A Somali Child Soldier

The use of child soldiers in Somalia is widespread. In the ongoing conflict, children are used for a wide variety of reasons. It is estimated that over 200,000 Somali children have carried a gun or have been involved in a factional conflict at some point in their lives. It is not rare to see boys as young as 14 in a militia attack or accompanying older soldiers.
The UN has continuously noted the presence of teenagers carrying weapons riding with other armed men in aircraft or other vehicles. It is estimated that five percent of all of Somalia’s children have participated in marauding gangs, militia attacks, or other military conflicts.

In the bodies of power that reside in Somalia, there are no limitations on army recruitment age. Child soldiers are also routinely used as suicide bombers and mine detectors, as the country’s land is laced with dozens of unknown bombs waiting to explode and take the lives of innocent civilians away.


Rebel commanders had constructed a four-foot tall killing machine that cut its way through village after village and nearly overran the government. Its trail was smoking huts and sawed off ears.

The Somalis learned that children were the perfect weapon: easily manipulated, intensely loyal, fearless and, most important, in endless supply.

Today, human rights groups say, there are 300,000 child soldiers worldwide. And experts say the problem is deepening as the nature of conflict itself changes — especially in Africa.

Here, in one country after another, conflicts have morphed from idea- or cause-driven struggles to warlord-led drives whose essential goal is plunder. Because those new rebel movements are motivated and financed by crime, popular support becomes irrelevant. Those in control don’t care about hearts and minds. They see the local population as prey.

In Somalia, within the last month, more than 1,000 people have been killed in Mogadishu, the capital, in a complex civil war compounded by warlords who command armies of teenagers, and Ethiopians who shell and bomb civilians with showing no mercy.

The war traces to 1991, when the central government was brought down by clans fighting over old grievances. But soon it became a contest among the warlords for control of airports, seaports and access to international aid. Sixteen years later, they are still blasting away.