A year ago (December 2006) the US government persuaded Ethiopia to invade Somalia, giving it military and financial backing to remove from power the Union of Islamic Courts (UIC) and replace it with the transitional federal government (TFG). Both Washington and Addis Ababa thought at the time that they had gained effective control of Somalia by replacing the UIC with an administration made up of warlords, military officers and secular officials. But now they have no doubt that whatever control they had has crumbled:
Ethiopia – which already has thousands of troops in Somalia, ostensibly to protect the tiny and powerless transitional government – appears about to launch full-scale war against the Islamic Courts Union (ICU), which controls most of the war-torn country, including the capital, Mogadishu, and is trying to restore Somali unity. It is in Ethiopia's strategic interest that Somalia continues to be a failed state nominally managed by a weak government that is controlled by it and its allies through the UN.
The Eritrean people and their leaders, who demonstrated a remarkable capacity for unity during a long and difficult struggle for independence, are beginning to show signs of restiveness at their president’s increasingly autocratic rule...
