Quoting Ethiopian Radio, Reuters reported today that since May 12, 2000, "Ethiopian forces have knocked 14 of Eritrea's 24 army divisions out of action." According to the report, this means that Ethiopia has "killed, wounded and captured" 77,000 Eritreans in less than three weeks. What's more, the remaining 10 Eritrean army divisions are "badly damaged."
Except for a handful of Eritrean military commanders, nobody really knows the extent of the damage Ethiopia has inflicted during its invasion of Eritrea. Given our tiny population and the value we place on an Eritrean life, if its claims are exaggerated by a 1000%, it is a national tragedy. If its claims are exaggerated by 300% it is still a nightmare. If its claims are exaggerated by 200% it is still a disaster. If its claims are exaggerated by 100%, it is still a catastrophe.
Is this a credible claim? In other words, what is the credibility of Ethiopian media and the Ethiopian Government when reporting Eritrean casualties?
Late last year, Ethiopian TV (ETV) produced a summary of the Ethiopian-Eritrean war entitled "Ethiopia-Eritrea Conflict in Perspective in 1991 E.C [Ethiopian Calendar]." In the report, Ethiopia claimed that "over 100,000" Eritrean soldiers had been "put out of action." The breakdown provided was as follows:
(1) February 1999: 10,000 Eritreans put out of action at the Badme Front ("Operation Sunset") (2) March 4, 1999:- 8,000 Eritreans put out of action in the Zalambesa Front (3) March 14 - March 19: 45,000 Eritreans put out of action at the Tsorona Front (4) April 1999: Bombing of Sawa, Asab and Massawa - unspecified number of Eritreans put out of action (5) May - June 1999: 30,000 Eritreans put out of action in repeated efforts to retake Badme
Let's look at each claim to see how credible it is:
February 1999: The Ethiopian Offensive (Operation Sunset) that dislodged Eritrea from Badme was a frontal assault on a heavily fortified position. When the trenches were broken, Eritrea retreated immediately. In fact, it was Eritrea that announced that it had withdrawn and it took Ethiopia more than 24 hours to confirm that it really had occupied Badme. Eritrean authorities who were asked about the operation have repeatedly said that our losses were "minimal." There were all sorts of numbers floating around but the most authoritative sounding was the Economist which described Eritrean loss as around 3,500. A huge number by our standards but nowhere near that claimed by Ethiopia.
March 4, 1999: This was a retroactive war: the Ethiopian Government did not even mention this alleged war back in March of 1999. It looks like a date, place and number pulled out of a hat.
March 14 - March 19: This was the Killing Fields of Tsorona where thousands of Ethiopian mine sweepers were herded and slaughtered. This huge military blunder which the Ethiopian Government denied at the time; then said that it was a mere skirmish staged by Eritrea for gullible journalists and one which current Ethiopian intellectuals consider a mistake that Ethiopia learned from was, nonetheless, presented by Ethiopia as a war that resulted in 45,000 Eritreans being put out of action. This alone should destroy the Ethiopian Government's credibility.
April 1999: There was a brief period of post-Tsorona frustration when the Ethiopian Airforce bombed Asab and claimed to have scored a direct hit on a reservoir (contradicted by journalists), when it bombed Massawa and hit a tire garage and claimed to have hit an oil deport, bombed a church in Adi Keyh and hit civilians and claimed it hit Sawa. The Ethiopian Government did not provide the number of casualties but for the numbers to round up to "over 100,000" it must mean they are claiming they "put out of action" over 7,000 Eritreans in these raids.
May - June 1999: This was the period that Ethiopia tells us that Eritrea made repeated attempts to reclaim Badme and, in the process, lost 30,000. From everything you know about Eritrean operations, does this sound consistent with its military strategy of trying to preserve manpower?
Whatever the precise numbers, the casualties on both sides are in the thousands-which is truly tragic if only because it was totally avoidable. Ethiopia justified its war by saying that its sovereignty had been violated, that Eritrea should be taught a lesson it should never forget and for Ethiopia to concentrate on its "war against poverty" it must first eliminate the Eritrean threat. To do that, it waged a four-pronged effort: economic, political, social and military.
Economically, it implemented a virtual trade embargo on Eritrea by boycotting its ports, by stopping all trade. When that didn't bring the much-promised Eritrean "economic meltdown", the Ethiopian Government tried to solicit the help of the international community-especially the US--by painting the Eritrean Government as a rogue government, a "rule of the jungle" government, a government that engages in illicit trade, a government that supports the "It-tiHad" movement, a friend of Libya so that the West could label Eritrea a terrorist state and prevent those in Diaspora from submitting remittances to a terrorist state. (That, too, didn't work although the fact that the State Department actually gave it serious consideration is alarming.)
Politically, it formed alliances with the Alliance-a conglomeration of Eritrean opposition groups whose agenda includes changing the Eritrean Government by force. This group has probably already been planted in Tesenei to embark on the Somalization of Eritrea. How does a civil war in Eritrea help Ethiopia's "war against poverty"?
Socially, it destroyed the bonds between Eritreans and Ethiopians by deporting tens of thousands of Ethiopians who had no crime other than being Eritreans. This is probably the most shameful, do-whatever-it-takes-to-win policy of the Ethiopian Government that has poisoned the relationship between the two people. Of all the things the Eritrean Government did, I am most proud that it did not reciprocate in kind although it had immense pressures from Eritreans to do and although, given the proximity of the war, it could have used the "national security" card more credibly that Ethiopia did. How does deporting Eritreans help Ethiopia's war against poverty?
Militarily, Ethiopia managed to occupy more than half of Eritrea and in the process of flexing its muscles, and its armaments to the "who won, who lost" media, it displaced hundreds of thousands of Eritreans reducing Eritrea to an old Ethiopian tradition: begging the world for help. It mattered little that Ethiopia lost tens of thousands of people. It mattered little that the war was entirely unnecessary. It mattered little that the fate of the millions suffering from drought and the hundreds of thousands dying of AIDS was considered of less importance. How does this help Ethiopia's professed desire to wage war against poverty?
Lessons For Eritrea
For Eritrea, the lesson, which we already knew but needed relearning is this: it is a lonely world and we have no one but ourselves to rely on. Alliances--especially ones that come at the expense of our citizens--are temporary and, in the end, backfire. I call on the Eritrean Government to disengage itself publicly from any entanglements--including the one with the Sudanese opposition who, no doubt, will turn against us--and do all it can to reconcile with all our citizens including any opposition group that will renounce violence. I would like the Eritrean Government to embrace political diversity and tolerance with the same zeal it fights ethnic and religious intolerance.