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STRATFOR's
Global Intelligence Update
April 7, 1999
Somalia -- Emerging Third Front in the Ethiopia-Eritrea War?
Summary:
Reports continue to emerge that Asmara and Addis Ababa are arming
competing factions in Somalia in order to create a third front
that could break the deadlock on the Ethiopian-Eritrean battle
front. While both sides deny the charges, the consistency and
redundancy of the reports and the logic of the presumed
underlying strategy suggests that Somalia may soon emerge as a
third front in the war -- or at least as a new source of chaos in
its own right.
Analysis:
According to the April 3 edition of the Mogadishu daily Xog-
Ogaal, a truckload of ammunition arrived in Mogadishu on April 1
from the town of Beled Weyne near the Ethiopian border. The
ammunition was allegedly part of a 40 metric ton shipment
supplied to warlord Hussein Haji Bod by Ethiopia. Two similar
truckloads were reportedly detained by members of the United
Somali Congress-Patriotic Movement (USC-PM) in Beled Weyne.
While Xog-Ogaal is supportive of Mogadishu warlords Hussein
Mohamed Aideed and Ali Mahdi Mohamed, who are opposed to
Ethiopia, an April 3 Agence France Presse article confirms the
report. AFP cited witnesses, including one of the workers who
reportedly unloaded the shipment, as saying that multiple cargo
trucks escorted by gunmen in machine-gun mounted pickup trucks
["technicals"] delivered the ammunition to the Gedoole militia
compound in northern Mogadishu.
Adding to the paper trail, on March 31, Mahdi Mohamed charged
Ethiopia with violating the arms embargo on Somalia by providing
weapons and ammunition to various factions. In comments carried
on April 1 in Xog-Ogaal and on March 31 in the Mogadishu daily
Qaran, Mahdi Mohamed claimed that United Somali Congress splinter
group leaders in Beled Weyne, including Hussein Bod, Umar Hashi,
Muhammad Dhereh, and several others, had received arms from the
Ethiopian government. Mahdi Mohamed alleged that technicals had
been dispatched from Mogadishu to escort the arms from Beled
Weyne. Qaran noted that this was the first time some of the
warlords had received aid from Ethiopia, and that some rival
factions were being armed by Eritrea. Both Eritrea and Ethiopia
have denied the charges.
This by no means the first allegation that the deadlocked battle
between Ethiopia and Eritrea may be seeping into neighboring
Somalia. The Mogadishu newspaper Tarik reported on March 6 that
some 200 of Aideed's militiamen would travel to Eritrea for
military training. In late January, the Rahanwein Resistance
Army and the Digil Salvation Army factions in Somalia alleged
that Eritrea had flown five plane-loads of arms and ammunition to
the Balidogle airfield, west of Mogadishu, for distribution by
Aideed to Ethiopian opposition forces based in Somalia. And the
Addis Tribune reported on March 5 that, the previous week, an
unidentified ship was spotted at the port of Merca, south of
Mogadishu, unloading arms thought to be for Aideed. The arms
reportedly included armored personnel carriers, as well as BRDM
and Ferret type reconnaissance vehicles.
The Mogadishu Times reported on March 8 that Ethiopian government
officials held talks with USC-PM officials in Feerfeer, on the
Ethiopian-Somali border north of Beled Weyne. According to
sources cited by the Mogadishu Times, the meeting was in
preparation for an Ethiopian offensive against some border
districts of Somalia. On March 9, Somali National Front leader
General Omer Haji Mohamed "Masale" claimed that an Ethiopian
armored column crossed the border on March 7 near Balanballe,
north of Feerfeer on the Ethiopian-Somali border in the Galguduud
region. The troops allegedly looted Balanballe and kidnapped a
local businessman before returning to Ethiopia on March 8.
Eyewitnesses reported that the soldiers claimed to be chasing
members of the fundamentalist Al-Itihad Al-Islam, an allegation
repeated in the Mogadishu newspaper Ayaamaha on March 10, citing
an Ethiopian government spokesman. The Ethiopian embassy in
Nairobi denied Haji Mohamed's allegations, but did reserve the
right to take steps against terrorist groups operating out of
Somalia.
Al-Itihad Al-Islam has been fighting to unite Ethiopia's Ogaden
region, formerly Western Somalia, with Somalia. The London-based
newspaper Al-Hayat on March 29 cited the head of the National
Front for the Liberation of Ogaden (NFLO), Mohamed Umar Uthman,
as stating that Addis Ababa's rejection of a dialogue with the
NFLO left the group with no option but to intensify its military
operations. Uthman denied his group had received military
assistance from Eritrea, though he admitted the NFLO was in
contact with Eritrea for political dialogue and is "willing to
accept military assistance from Asmara and any other quarter, to
help our forces in their confrontation with the Ethiopian Army."
Besides the Ogaden conflict, Ethiopia is also coping with other
separatist ethnic Somalis and Oromos.
On March 17, Qaran reported that the Dagodi and Gare clans in
Somalia had issued a statement expressing concern at and
opposition to Aideed's support for Oromo rebels based in Somalia.
The clans warned ethnic Somalis in Ethiopia to beware of the
danger they faced. They also warned Aideed that he would be held
responsible for the consequences of his actions, and urged his
Habargidir clan to counsel him against continuing such support.
On March 11, director of the Eritrean president's office Yermane
Gebremeskel, told China's Xinhua news agency that his country did
maintain some relations with Somalia, but denied that Eritrea
took sides in Somalia's internal struggle or armed individual
factions. Yermane said that Somalis are "very friendly" to
Eritrea, and were so throughout Eritrea's fight for independence.
He said that, while Eritrea had sympathy with some groups in
Eritrea, it was not trying to play one group against the other,
and had even turned down breakaway Somaliland president Mohamed
Egal's request for diplomatic recognition.
The simmering dispute between Ethiopia and Eritrea erupted in
open combat on February 6, and despite the continuing efforts of
the Organization of African Unity (OAU) to negotiate a
settlement, has degenerated to an entrenched stalemate. Some
500,000 Ethiopian and Eritrean soldiers are dug in along both
sides of the border, and though Ethiopia has reportedly retaken
the disputed Badme region and both countries have technically
accepted the OAU peace plan, the fighting has not ceased. Locked
in a stalemate, it is only natural that the warring sides would
seek to outflank one another.
Eritrea has it easier in this case, as it does not share a border
with Somalia, while Ethiopia has a history of conflict along its
border with Somalia. The fact that Somalia has been in a state
of anarchy since 1991, divided among feuding warlords, only makes
it easier to manipulate. By funding dissident Ethiopian groups
based in Somalia, which despite denials appears to be what it is
doing, Eritrea hopes to present Ethiopia with a two front war.
By funding pro-Ethiopian factions in Somalia, in turn, Ethiopia
hopes not only to let them take care of its dissident problem,
but also perhaps to secure access to the port of Mogadishu,
currently held by anti-Ethiopian forces.
What appears to be brewing, therefore, is less a third front in
the Ethiopian-Eritrean war than a renewal of the civil war in
Somalia. Foreign military aid to both sides has not helped
resolve the Ethiopia-Eritrea conflict. If this little bit of
chaos in neighboring Somalia doesn't tip the scales between
Asmara and Addis Ababa, and they don't simply tire into
acceptance of a peace accord, there remain two options. They can
try the same gambit to the West, attempting to manipulate Sudan
or its opposition forces to their favor. Or they can hope for
more direct foreign military or political aid. Either way, the
situation will likely get worse before it gets better.
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