we are joined by peter pham, director of the nelson institute for international and public affairs atjames madison university. >> as a somalia organization, concerned with who controls somalia, or a transnational organization? >> it's one way of evolving. certainly a few years ago it was concerned with establishing an extremist, islamist state, enam rate in somalia. but defeats by african union peacekeepers aided by intervention forces from eatsopia and kenya have put the group down on its heels and as a result it has been gradually transforming and this is perhaps, if you will, the first salvo of the group as its new formation as a transnational group attracting people not only from somali backgrounds but other backgrounds and fighting as the regional affiliate of al qaeda it became a year ago. >> they were pushed out of moag deesh you and out of their southern base. are they operating out of trends or weakness when they do an audacious attack on a civilian target like a shopping mall? >> ironically it was the weakness and defeat that enabled them to transform themselves. up to that

peter pham, director of the council, thank you for being with us. >> thank you jonathan. >> what does this say about the power and sophistication of this group al shabaab? >> it says all the people that counted al shabaab out as a defeated organization were clearly wrong. what happened was al shabaab lost territory in somalia but it transformed itself from being an insurgent group, into a pure transnational terrorist group and this is its calling card and this is announcement that it has completed this transformation and is now posing a threat to not only somalia but indeed the east africa region. >> how does this compare to other groups launched within somalia? >> well, in somalia it's launched a number of suicide attacks, road side bombings relatively low tech endeavors. it's mrs. over the years fought a number of -- it's also over the years fought a number of african american peace keepers. but this operation's different. it required a lot of tactical planning to scope out the westgate center and to carry out the action we have seen to such deadly attack. clearly the group that is