The Somali-Ethiopian war was the second full scale war that broke out between the horn of Africa rivals. For those of you that are familiar with this war, which was the largest war involving armor, mechanized divisions and aircraft in Sub-sahara Africa, I want to know what your thoughts are and your inputs on this war that could have lead to an all out war in the Horn involving both Superpowers and many other nations.

During the British colonization of Northern Somalia, the Ogaden Region was controlled by the British which conceded the region to the Ethiopian empire even though it was settled by Somalis, the people spoke Somali, and the region belong to Somalia pre-colonization. The Northen Frontier District which is also Somali was incorporated into Kenya during Colonization. Djibouti which is also a Somali speaking region was occupied by the French which later granted it independence separate from Somalia.

Back to the Ogaden region which was the cause of the 1977 war; the war happend because Ethiopia wouldn't give the Ogaden region self determination and let them decide if they wanted to remain with Ethiopia or join Somalia in a union. The Somali military went into to Ethiopia and had huge success in the beginning and thrusted all the way into Dire Dawe, Jig Jigga, Nazret and Harer. The Ethiopian military began to collapse and Addis ababa felt threatened with 90 percent of the Ogaden region in Somali hands.

The new Ethiopian regime that overthrew Haile Selassie proclaimed itself Communist and began to seek assistance from Soviet Union and Cuba which was already in Angola fighting to install a communist regime their. The Soviets which originally were allied to Somalia's socialist regime began to ally with Ethiopia and in turn not to lose their foot hold in the Horn of Africa the United States which was an ally of Ethiopia switched sides and now supported the Somali regime.

The Ethiopian military was saved by an airlift from Soviet Union and the Warsaw pact. The Soviets sent trainers, weapons and supplies so did the East Germans, and the Cubans provided 11,000-15,000 troops. With these assets in hand and Cuban troops fighting with them and Soviet trainers providing guidance the Ethiopians slowly regained the advantage and finally somalia after being driven from most of the Ogaden region withdrew its remaining troops.

The Ethiopians wanted to push into Somalia itself, but the Soviets pulled the plug and stopped the Ethiopian military after the Somali military did mass mobilization and the The United states, Italy, France, England, West Germany, China, Saudi Arabia, and Iran all sent either weapons, money, or trainer to help the Somali military resist a Ethiopian-Cuban-Soviet invasion. Egypt's Sadat and and Pakistan promised to contribute troops to bolster the Somali military if Somali territory was threatened.

I want to know what you guys feel about this war and what might have happend had it spiralled out of controlled.

Its another instance of the highhandeness which have characterized the meddling by international forum of the big brothers. As history shows they have always gone into a third world country to exploit those nations to their own peculiar advatages without a thought to the ethnic, cultural,social and economical background of these nations and have departing left behind a mess and the nations poorer and ridden with conflicts which till date have fall outs and repercussions which these affected nations have to pay for and face. My own ountry is an example; it managed to overthrow the yoke of the British Empire which ruled it for almost 200 yrs in the year 1947. The imperialists withdrew in haste and partitioned the country which led to an unparalleled exodus in the history of the human race and to an unprecedented genocide. Till date we have fought almost three full fledged wars with Pakistan the country which was carved out of the erstwhile India and a localized war in the higher reaches of the world's highest battlefield in Kargill as late as 1998. That apart our neighbour Pakistan has launched a low intensity proxy war characterized by terrorism and this war has been raging in the country since almost two decades.
So yours is a country torn apart by the machinations of selfish foreign powers who couldn't see beyond their immediate needs.Do you find anyone of the so called regulars of this forum and who generally are from the countries who created the havoc in the first place following up this thread? That should speak for itself.

You are right, I don't expect them to respond except for few reasonable ones I have meet here; I did this post because most of the regulars here jump to argue for the war in Somalia when in fact they have no knowledge of the history of bad blood between Somalia and Ethiopia due to the imperialistic colonizations of countries by the west. You are also right about another point most western countries except for few like Canada and Switzerland have participated in the Colonization, occupation, pillaging, slavery and destructions of entire civilizations from the Natives in South America to the Africans and Chinese. The Natives in South and North America were wiped out over hundred million Africans enslaved, and millions of Asians such as the Chinese fell victim to such tactics as the opium epidemic caused by the British. So yes, I don't expect for Western countries to come to terms with the horrific and evil acts they commited across this planet. They were the cause of everything from the wiping out of the Natives in the Americas, the enslavement of the Africans and the pillaging of African riches to the colonization of Asia and both WW1 and WW2.

I am not going to sit here and defend colonialism but guys it ended 60 years ago since then it has been the responsibility of those former colonial nations to sort their crap out and manage themselves I do not believe you blame political issues on former colonial powers after 60-100 years of self rule.

Monty, I know slavery and colonization was 60-100 years ago depending on the country and I agree with a point you made: that the colonized nations should work their problems out now that they are independent; but look at it this way certain problems they created like carving out nations and handing a nation's territory to another country is what ignited most of the wars post-colonial.

Its not easy to resolve these kind of mess the colonial powers created, for one the nation that controls the territory that is in question won't handed over to its rightful owner and the rightful owner won't accept anything less than getting that territory back, now one must ask themselves that colonization alone is not the problem because nations can look past that and move on, but when a country can't have part of their territory back even after independence that causes resentment of the colonizing power for creating such a mess and an impasse.

If Britain didn't hand over Somali territory to Ethiopia and Kenya, Somalia won't be having the problems it has with its neighbors. Not only has the colonizing power tore a country apart but they also made enemies out of neighbors because of the territorial disputes they created from India-Pakistan, Somalia-Ethiopia, Somalia-Kenya, Ethiopia-Eritrea, Argentina and many others.

I agree with you that after colonization the formerly occuppied countries should resolve the problems and move on, but its easier said than done. They really created huge mess across the world. And you being one of the few reasonable people in this forum that actually has common sense and knowledge you make good points but you must understand that a lot of mess was done that won't be resolved easily.

So, to conclude..The mess created takes MORE then 60-100 years of self rule to sort out?

Maybe they should just go back to colonialize?
It would take far shorter then 60-100 years, and perhaps after solving the mess they could give it back for another 60 or so years of civil wars and other fun activities?

Simple fact is, and I am stating this from my own personal experience.
Africa the continent (atleast the parts I have been to) are still showing a strong tribal identity rather then national ones.
And as long as there are different tribes inside the same national borders there will be unrest, genocide and civil war..But you already knew that didn´t you?
A 16 year old boy, ****ed up on Khat doesn´t give a **** about what country he is currently roaming in.
He is there because he was told to be there by someone he trusted enough to fight for and/or were forced to fight for by means of terror.

The tribal identification rather then a national one is IMO one of the roots to the problems that African nations are having and NOT something that happened 60+ years ago.

But you probably knew that too didn´t you?

So why not just take the continent and break it up into tribal nations sized after size of tribe?
Because SOME tribes ALWAYS wants more huh?

Now that you are done with pointing fingers every wich way, what would your SOLUTION be?

First of all KJ, I am not simply point fingers just for the fun I am stating something which everyone in the world recognizes that when you forcefully colonize a country and then when the colonizer is finally done and leaves he carves out the occuppied country and gives some of that territory to its allies in the region, how do you not call that a mess.

I don't know if you support colonization and slavery or you don't because from the way you are speaking you are coming of as you want slavery and colonization to occur all over again.

The third world wouldn't be half a messed up as it is if the Colonizers didn't rob the natural resources for hundreds of years and then carved up the countries.

Yes you are right many African countries are fighting today not because someone carves up their territory and gave it to another country but because of civil war. Every country goes through civil war whether its an African country or European and the West. Those countries will come out of the civil war so don't make it seem like Spain, France, Italy, America, Russia and China amongst many other countries did not experience civil war. Every country will experience civil war at one time or another and that is what makes countries better themselves and makes them unite as a nation.

Long story short I wasn't speaking of countries in civil war, unless you are trying to change the subject, but whether you like it or not many other countries are fighting not because of civil war but because of territorial problems with their neighbors and whose fault is that?

What did the British expect that Somalis would accept that they handed Somali territory to Ethiopia and Kenya?

Did they expect that India and Pakistan would live in peace if they carve India up?

Did they expect that Eritrea would like being incorporated into Ethiopia?

The answer is no, they did it out of selfishness, greed and the hunger for other nations riches.

Yes it was 6o+ years ago but things like that are not easy to let go when your territory is given to another country by a colonizer.

So you can dance around the facts and close your eyes to them but countries like Britain, France, Italy, Spain, Portugal are why their are many problems in this world.

Originally Posted by Somalia

The rampant corruption in the dark continent is NOT a result of any colonial power. And corruption and graft is the reason 60+ years after independence the entire continent is closer to the Stone Age than even the Industrial Age let alone the Information Age.

Originally Posted by KJ

Now that you are done with pointing fingers every wich way, what would your SOLUTION be?

Still can´t see your SOLUTION anywhere, I see alot of whining but no solution.
So what is your post really about?
Sympathy?

Guess what, in the real world everyone have problems..
The diffrence is, some people solve theirs..

And for the other part of your post...The old colonies have been incharge of their natural resources for 60+ years.
(There are very few areas in Africa that have no natural resources whatsoever)
If the money was actually spent towards making life a little better for all the citizens instead of trying to eradicate another tribe, everyone would eat..
Just some food for thought, just incase you actually are willing to think anymore.