"The aim is to push the perimeter out and harden it, to make it more difficult for Shabaab to penetrate the city," Matt Bryden, the director of Sahan Research, a Somalia-focussed think tank in Nairobi, told me.
Most of us thrive on pushing back the perimeter fence of our own little field of research, even if our total estate only grows by a few square centimetres each working week.
Now, with urban sprawl pushing up against perimeter fences, the U.S. Department of Defense has quietly become a major protector of wilderness and ranch lands.
In Chelsea, the commercial epicenter, the census keeps building, with new galleries filling available space and pushing the neighborhood's perimeters.
Most of the furniture, including the piano, is pushed to the perimeter.
"But we are trying to deliberately push back his perimeter, shrink the area where he can move," the officer said.
The sparse furniture, pushed to the perimeter, gives the apartment the feel of a nightclub after everyone has gone home.
On the interior, circulation and service systems are pushed to the perimeter of the house, resulting in an open central space on the ground floor.
Although Putin is determined to push the EEU perimeter as far as possible, it is not yet clear what real economic benefit countries will gain from membership.
The Russian counteroffensives at the Battle of Stalingrad and the Battle of Kursk had pushed back the perimeter of Hitler's Europe in the east.
However, for a brief time in late 1950 portions of the city stood on the front lines, as North Korean forces pushed the Pusan Perimeter southward from Pohang.
