US has mixed record in air strikes on al Qaeda

LONDON, Jan 9 (Reuters) With a mixed track record of air strikes against Islamist leaders, the United States was taking a big risk when it launched last night's raid against a suspected al Qaeda target in Somalia, analysts say.

The same tactic that successfully eliminated Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, al Qaeda's leader in Iraq, has backfired on other occasions where intelligence proved inaccurate or raids claimed high civilian casualties.

The use of airstrikes ''certainly has its moments, but it can be a pretty blunt instrument. Smart weapons are only as good as the intelligence you have to target them,'' said Michael Williams of the Royal United Services Institute in London.

''The downside is those attacks can be used -- especially if there's collateral damage in terms of civilian deaths -- by radical Islamists to foment hate and violence towards the United States. If it's done poorly, it could be disastrous.'' Al Qaeda's number two has already urged Muslims to wage an Iraq-style insurgency in Somalia, where Islamist fighters were put to flight last month by Ethiopian and government forces.

Washington, which has steered clear of direct intervention in Somalia since a disastrous peacekeeping mission that ended in 1994, says some Islamists have sheltered al Qaeda members.

Details of yesterday's operation were sketchy, but a Somali government source said many people were killed by cannon fire raining down from a US AC-130 aircraft on a Somali village where at least one al Qaeda suspect was believed to be hiding.

TARGETING BUILDINGS Andrew Brookes, aviation specialist at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, said the AC-130 was accurate enough to destroy a building without wrecking an entire village, but not to pick out one targeted individual from a group.

''It can take out the building in which you think the bad guys are doing their business. But of course unless you have somebody on the ground to validate it, you don't know who's in that building with the bad guy that you're after,'' he said.

''It can hit a building, no great problem. The trouble is, anybody in that building or outside is going to be destroyed with it.'' Produced in versions known as the 'Spectre' and the 'Spooky', equipped with advanced sensors and operating from around 5,000 feet to evade rifle fire and rocket propelled grenades, the AC-130 is one of a range of airstrike options at the United States' disposal.

Missiles from an unmanned Predator drone killed six al Qaeda suspects in Yemen in 2002, but a similar operation in Pakistan last year missed Osama bin Laden's deputy and claimed the lives of 18 civilians, including women and children.

Brookes said the choice of weapon would depend on the range of the operation and the nature of the targets -- a cruise missile, for example, might be appropriate for a static target such as a building.

On various occasions before the September 11 attacks in 2001, the United States drew up plans to eliminate al Qaeda leader bin Laden with cruise missile attacks or AC-130 raids on Afghanistan.

But according to the report of the 9/11 commission, several operations were scrapped at the last minute because of concerns about unreliable intelligence or fears of civilian casualties.

REUTERS BDP BST2036