Somaliland offers Berbera base to US forces as tensions rise in Bab-el-Mandeb

Johannesburg: The US has been offered the strategically important air base and port as the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz begins and Iran-backed threats target the key Red Sea chokepoint of the Bab el-Mandeb Strait.

Top US military officials, including General Dagwin Anderson, commander of US forces in Africa, recently toured facilities in Somaliland. Somaliland is a pro-US outpost that broke away from war-torn Somalia in 1991.

Bab-el-Mandeb, which means ‘Gate of Tears’ in Arabic, has become the main route for sending oil from the Middle East to Asia since the Strait of Hormuz was effectively closed. Saudi Arabia has begun shipping potentially up to seven million barrels of oil per day from its port at Yanbu on the Red Sea through the strait, Bloomberg News reported. It is reported that 14% of the world’s shipping passes through the 16-mile-wide strait.

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Somaliland security personnel stand guard in front of shipping containers being stored at the port of Berbera. (Ed Ram/AFP)

Enter the controversial offer to the US of an air and naval base in Berbera, Somaliland. The official site of the Republic of Somaliland on

“Berbera clearly has huge strategic potential for sea and air operations,” Edmund Fitton-Brown, Britain’s former ambassador to Yemen and a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), told Fox News Digital.

Bab-al-Mandeb, Yemen – 22 October 2020: An aerial view of the Bab al-Mandeb Strait is a sea route connecting the Indian Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea via the Suez Canal. (Gallo Images/Orbital Horizon/Copernicus Sentinel Data 2021)

The US has another Red Sea base in Djibouti, but Fitton-Brown told Fox News Digital that the government there is growing uncomfortable with some of the administration’s policies: “Djibouti has become a reluctant, unwilling ally of the US to help enforce sanctions on the Houthis. Somaliland, which is almost equally well positioned to address issues on Yemen’s western and southwestern coasts, has seen the US, Israel and the UAE “Can help fight the Houthis.”

This controversy has come on the question of America recognizing Somaliland.

U.S. Air Force Gen. Dagwin Anderson, commander, U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM), meets with Somaliland President Abdirahman Mohamed Abdullahi in Hargeisa, Somaliland, Nov. 26, 2025. The meeting was part of General Anderson’s visit to East Africa to meet with government and defense leaders to strengthen America’s strategic approach to counter terrorism through mutual engagement, strengthened cooperation, and aligned security priorities. (U.S. Army photo by Capt. Ubon Mendy)

“We’re looking at it right now,” President Trump told reporters in the Oval Office last August when asked about recognition of Somaliland and the possible resettlement of Gazans there. “We’re working on it right now, Somaliland.”

But last week, a State Department spokesperson told Fox News Digital, “The United States continues to recognize the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Federal Republic of Somalia, including the territory of Somaliland.”

Last year Israel became the first country to recognize Somaliland.

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In this image provided by the U.S. Navy, the amphibious dock landing ship USS Carter Hall and the amphibious assault ship USS Bataan transit the Bab el-Mandeb Strait on Aug. 9, 2023. (Mass Communications SPC 2nd Class Moises Sandoval/US Navy via AP)

Iran is encouraging Houthi rebels to take action in the Red Sea. “Insecurity in the Bab al-Mandab Strait and other straits, including the Red Sea, is one of the options for the resistance front, and the situation will become much more complicated for the Americans than it is today,” the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)-affiliated Tasmin news agency warned on March 21.

Bara Shaiban, an expert on the Houthis at the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), says recognition of Somaliland is problematic, as it would “damage America’s relationships with Arab countries such as Saudi Arabia and Egypt, many of which are American allies. It would be unwise for the United States to upset its allies in the region just to gain access to Somaliland ports.”

This handout screen grab from a video shows the acquisition of the Galaxy Leader cargo by Yemen’s Houthi fighters on the Red Sea coast near Hudaydah in the Red Sea, Yemen, on November 20, 2023. (Houthi Movement/Getty Images)

“The United States is not seeking to establish a new base, as such actions are inconsistent with the America First security framework expressed by the President and the Secretary of War,” a spokesperson for U.S. Forces in Africa (AFRICOM) told Fox News Digital.

While both the use and recognition of Somaliland bases in public are taboo areas, analysts say that with Somaliland offering the use of its bases without immediate recognition by the administration, the issue is probably not out of the question in private.

And that’s why a recent video shared with Fox News Digital shows AFRICOM Commander Dagwin Anderson and a large group of senior military officers in Somaliland, where he met with its President and inspected the port in Berbera just 5 months ago in November.

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This is not the only reported visit. Bashir Goth, Somaliland’s top diplomatic representative in Washington, said at a recent Foreign Policy Research Institute debate “The war in the Middle East has increased the strategic importance of Somaliland,” Goth said. “US military interests have been very strong. Every month, there has been a delegation from AFRICOM to Hargeisa (the capital of Somaliland).”

Fox News Digital contacted the Republic of Somaliland, but they declined to comment.