(The following article is from the January 1-31, 2009, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $25/year, or $12 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $25 US per year; other overseas readers - $25 US or $35 CDN per year. Send to: People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St., Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.)

By Stephen Von Sychowski

In December 2006, Ethiopian troops entered Somalia and toppled the Islamic Courts Union (ICU) government which controlled much of the country. A vicious guerilla war ensued between invading forces and various Somalian forces. The African Union pledged 8,000 peacekeepers towards the conflict. To this day only Uganda and Burundi have sent troops, which total just fewer than 3,500. And now, two years later, Ethiopia has announced its withdrawal.

     This war, which has killed unknown thousands of civilians and fighters, was hardly mentioned in the corporate media. When it was, it was portrayed in classic imperialist style as a war between brutal and uncivilized Third World peoples. Behind this charade, however, is the blood soaked hand of imperialism.

     The U.S. sees Somalia much the way it sees the Third World in general; as a source of natural resources (oil, iron ore, copper, salt, etc.) and potential cheap labour. Somalia has also long been considered a strategic base of operations due to its proximity to the Red Sea and the Suez Canal.

     After Somalia's central government collapsed in the early 1990s, it was invaded by U.S. troops who were driven out in 1993. But attempts at U.S. domination didn't stop there. The U.S. was quick to prop up tyrannical governments in neighbouring Ethiopia since the counter-revolution in that country in 1991. The current government of Ethiopia, which was puppeteered into this disastrous war by U.S. imperialism, is no exception.  

     In 2001, the U.S. carried out military operations inside Somalia, claiming that it was a "failed state" and a potential breeding ground for Al Qaeda operatives. In 2002, they established a military base at Camp Le Monier in nearby Djibouti, and proceeded to carry out covert operations in the region from that base. And finally, in 2004, the U.S. attempted to impose a "transition government" in Somalia. But the "transitional government" never took root; instead, the ICU swept through the country establishing its rule and forcing the "transitional government" into isolation.

     The ICU was an Islamic Fundamentalist movement, carrying with it reactionary social policies and establishing an Islamic theocracy. Despite this they became exceedingly popular, because they brought order and normalcy to a country that had endured more than a decade of war and violent chaos. Furthermore, they opposed the presence of foreign troops in Somalia. While politically and socially reactionary, the ICU constituted an objectively anti-imperialist force. Naturally, they were quickly identified as "terrorist" and enemies of U.S. imperialism.    

     With troop shortages, crushing debt, public opinion turning against the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and "Black Hawk Down" still fresh in the U.S. people's minds, it was much easier for Bush to have neighbouring Ethiopia fight U.S. imperialism's war than to conduct it directly with U.S. forces.

     But the fierce resistance of the Somalian people through the application of guerilla warfare has forced the Ethiopian troops from the Somalian countryside. While this constitutes a defeat for imperialism, one can hardly rejoice. Somalia is now worse off than two years ago, with even less in the way of a clear central government, and a variety of ideologically opposed factions looking to take power. We can only hope that this process can be carried out relatively peacefully. It also remains to be seen what will come of the remaining foreign forces from Uganda and Burundi.

     Today, it seems only one thing is certain: in a world of capitalist crisis where imperialism is taking losses every day, for a moment the eyes of anti-imperialists around the world will fall on Somalia, reminding us that they can be defeated. Today in Somalia, tomorrow in Iraq and Afghanistan.