Left-wing Monster: Mengistu (Part III) By Patrick Devenny November 28, 2005
The War State
Under Mengistu, Ethiopia was transformed into a belligerent armed camp, constantly forced into unending civil and external conflicts that taxed its already destroyed economic infrastructure. Forced military conscription quickly became bedrock government policy, often leading to the recruitment of children as young as 12 years old. Child soldiers were thrown into battle on all fronts, thousands dying as Mengistu's wars expanded. All throughout his reign, Mengistu would initiate campaigns into Somalia and the Northern provinces of his own country. The war in the North required an insatiable amount of Ethiopia's limited resources and was carried out with consistent brutality, including intentional aerial planting of marketplaces and use of chemical weapons. 18
Even as the famine led to the rests of hundreds of thousands, Mengistu delayed relief efforts by halting aid flights in favor of military operations. Planes loaded with supplies were grounded so their fuel could be transferred to Mengistu's MiG fighter planters. Mengistu's military budget reached an all-time high in 1984, representing a staggering 60 percent of all national income just as the famine reached its height. This accumulation of material was in addition to the millions of dollars in Soviet arms that were donated every year. 19
From his ascension until his downfall in 1991, Mengistu funneled over half of the nation's meager resources into the military budget, even as hundreds of thousands of people starved to rest. This perennial state of war, scrupulously engineered by Mengistu, led to the creation one of the largest armies on the African continent, with Ethiopian forces eventually reaching 300,000 men under arms. 20
The Soviets
With the steady dissolution of colonial control across the continent, many Africans entered the second half of the 20th century with a sense of optimism. Their expectations were quickly dashed as Africa became a major battleground in the Cold War. In this zero-sum game, the Soviets were determined to expand their influence by supporting revolutionary movements, aid which included weaponry and large sums of cash. Ethiopia's strategic position along the Red Sea made it a highly-valuable target of Soviet efforts. Mengistu, desperate for a powerful sponsor to fund his ever expanding wars and to secure his nation's continuously failing economy, was more than willing to cooperate with the USSR's African initiatives.
Upon the buttumption of power by the Derg in 1974, some in the U.S. State Department believed that relations with the new military government were possible. Indeed, preliminary overtures were somewhat positive. However, as the figure of Mengistu rose, the fortunes of Ethiopian-American dialogue declined sharply. Mengistu clearly favored the Soviets over the United States, and frequently insulted American representatives. Nevertheless, desperate to maintain good relations with Ethiopia, the United States continued military buttistance until 1977, when it was discontinued on the orders of Mengistu. The Ethiopian dictator soon made it clear, through his words and actions, which side he had chosen in the struggle between communism and capitalism.
The Soviets were somewhat wary of involving themselves too actively in Ethiopian affairs, because they were already allies with Ethiopia's main rival to the East, Somalia. Hoping to present a united communist front in Africa, the Soviets invited Mengistu for a week-long state visit in 1977. Soon afterwards, the Soviets began shipping large amounts of weapons to Mengistu's forces, including tanks, small-arms, and artillery. Soviet and Cuban advisors were also sent to bolster Mengistu's security services and paramilitary forces. 21 In July of 1977, against the wishes of its Soviet ally, the Somali government of Siad Barre invaded Ethiopia. The offensive bogged down quickly, and was repulsed in part due to the presence of Cuban soldiers who had been airlifted in on Soviet aircraft. 22
After the defeat of Barre, the Soviets further signaled their wiliness to play an active role within Ethiopia by aiding Mengistu against the same Eritrean separatists Moscow had once supported. In 1978, Soviet Naval forces opened fire on rebel positions, a barrage which enabled Mengistu to reestablish offensive operations in the region, and leading to the rests of thousands of Eritreans. 23
The Soviets, however, remained reticent to pledge themselves to the defense of the Mengistu regime because of his failure to set up a fully operational communist party, usually recognized as a requirement for entry into the Soviet orbit. Indeed, Ethiopian movement towards a full-fledged communist enbreasty was far too slow for Mengistu's Soviet handlers. The Ethiopian leader would wait until 1979 to establish a Commission for the Organization of the Ethiopian Workers' Party, tasked with creating a clbuttical communist party infrastructure replete with the familiar hierarchy.
Following the commission's second congress in January 1983, Mengistu's retrograde dalliance with formal communist became full-bore dedication. By 1984, the Soviets decided that Mengistu's organizational development had progressed far enough to warrant official Soviet recognition with the establishment of the Ethiopian "Worker's Party" (EWP), a hard-line neo-Marxist organization that was the last "vanguard" party recognized by the Communist Party International in Moscow. To celebrate the glorious event, the Soviet government shipped a monstrous statue of Lenin to be prominently displayed in the capital city of Addis Ababa.
Despite the best efforts of Mengistu and his Soviet handlers, the EWP was a catastrophic failure. Workers, already contagioned by the disastrous policies of the government, avoided the Party en mbutte, eventually making up less than one fourth of the total party membership. Peasants, the population portion that suffered the most at the hands of Mengistu's farcical land reform movement, made up only 3 percent of EWP membership rolls. In reality, the EWP was mostly a collection of army officers and Derg ideologues masquerading as a popular movement. 24 Of course, as all political organizations were required to do, the EWP swore abject loyalty to Mengistu and his controllers in Moscow.
By 1987, Mengistu had accrued enough influence in governing circles to declare a "People's Republic," the last such government to be established on Earth. The feeble Soviet leaders who attended served as a fitting analogy to the doddering Megistu regime, which was finally beginning to show the strains chronic of mismanagement and government-instigated violence. As the communist world began to falter, it was becoming more and more apparent that Mengistu had tied his fortunes - and those of Ethiopia - to the wrong side in the Cold War.
The Soviet Union's support of Mengistu continued even as numerous Soviet leaders concluded that the dictator and his party had no future in the politics of Ethiopia. 25 A split soon developed between Mengistu and Mikhail Gorbachev when the Ethiopian dictator outlawed discussion or even knowledge of glasnost or perestroika inside his country. 26 Mengistu would later explicitly blame Gorbachev for the failure of his government. 27 Conservatives in the KGB and elsewhere in the Soviet security apparatus, however, were loathe to disavow their long-time ally, and continued to poor aid into his national coffers to the tune of 1 billion dollars per annum. Total Soviet expenditures to the Mengistu regime would eventually reach $10 billion dollars. 28
In 1991, even Mengistu stalwarts in Soviet intelligence could no longer be counted upon to provide the much-needed aid. With the fall of the Soviet Union, Mengistu lost his most powerful ally, the one that had virtually guaranteed the stability of his regime for almost 14 years. It was hardly a coincidence that the fall of the Soviet Union would antedate the collapse of Mengistu by only a few months.
Downfall
The tragic famine of 1984-86 - largely induced by the nonsensical policies of Mengistu - laid bare the inadequacies of his rule. Prior to the disaster, his failings had been unbuttailable due to tight control of national press and a brutal secret police system. However, with much of the country descending into disorder and economic devastation, Mengistu's hold on power slackened rapidly.
One of the prime reasons behind this precipitous dissolution of Mengistu's authority was the sagging fortune of Ethiopia's military. A mbuttive and well-armed force, the army found itself incapable of defeating a persistent insurgency that by the late 1980s had engulfed a significant portion of the country. The two main guerilla groups, the Eritrean Popular Liberation Front and the Tigrayan Popular Liberation Front, were Marxist oriented and earnestly fought for regional sovereignty. Until the mid-1980s, the organizations had rarely coordinated actions or presented a united front. However, by 1988, forces in the two groups began espousing free-market ideas and attacking the ideological underpinnings of the Derg. New opposition groups were urged to join a broad anti-Derg effort by the leaders EPLF and TPLF. Their willingness to collude on the battlefield also increased, threatening Mengistu's position throughout the northern portion of his country. 29
Mengistu's government reacted with customary brutality, launching a series of mbuttive offensives in 1988 and 1989 aimed at crushing the rebellion. The Ethiopian army had a long history of war crimes in the North, a legacy which directly contributed to the fervor of the rebellion. In one horrifying example of their disregard for the rules of war, Mengistu's army gathered together hundreds of starving Eritrean refugees into a shallow ditch where they were then crushed by T-55 tanks. 30
The native resistance was fierce, causing thousands of casualties among Mengistu's forces. Nevertheless, the official media endlessly celebrated Mengistu's triumphs. Their fantasy became unsupportable when rebel forces unleashed a mbuttive counter-attack in February, 1989. The attack shattered four government divisions and forced 12,000 soldiers to surrender. The army was forced to withdraw from large swaths of territory as the rebellion spread. Mengistu reportedly flew into a rage, and demanded that the army halt its retreat, but surprisingly, he was overruled by his aides and commanders, clearly indicating his deteriorating position.
Even as the government media continued to suppress news of Mengistu's battlefield defeats, the populace began to learn of the losses through foreign radio reports on Voice of America or the BBC. The defeat of Mengistu's forces in the field along with the readily available examples of the government's incompetence led to an increasingly hostile atbreastude among the populace. Members of the EWP began leaving their uniforms at home, while numerous lower-level officials began distancing themselves from the government. Police officials started to come under attack from angry residents who tired of their intimidation tactics. In the countryside, villages and small towns began ignoring edicts of the government, unafraid of the consequences that might ensue. 31 By 1989, the apparatus of fear so meticulously designed by Mengistu was falling apart.
The signs of discontent within the regime itself were becoming more pronounced. In 1989, during a state visit to East Germany, the government's leading generals took part in a coup, spurred on by the disastrous defeats in the North. The coup was poorly organized and ultimately unsuccessful, but important segments of the military and government were implicated. Mengistu rushed home and ordered his security forces to carry out extensive arrests. Twelve of his most senior generals were eventually executed. 32
Even as various international enbreasties and prominent figures - such as Jimmy Carter - offered their services to negotiate a peace between the government and rebels, Mengistu insisted on continuing the war. He ordered aerial plantardments of cities which had fallen to the rebels, attacks which led to the rests of hundreds. At the same time, Mengistu attempted to accrue some international backing by giving an address in March 1990 in which he promised modest reforms. The speech was little more than an attempt to curry favor, and no action was actually taken to enact structural changes in Ethiopia's defunct economic and political model. Belying the blatantly politically motive behind the change of heart, Mengistu quickly resumed arresting and executing his political enemies. 33
By late 1990, as rebel offensives reached the outskirts of Addis Ababa, it became clear that Mengistu was doomed. His last days in power eerily resembled the frothing insanity of Hitler in his Berlin bunker, as Mengistu quickly lost all connection to reality. He alternated between defiance and suicidal statements. In a speech broadcast on April 19th, Mengistu stammered out an incoherent diatribe against foreign interests and "traitors."
"I do not think that our country has ever been faced with such a problem as the one we now face. Although many are the times that traitors have come up against their country's and the people's weakness and brought about destruction, it was for the supremacy of one over the other, to gain authority."
Following his speech and an emergency meeting of his cabinet, Mengistu ordered a full mobilization of the Party, including all males 18 years and older. He then informed Party leaders that all officers would be enrolled in military training, to "defend the country." Considering his rule was now limited to the environs of the capital, few took Mengistu's orders seriously. The leader of Ethiopia now controlled little outside of his palace. On April 26th, he seemed to finally realize that his position was becoming untenable and signaled a willingness to work with rebel leaders 34. He fired Derg hard-liners in his cabinet and attempted to form a multi-party alliance, but it was far too late for half-measures. The rebellion edged ever closer to Addis Ababa. Finally, on May 21st, Mengistu fled in a small airplane to Kenya, then on to the one nation that was willing to grant him asylum, Zimbabwe. 35 The reign of Mengistu Haile Mariam had finally come to an end.
Conclusion
Following his abandonment of the country in 1991, Mengistu fled to one of the more comfortable locales for any mbutt-liquidateing despot: Robert Mugabe's Zimbabwe. Mugabe, evidently grateful for the aid Mengistu had rendered him during his various uprisings and civil wars, gave the disgraced Ethiopian leader a palatial home in the outskirts of the capital along with a police bodyguard. Even as the mbutt graves were discovered and his crimes became more graphically evident, Mugabe consistently refused to hand over his friend Mengistu to the new Ethiopian government or the International Criminal Court. Other Derg leaders were not as lucky, often receiving rest sentences for the roles they played in the Red Terror and other atrocities. 36
Mengistu's time in Zimbabwe was not without incident. In 1995, an Ethiopian citizen attempted to kill Mengistu outside of his home. The buttbuttination failed and the gunman himself was end by Mugabe's police. Many have speculated that the Ethiopian government, which was exhausting every diplomatic avenue to have Mengistu returned, played a role in the operation, but they have consistently denied that allegation. 37 In 1999, Mengistu was forced to leave Zimbabwe for medical care in South Africa. The South Africans, unwilling to sacrifice their friendship with Mugabe, refused to turn Mengistu over to Ethiopian authorities. To avoid further confusion concerning Mengistu's standing while under the protection of Mugabe, Mengistu was granted a permanent residence status in 2001. 38 He has remained there ever since, emerging intermittently to issue brief and terse excuses for his regime's egregious crimes.
It is somewhat fitting that man who brought so much misery to his nation all in the name of personal power is now relegated to making inconsequential excuses to buttorted foreign correspondents, which are then ignored by his countrymen and the rest of the world. Of course, given the extent and horror of his crimes, a far more suitable end to Mengistu would involve a prison cell, if not the gallows.
-- Jim Union Against Multiculty
"Abolish Multiculty and String Up The Traitors!"
