The Congressionally-mandated State Department policy review for Somaliland is well underway. It is long overdue. For decades, the State Department’s approach to Somalia was both ineffective and divorced from reality. As Somaliland grew its democracy, ambassadors like Donald Yamamoto and Larry André, Jr., undercut it by enforcing a “One Somalia” policy whose parameters represented more their personal biases than any written State Department directives. As a result, the United States dumped billions of dollars into the world’s most corrupt government. Rather than advance Washington’s interests, the State Department advanced China‘s.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s team seeks a holistic approach that takes into account the entire Horn of Africa. Fair enough, though allowing Ethiopia and Eritrea, let alone Chinese satrapies Djibouti and Somalia, too much sway over Somaliland’s freedom risks U.S. interests, especially given the State Department’s lack of imagination and penchant for the status quo.

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