets rather than going after things they know they can t successfully attack anymore. we ve pardoned some of the embassy. but malls are the new airplanes. they may go after something like that. in libya, libi by his name, you know he was a libyan national, so there may be reprisals aimed at american facilities there and you know, as i think it was
drone strikes have come under criticism a lot. we don t know exactly why they carried out these raids instead of shooting them with drones. one possibility that you want to capture these people were extra intelligence. there can also be fewer risks of civilian casualties and there has been a lot of criticism of the drone program. unclear if they played any part. should we draw any conclusion or anything from these two, the way these two operations went down in two bad guys captured thousands of miles apart at the same time? we don t know whether the close coordination, why this happened, right? it could be that the same intelligence mechanism that let us know where al libi was, that let us know where the al shabaab leader was, so it s possible we thought that the terrorists would know when one was caught, the other would go under ground.
it s possible it was done for other strategic benefits. they had been heavily recr t recruited here. how risky was this attack on al shabaab? so, the worst case scenario, this is a risky operation. happens almost 20 years to the day after the black hawk down issue in mogadishu. al shabaab also recruits heavily from the united states. now, if al shabaab turns into an international terrorist organization, that s not a good thing. this could be a death blow to an organization that has been on its heels before that attack in kenya, or this could be something that inspires al shabaab and makes it into a worse problem. and as usual, if you go on social media, people are making political, the really partisan people, the people in the weeds on both sides, are making some sort of political statement about this. is there a political statement to be made about this? might someone make hay and say, listen, this is proof that this
the al shabaab leader. barbara starr working her sources from the pentagon. two major operations here. two very different parts of aft africa. why don t we start with libya first. well, don, as you say, this operative seized by special operations forces, now in u.s. custody. my colleague, evan perez, our justice reporter here at cnn, continuing to follow this story through the night. i think it is fair to say we should expect to see al libi show up back in the united states for federal prosecution. he is under indictment for alleged terrorism activities. in somalia, you saw us navy s.e.a.l.s confirmed, went into a town in south central somalia to try to capture a leader. got into a heavy fire fight. no s.e.a.l.s wounded or killed thankfully in that, but the s.e.a.l.s did withdraw from the
welcome back. breaking news this hour. we are following two u.s. military attacks in africa to tell you about. a u.s. special forces, that s what cnn has learned, special forces captured an al qaeda operative wanted for the 1998 bombings of the u.s. embassies in kenya. abu anas al libi has topped the list for years. he was captured in tripoli. a u.s. official says the operation was conducted with the knowledge of the libyan government. the u.s. had a $5 million bounty on his head and now, libi joined al qaeda soon after its founding and is considered a senior member of al qaeda. also to tell you about in somalia, we are learning a us navy s.e.a.l. team went on a mission there in smaomalia and they tried to nab an al shabaab leader possibly linked to that kenya mall attack that left 67 people dead.