Ethiopia Attacks Somalia

With Somalia effectively split into (at least) two disparate regions, the Mogadishu based Islamic Courts Union controls roughly half of the country, while the remaining Transitional Federal Government, based in Baidoa, struggles to maintain its slipping grasp on a country now split into three parts. Amidst this troubled background, even more problematic developments have arose. Neighboring Ethiopia, openly hostel to the ICU Islamist goverment, has begun attacking Somalia in earnest, commencing with an air and ground campaign against various targets within ICU controlled Somalia.

According to witnesses, the warplanes bombarded several towns while Ethiopian tanks pushed aggressively into territory that had been controlled by Somalia’s Islamist forces. Ethiopia is backing Somalia’s transitional government, which has been losing control of parts of the country to the rival Islamist forces.

Until today, Ethiopian officials denied they had combat forces in Somalia, saying instead that their presence was limited to a few hundred military advisors. But witnesses had said Ethiopian troops were already in Somalia.

“Our defense force has been forced to enter a war,” Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi said on television today, according to news reports. He said his country was defending itself against “attacks from extremists and anti-Ethiopian forces” and would “protect the sovereignty of the land.”

The Ethiopian offensive ignited fighting up and down the Somali coast.

“The Ethiopians are blowing things up all over the place,” said Mohammed Hussein Galgal, an Islamist commander in Beledweyne, near the Ethiopian border. “Civilians have been killed, people are fleeing. But don’t worry, we won’t be defeated.”

Ethiopian officials said today that they had run out of patience with the Islamist leaders, who have declared war on Ethiopia and vowed to turn Somalia into a recruiting ground for anti-Ethiopian fighters.

“What did you expect us to do?” said Zemedkun Tekle, a spokesman for Ethiopia’s information ministry. “Wait for them to attack our cities?”
Sounds like a familiar doctrine.... where have I heard that before? Oh yes, it's the foreign policy championed by our own President Bush, who flouted international law when he attacked Iraq because they were supposedly about to attack us, so it was all really a defensive engagement... or something. It set a dangerous precedent, and one that we're likely to be seeing more of in the future.

Not to mention the fact that Ethiopia is one of the few Christian countries in the region, so its war against the Islamist government of Somalia could easily be construed as a proxy fight between Christianity and Islam. It doesn't help that the US is backing Ethiopia's military.

Ethiopia has the most powerful military in the region, trained by American advisors and funded by American aid. American officials have acknowledged that they tacitly supported Ethiopia’s decision to send troops to Somalia because they felt it was the best way to check the growing power of the Islamists, whom American officials have accused of sheltering Al Qaeda terrorists.
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What complicates the issue is the presence of other foreign troops inside Somalia and the rising potential for Somalia’s neighbors to be dragged in. United Nations officials estimate that there are several thousand soldiers from Eritrea, Ethiopia’s arch-enemy, fighting for the Islamists, along with a growing number of Muslim mercenaries from Yemen, Egypt, Syria and Libya who want to turn Somalia into the third front of jihad, after Iraq and Afghanistan. On Friday, residents of Mogadishu said they saw boatloads of armed men landing on the city’s beaches.
So not only is there a deep religious motivation underlying this conflict, but the US-backed Ethiopian attack may be an attempt to bolster the wrong side in the conflict. The problem is that the ICU enjoys significantly more popular support than the Transitional Federal Government. Even though the openly Islamist nature of its rule doesn't jive well with Western notions of equality and religious freedom, the fact that it is a functioning government of sorts makes it an appealing alternative to the hellish anarchy Somalis were subjected to before the ICU took over. So the US and its allies, in supporting Ethiopia, should strongly consider removing themselves from this particular fight, since while it may be ideologically advantageous elsewhere to support attacks against Islamist governments, when it's one the people support and is far better than what had previously been there, it's probably not a good idea to get involved.

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