|
Ethiopia The Eritreans
A variety of Eritrean secessionist groups have used
conventional means and guerrilla tactics to defy the forces
of both the imperial and the revolutionary governments (see
The Eritrean Movement, ch. 4). The Eritrean Liberation Front
(ELF), a nationalist organization committed to self-rule for
Eritrea, commenced a small-scale insurgency in 1961 against
imperial security forces. Throughout the 1960s, the level of
hostilities accelerated steadily, leading to the 1971
imposition of martial law. Ethiopian army personnel deployed
to Eritrea during this period numbered about 20,000, roughly
half the force's total, but much of the burden of
counterinsurgency operations fell on the paramilitary mobile
police.
Ideological and ethnic differences split the ELF in 1970
and resulted in the formation of the Marxist-oriented
Eritrean People's Liberation Front (EPLF). From 1972 to
1974, a civil war ensued between the two groups. Eventually,
the EPLF, which advocated "revolution before unity," emerged
victorious. Many ELF members, and sometimes entire units,
then fled into eastern Sudan, further weakening the
organization in Eritrea. After establishing its dominance,
the EPLF used its increased popularity to expand its
personnel strength. By 1977, when secessionists controlled
the countryside and most population centers, the EPLF had
approximately 15,000 troops in the field. The ELF, however,
still had numerical superiority, with about 20,000 troops in
its ranks. Therefore, to further discredit and isolate the
ELF, the EPLF and a group of former ELF cadres who had
reorganized themselves as the Eritrean Liberation Front-
Revolutionary Council issued a joint statement indicating
that they were "the sole representatives of the Eritrean
people and the only legal spokesmen on all issues concerning
the Eritrean people's struggle."
In May 1978, a 100,000-member Ethiopian force was deployed
in a counteroffensive whose objective was the eradication of
the Eritrean revolution. Even though the EPLF and ELF
succeeded in making some preemptive attacks against
government units and in defending Eritrea's southern border,
the ferocity of the government counteroffensive forced the
rebels to undertake a "strategic withdrawal" to their base
area. As a result, the Ethiopian army reoccupied most towns
and cities that had been taken by the rebels. Government
troops also dealt a crippling blow to the ELF, causing many
of its personnel to flee into eastern Sudan, where many of
them remained.
The only government setback occurred at the EPLF-held town
of Nakfa, which eventually became a symbol of Eritrean
determination to resist government control. After retreating
EPLF units had reached Nakfa, they built heavy
fortifications, including a forty-kilometer-long defensive
trench in the surrounding mountains. Despite repeated
attempts, the Ethiopian army was unable to dislodge the EPLF
from Nakfa. Between 1978 and 1981, the Derg unleashed five
large-scale military campaigns against the EPLF, none of
which resulted in a government victory.
In February 1982, the Mengistu regime embarked on its sixth
counteroffensive against the EPLF. Dubbed Red Star, the
campaign involved 120,000 government troops. The campaign
failed to drive the EPLF from Nakfa and resulted in the
deaths of more than 40,000 Ethiopian troops. Although Addis
Ababa managed to consolidate its hold over the Eritrean
highlands, it was unable to eliminate the EPLF, which still
possessed the capacity to make hit-and-run strikes against
government positions.
Once the 1982 Red Star offensive ended, the EPLF regrouped
its forces to seize the military initiative. In January
1984, the EPLF captured the town of Teseney in southwestern
Eritrea, and two months later the rebels overran the port of
Mersa Teklay, thereby establishing an EPLF presence on the
northeastern coast. During this battle, the rebels also
captured a significant number of weapons, which they used to
take the strategic hilltop town of Barentu in early July
1985. Once again, the rebels captured an array of military
equipment, including fifteen T-54/55 tanks and dozens of
trucks and artillery pieces. In May 1984, EPLF commandos
attacked the Asmera air base and reportedly destroyed two
Soviet Il-38 maritime reconnaissance aircraft.
When news of the EPLF's victory at Barentu reached Addis
Ababa, the Mengistu regime ordered the redeployment of two
divisions (about 30,000 troops) from the Ogaden to northern
Ethiopia and formed a new armored division to help retake
the town. The Ethiopian army then made perhaps as many as
thirteen attempts to recapture the town, losing 2,000
soldiers killed or wounded in the process. After the
Ethiopian air force started bombing Barentu, the EPLF
guerrillas withdrew from the town on August 24, 1985, taking
with them at least thirteen T-55 tanks, twelve artillery
pieces, and several APCs. According to the EPLF, their units
killed or captured 11,250 Ethiopian soldiers during several
battles fought before the withdrawal.
Within days of reoccupying Barentu, the Ethiopian army
recaptured Teseney, thereby cutting off the EPLF's western
territorial flank. Additional government victories forced
the rebels to fall back to their Nakfa stronghold. Over the
next several weeks, the Ethiopian armed forces used tanks
and other armored vehicles, cluster bombs, napalm, and
fighter-bombers to support the ground attack on Nakfa. By
the summer of 1986, the government offensive had ended;
Nakfa, however, was still in rebel hands, and the EPLF had
extended its area of control southward along the Eritrean
coast.
On October 10, 1985, the Derg launched another anti-EPLF
offensive, whose objective was the capture of Nakfa "within
five days." The operation involved sixty aircraft and thirty
helicopter gunships. For the first time, the Ethiopian air
force dropped airborne units behind rebel lines in northeast
Sahel awraja (subregion). When Ethiopian forces failed to
capture the city, the Mengistu regime ordered two more
attacks on Nakfa, each of which ended in the government's
defeat.
In 1986 the EPLF relied on more traditional guerrilla
tactics in its operations against the Ethiopian armed
forces. On January 14, 1986, for example, a rebel commando
unit, armed with rocket launchers and hand grenades, again
penetrated the Asmera air base, destroying more than forty
aircraft and burning the installation's ammunition and fuel
depots. Apart from the impact on the Ethiopian air force,
this attack caused the Soviet Union to terminate its
reconnaissance flights to and from Asmera. The following
May, EPLF artillery units bombarded Ethiopian positions in
and around Mitsiwa, destroying fuel tanks and tankers.
Regular units also overran government garrisons located
about thirty kilometers south of Asmera.
Concurrent with these military operations, the EPLF
continued its political offensive against the Mengistu
regime. On September 23, 1986, the rebels celebrated their
twenty-fifth year of resistance by calling on the
Organization of African Unity (OAU), the League of Arab
States (Arab League), the UN, and the Nonaligned Movement to
recognize the legitimacy of their claim to nationhood. Then,
on November 25, the EPLF announced that it had merged with
an ELF faction that had severed ties with its parent group.
The EPLF also continued efforts to reach an accommodation
with another ELF faction, the Eritrean Liberation Front-
Revolutionary Council, led by Ahmad Nasir.
The armed struggle in Eritrea entered 1987 with neither the
EPLF nor the Ethiopian government willing to abandon the use
of military force to achieve their political objectives.
However, the Mengistu regime abandoned its costly strategy
of launching annual major counteroffensives in Eritrea,
preferring instead a policy of defensive containment while
rebuilding its army, which still had not recovered from the
October 1985 offensive.
The EPLF also kept its military activities to a minimum.
Apart from various hit-and-run operations, one of the
largest rebel engagements occurred on March 20, when the
EPLF clashed with four Ethiopian army brigades in Eritrea's
northern zone. In the two-day battle, the EPLF claimed
government forces suffered 650 casualties.
The following year, the EPLF, which by then had
approximately 30,000 full-time fighters plus an unknown
number of part-time personnel, stepped up its military
activities in Eritrea. On March 19, 1988, the rebels
inflicted a defeat on Ethiopia's Second Revolutionary Army
at the garrison town of Afabet. According to British
historian and Africa specialist Basil Davidson, the Afabet
victory was one of the biggest ever scored by any liberation
movement anywhere since Dien Bien Phu in Vietnam in 1954.
Rebel spokesmen indicated that the EPLF had destroyed an
Ethiopian army corps, comprising three divisions totaling
18,000 to 20,000 personnel. The rebels also had captured
several thousand Ethiopian soldiers, three Soviet military
advisers, and an array of equipment.
The Ethiopian government, which launched an unsuccessful
counteroffensive in June 1988 against the EPLF, eventually
ordered the evacuation of all foreign personnel working for
humanitarian and relief organizations in Eritrea.
Additionally, Addis Ababa told these organizations to
relinquish all food and nonfood assistance to the
government's Relief and Rehabilitation Commission (RRC).
Many Western governments, including that of the United
States, objected to this decision because they feared
Mengistu would resort to using food as a weapon against
Eritrean and Tigrayan rebels and their sympathizers.
Another development associated with the Eritrean triumph at
Afabet was the EPLF's and TPLF's acknowledgment of each
other's military victories, something that had not happened
since a disagreement between the two groups in 1985 (see
The
Tigray, this ch.). In addition, the two groups issued a
reconciliation statement in Damascus, Syria, and promised to
coordinate future military actions to bring an end to the
Mengistu regime. However, the EPLF-TPLF relationship
continued to experience difficulties, largely because of
disagreement over strategy and tactics, over the next
several years.
Apart from further demoralizing the Ethiopian army, the
Afabet victory also gave impetus to the peace process. In
early July 1989, Yuri Yukalov, director of the African
department at the Soviet Ministry of Foreign Affairs, met
with EPLF secretary general Issaias Afwerki. The meeting was
significant because it was the first serious contact between
the Soviet Union and the EPLF and because it demonstrated to
Mengistu that Moscow was no longer willing to provide
unlimited military assistance to support his military
strategy in northern Ethiopia.
The EPLF sustained its military pressure on the Mengistu
regime in 1989. On January 17, rebel units launched a
preemptive attack against Ethiopian troops located northwest
of the Asmera-Mitsiwa road. During the two-day battle, the
EPLF claimed to have killed, wounded, or captured some 2,600
Ethiopian soldiers, in the process destroying twenty-one
tanks and capturing eight others, together with a variety of
small- and medium-caliber weapons. On February 19, EPLF
units, operating in conjunction with the TPLF, struck and
captured the town of Inda Silase in Tigray. Over the next
few months, the EPLF defeated an Ethiopian contingent at Adi
Kwala, a town ninety kilometers south of Asmera (March 15);
repulsed an Ethiopian army attempt to cut off the EPLF
fortifications around Keren (March 22-29); and killed or
wounded approximately 1,000 Ethiopian soldiers at Adi Goroto
(March 27-29).
In mid-1989, after Mengistu had succeeded in thwarting a
coup attempt, the EPLF and the Ethiopian government agreed
to enter into negotiations mediated by former United States
president Jimmy Carter. After a round of preliminary
negotiations, which opened on September 7, 1989, at the
Carter Presidential Center at Emory University in Atlanta,
Georgia, the two sides agreed to hold another round of peace
talks in Nairobi, Kenya, beginning on November 20, 1989.
These talks failed to produce a peace agreement. Subsequent
meetings in Washington, chaired by United States assistant
secretary of state for African affairs Herman Cohen, also
accomplished little.
Meanwhile, government forces continued to suffer
battlefield defeats. On February 10, 1990, the EPLF captured
the port of Mitsiwa. The fall of this strategically
important port isolated Ethiopia's Second Revolutionary Army
and eventually resulted in the loss of Eritrea.
Additionally, the EPLF used its small fleet of armed speed
boats to sink or cripple most Ethiopian navy ships anchored
in Mitsiwa harbor. Then, in August, the EPLF launched an
offensive along the Dekemhare front, south of Asmera. During
this operation, the rebels killed or wounded more than
11,000 government soldiers and captured two tanks, many
vehicles, and more than 1,000 medium and light weapons.
Although government forces enjoyed a few minor victories at
the end of 1990, the EPLF remained in control of most of
Eritrea.
In early 1991, the rebels started their final offensive
against government forces by driving south along the Red Sea
coast, a movement that by early April brought them to the
gates of Aseb. At the same time, they formed an alliance
with other rebel groups operating as the Ethiopian People's
Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) and contributed at
least eight brigades to the EPRDF to aid in military
operations in Gonder and Gojam. By the end of April, the
EPLF controlled nearly all of Eritrea, the major exceptions
being Keren, Asmera, and Aseb. In late May, the EPLF assumed
control of these towns without heavy fighting and without
Ethiopian government reprisals against civilians. The
120,000-member Second Revolutionary Army surrendered in
Asmera on May 24, the same day that Keren capitulated, the
garrison at Aseb following suit the next day. Having
occupied all of Eritrea, the EPLF announced its intention to
repatriate all Ethiopian soldiers, security personnel, WPE
members, and ordinary citizens back to Ethiopia. Shortly
thereafter, EPLF leader Issaias Afwerki indicated that as
far as he was concerned, Eritrea was an independent state.
Data as of 1991
|
