Futureless Somaliland, Somalia, Abyssinia, and Egypt (2008)

Futureless Somaliland, Somalia,
Abyssinia, and Egypt
We have to admit that Somalia lost a war against a Nuclear Superpower and
its satellites. This is the only truth. It is disreputable for a Somali not to say it
loudly, and not to be proud for having fought against the Soviet Union itself.
In two previous articles, titled ‘The Nile, Egypt, Abyssinia, Somalia, and
Somaliland’ (http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/57815 /
republished in 2021 here:
https://www.academia.edu/54525765/The_Nile_Egypt_Abyssinia_Somalia_
and_Somaliland_2008_) and ‘Nile Politics, Egypt, Sudan, Abyssinia, and the
Horn of Africa’ (http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/58054 /
https://www.academia.edu/54530133/Nile_Politics_Egypt_Sudan_Abyssini
a_and_the_Horn_of_Africa_2008_), I refuted Mr. Ahmed Ali Ibrahim
Sabeyse's response to my earlier article ‘Kosova and Somaliland: the
Impossible Equation’ (http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/53122 /
https://www.academia.edu/43318785/Kosova_and_Somaliland_the_Imposs
ible_Equation_2008).
Mr. Ahmed Ali Ibrahim Sabeyse's response seems to be a series of articles.

Following his first response (titled 'Kosovo and Somaliland: the Impossible
Equation – The Egyptian Position'), he came back with a second part, which
like the first was published in several East African portals; it seems he will go
on, and I must admit that I find this juxtaposition as a very good opportunity
for many East African readers (and not only) to seriously mull over the
subject discussed.
Mr. Sabeyse´s second article, titled ‘The Somali Irredentism and Regional
Politics’ (http://www.somalilandtalk.com/node/3229), consists in an effort
to present what was not delivered in the first diatribe, and more specifically to
demonstrate that Egypt's position against a formal recognition of the
breakaway state of Somaliland is due to an Egyptian – Abyssinian rivalry.
In the present article, I will publish Mr. Sabeyse’s second article and then
comment extensively on it. Numbers encrusted in the text refer to my
comments.
The Somali Irredentism and Regional Politics
By Ahmed Ali Ibrahim Sabeyse
How does Somalia fit into the overall Egyptian regional policy? 1 First of all,
to assuage any Ethiopian attempts to utilize the waters of the Blue Nile, 2 a
strong, united Somali state is the safest long term insurance policy. 3 During
the mid-1950's President invested in the independence movements of the
African continent and the Pan-Arab nationalism. 4 Somalia and Egypt
concluded a number of trade agreements. 5 The Arabic version of one of the
clause in one of the bilateral agreements stated the following: "Wa sowfa la
tudbaq al-Iiraadat-ul qatciya calal waaridat al munsha'a min-al-Somal.."
Roughly translated: "Customs duties shall not apply on imports originating
from Somalia." 6 It cost the Somali government to dispatch numerous
delegations to get this simple clause corrected. The missing thing is the
effective date of this customs duties exemption.
In 1963 during his return from some western capitals, Prime Minister
Abdulrashid Ali Sharmaarke, met in Cairo with President Jamal Abdulnasir
of Egypt. The Prime Minister failed to secure military assistance for the
Somali army. 7 However, through the intervention of president Nassir, the
Somali Prime Minister changed his itinerary and travelled to Moscow instead.
The result: The conclusion of a friendship and co-operation treaty between
Somalia and the Soviet Union. 8 Within few months, Soviet military hardware
start pouring into Somalia.
This perfectly matches the ages old irredentist Somali culture. 9 Ethiopia and
the defunct Somali state went to war over the Harraghe 10 region in

February/March, 1964 and again in June 1977/April 1978. At initial stages of
the 1977/1978 blitzkrieg, the Somali National Army, disguised as Western
Somali Liberation Front, overran most of the Ethiopian forward bases in the
Ogaden desert. 11 The latter war precipitated the final dismemberment of
Somalia. 12 A perpetual state of war between a unitary Somali state and
Ethiopia serves 13 the national interest of Egypt. 14 The people of Somaliland
15 have no desire to fall prey to the tangled web of a proxy war. 16 Like any
other post conflict society, 17 we ask ourselves the following question: Are we
18 better off charting our own destiny? 19 Certainly we are, compared with
the experience of thirty-and-half years of a dysfunctional union 20 with
‘southern Somalis.’ 21
The professor's one-dimensional analysis 22 has no substance at all- it is an
extension of the preceding rigid Egyptian Foreign policy. 23 The shenanigans
of these faulty assumptions 24 consequently lead to equally flawed
conclusions. 25
Without a thorough examination of contemporary political history of post
independence Somalia, 26 Dr. Megalommatis offers an over simplistic view of
the situation. 27 The union of the two former colonies 28 failed to develop a
cohesive national identity. 29 The Somali creed is culturally, socially,
ethnically, linguistically, and religiously a homogeneous society is a
misnomer 30 that no is longer applicable. 31 The same thing applies to the
outdated misconception that "the unity, the sovereignty, the territorial
integrity, and the national independence of Somalia is sacrosanct." 32 May I
draw to the attention of the distinguished professor that the nations of the
Arab League are homogeneous if culture, religion, language, and ethnicity 33
are the only criteria determining the characteristics of a unitary state? 34 The
Somalis do not fit into that category. 35
The withdrawal of Somaliland from an ill-fated union 36 with Somalia is one
of the latent symptoms of a much deadlier epidemic that fragmented and
eventually consumed the Somali polity. 37 As a minimum, the Somali crisis
merits an objective analysis of the causes in order to postulate a realistic
conflict resolution programme. 38 The Egyptian government views 39 the
unity of the old Somali Republic as a bulwark against any Ethiopian efforts 40
to divert the waters of the River Nile. This adds an unsettling new dimension
41 to an already volatile region. 42
For the benefit of the professor, the chronicles of the unitary Somali State will
shed some light on this issue.
To be continued...
Ahmed Ali Ibrahim Sabeyse

Comments
1. As the author tries to explain the relations between Egypt and Somalia
through the viewpoint of Egypt's policies of Pan-Arabism, and interpret
Somalia's participation in the Arab League as instrumental to Egypt's Nile
policies (because of an assumption that Egypt 'has' to always play or be as a
permanent counterweight to Abyssinia), I have to state beforehand that
simply Mr. Sabeyse never read any article of mine against Pan-Arabism and
has no idea about my scholarly viewpoint, my spiritual worldview, and my
academic approach to the very nefarious phenomenon of Pan-Arabism. As
many readers may read this article without having had an idea about this
subject, for them and for the speedy Mr. Sabeyse, I add here a non-exhaustive
list of articles (and the respective links to them) I have published on the
subject:
- The Secret Reasons of the Darfur Genocide: fake Arabic imposed on Non-
Arabs
http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/17560
(currently:
https://www.academia.edu/35045597/The_Secret_Reasons_of_the_Darfur_
Genocide_fake_Arabic_imposed_on_Non_Arabs_2006_)
- End the Darfur Genocide – 21st Century’s Most Outrageous Crime Against
Mankind / http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/17925
(currently:
https://www.academia.edu/54089527/End_the_Darfur_Genocide_21st_cent
ury_s_most_outrageous_crime_against_the_Mankind_)
- Modern Arabic: the Anglo-French Tool of Islamic Terrorism Promotion
(currently:
https://www.academia.edu/35195555/Modern_Arabic_the_Anglo_French_
Tool_of_Islamic_Terrorism_Promotion_2006_)
- Yemen and the fabrication of a bogus-Arabic nation
(currently:
https://www.academia.edu/54178393/Yemen_and_the_fabrication_of_a_bo
gus_Arab_nation_2007_)
- Pan-Arabism: the Inhuman Progenitor of Islamic Terrorism
(currently: https://www.academia.edu/23699776/Pan-
Arabism_the_inhuman_progenitor_of_Islamic_Terrorism_by_Prof._Muhamm
ad_Shamsaddin_Megalommatis)

Everything said about me, my interpretations, historical syntheses and
analyses, approaches and standpoints is irrelevant and/or mendacious, if it
contradicts my views therein expressed.
2. Somalia cannot 'assuage' Abyssinian attempts to utilize the ‘waters of the
Blue Nile’, and the Horn of Africa nation was never viewed by the Egyptian
foreign policy as possibly involved in this regard. Indeed, Abyssinia has
signed agreements with Egypt on the Nile water flow. Either Somalia exists or
not, if an agreement is violated, there will be a conflict or war. If there is a war
between Egypt and Abyssinia, the only possible allies that would be of
significance for Egypt are Sudan and Saudi Arabia. However, for various
reasons, Abyssinia was never able to envisage a perspective of war against
Egypt, as the military, technological and economic edge of Egypt is enough to
deter any initial thought. Do not misunderstand me; I do not consider Egypt
militarily strong as a NATO member state like Turkey or as (monarchical or
theocratic) Iran, but Abyssinia is so impotent, particularly in terms of military
aviation (the two countries have no common borders) that there is no point of
further discussion.
Again, this does not mean that Somalia is militarily insignificant; quite on the
contrary, Mogadishu demonstrated a great military capability when it
attempted to liberate Ogaden in 1977. At the time, one could establish a
military comparison between Somalia with Israel – certainly not in absolute
terms. Israel only rarely attacked directly countries larger than itself;
however, in the late 70s, Somalia attacked a much larger country, and
advanced successfully and victoriously. In fact, Somalia won over Abyssinia,
because the extraordinary assortment of tyrannized nations that the Amhara
and Tigray rulers have in their hands can never become a force.
Abandoned by America and Europe, Somalia lost to the combined military,
diplomatic, and technological forces of Cuba and Soviet Union, not to
Abyssinia. Why and how should an unequipped and incapable country,
which cannot carry out a successful war against another -much smaller-
country, be a matter of concern for Egypt?
All this does not minimize the importance that Egypt has always given to
Somalia within the context of Cairo's Pan-Arabist policies, but this is another
issue. I do not consider Somalia as an Arabic speaking country, I do not find
any reason for a united, free and independent Somalia to be a member state of
the Arab League, and I do not accept the forgery of Pan-Arabism already for
Egypt; this theory did harm to the Land of the Pharaohs, there is no doubt.
But, again, all this has nothing to do with Egypt’s Nile policies.
3. It is quite interesting that the author pursues his argumentation without
offering the slightest element of support to his assumption. All he is going to

say in the rest of the text reveals the importance that Egypt and the Arab
League gave to Somalia within the context of Pan-Arabism (which is for me
an aberration) – not the Nile politics. Indeed, if Abyssinia was a potential
threat, an Egyptian – Sudanese alliance and military agreement would suffice
to open the way of the Egyptian soldiers to Gondar and Bahar Dar. The
subsequent rebellion of the Oromos, the Ogadenis, the Afars, the Sidamas,
and all the other tyrannized nations of Abyssinia would put a tombstone on
Africa’s cruelest and most inhuman colonial tyranny, without the need for
Somalia to be an ally for Egypt.
4. Yes, this statement is very correct indeed. In and by itself, it outmaneuvers
the author's attempt to justify the link made between Egypt’s perception of
Somalia’s usefulness as an ally and the Nile politics. In the early 60s, Egypt in
alliance with India and Yugoslavia played a role against the interests of the
colonial powers, England and France, while pursuing a rather balanced stance
between America and Soviet Union. Pan-Arabism is the main reason for all
misfortunes and problems of Egypt; as a theory, it was planned by the
colonial academia long before the collapse of the kingdom in Egypt (1952),
and projected on various unrelated (to one another) nations of the Middle
East and Northern Africa; finally, it damaged them all in a multifaceted way.
5. I have no doubt about the different ways that the Egyptian diplomacy used
in order to make of Egypt the focal country of Pan-Arabism; however, it was a
very erroneous concept that triggered confusion of identity, lack of viable
cultural and educational policy, and grave political conflicts among different
nations that were not Arabic but were ruled by ignorant, self-indoctrinated
and idiotic elites only to drive their countries to self-destruction. But again, all
this does not prove anything as regards Egypt’s concern to set up an alliance
with Somalia in order to materialize objectives pertaining to Nile politics.
6. Translated to English or to any other language, this statement does not
change the reality: it is irrelevant to Egypt's objectives pertaining to Nile
politics.
7. This clearly backfires; it demonstrates that Egypt did not view Somalia as a
military ally against Abyssinia, and more particularly with respect to the Nile
politics.
8. The Egyptian gesture was purely diplomatic; it helped offer another
country to become an ally of Soviet Union. If now one considers this as a
mistaken foreign policy of Somalia, the conclusion may be right, but again it
does not concern the Nile politics, and does not prove the existence of an anti-
Abyssinian dimension in the two countries’ diplomacies.
9. "The ages old irredentist Somali culture"; the statement sounds as if just
made by a ferocious enemy of the Somali nation, a criminal and barbaric,

bloodthirsty monster like Menelik, Zauditu, Haile Selassie, Mengistu, Melese
Zenawi. The term, if put in the mouth of any Somali native speaker, turns
automatically the orator to a high traitor and impostor. As a matter of fact,
Irredentism signifies advocacy for territorial claims on the basis of prior
historical possession. However, when it comes to legitimate demands of
oppressed and tyrannized nations, like the Ogadenis of Abyssinia, for
liberation, we cannot use the term 'irredentism', which ultimately turned out
to acquire a negative and expansionist connotation. All the same, the term
was first used in Italian: 'Italia irredenta' (unredeemed) was a term used for
the designation of territories with partly Italian population that were ruled by
the Austrian – Hungarian Empire prior to WW I. It is however better to make
a distinction between irredentism and legitimate claims for the liberation of
populations unwillingly included within a state ruled by another nation.
Somalia has permanent and rightful entitlement to Ogaden. For the quite
submissive (to the Neo-Nazi Abyssinian elite) author, History seems to
peremptorily start with the arrival of the colonial powers in Somalia. It is
most offensive for any Somali native speaker to minimize his own nation's
History to just 10 – 13 decades. Somalia’s most glorious History covers the
span of 40 centuries, drawing back from Ancient Punt (later called Opone in
the classical Greco-Roman sources – in the Horn of Africa, Cape Guardafui,
area) through Azania of the Late Antiquity and the Islamic Times’ Sultanates.
Contrarily to the falsehood published in Wikipedia, never did a part of the
Somalia's northwestern confines belong to the Axumite Abyssinian Kingdom.
South of Egypt and Sudan, which is the true historical Ethiopia of the classical
Greco-Roman sources, the greatest African radiation of Culture and
Civilization emanated from Somalia, not Abyssinia.
Abyssinia, fallaciously renamed as ‘Ethiopia’, is an illegal state – direct threat
to the entire Mankind. The Abyssinian control over Ogaden is a transfer of
colonial pseudo-rights and as such, it represents, after all the perpetrated
crimes against the Ogadenis, one of the bleakest pages of African History. The
rightful Somali willingness to detach Ogaden from the inhuman clutches of
the Neo-Nazi Amhara and Tigray elites meets precisely the top wishes of the
oppressed Ogadenis, who are Somalis like all the rest. There is no
'irredentism' involved in this regard.
10. The anti-Somali hatred, which is reflected in the text, is enough for me to
question whether Mr. Sabeyse earns his life by simply lending his name to
texts written by the illegal tyrants of Abyssinia. Abyssinia did not enter to
war with a 'defunct' state, because this is simply impossible; a defunct state
simply does not exist. The war took place in Ogaden. And what makes the
author's sentence even less credible is the fact that all the Ogadenis, the
Oromos, the Afars, the Sidamas, the Kaffas, the Shekachos, the Anuak, the
Agaw, the Kambattas, and the Wolayitas did not wish to oppose and did not

oppose the Somali army. All these oppressed nations of Abyssinia, and all the
Amhara and Tigray Muslims sided with the rightful Somalis. So, it was not
'Abyssinia' (fallaciously and treacherously renamed ‘Ethiopia’) that entered in
war with Somalia.
It was the elites of the unrepresentative and tyrannical state of Abyssinia, the
ethno-religious groups of the Monophysitic Amharas and Tigrays (so just 18%
of the country's population), that entered in war against Somalia. And they
lost it, until the Cubans, their communist brigades, the Soviet military experts,
advisors and intelligence entered in war against the brave Somali army.
Finally, we have to admit that Somalia lost a war against a Nuclear
Superpower and its satellites. This is the only truth. It is disreputable for a
Somali not to say it loudly, and not to be proud for having fought against the
Soviet Union itself.
11. Mr. Sabeyse should remember that liar is not only the one who distorts the
truth, but also he who hides it. You cannot speak about the Ogaden
Liberation War without referring to the Cubans and the Soviets; you become
ridiculous.
12. Another point of inconsistency and absurdity; the 1977-78 war did not
'precipitate' developments that took place after …. 13 years. The reasons of
Somalia's civil war are far more perplex than just a military failure against a
nuclear superpower. And 'precipitated' event is something that happens
within some weeks or months after another, earlier development; not 13 years
later!
Even worse for the Anti-Somali, Somali author, Somalia has not been
dismembered, and will never be dismembered, despite the evil wish of the
criminal Neo-Nazi Abyssinians. Dismemberment means foreign invasions
from neighboring countries and annexation of parts of a country. If Kenya,
Djibouti, Yemen and Abyssinia invaded Somalia, and each of the invading
countries annexed a part of Somalia, then we could perhaps speak of
‘dismemberment’. Poland was dismembered and divided among Sweden,
Russia and Prussia. The Ottoman Empire was dismembered mainly by
France, England, Italy and the Balkan states. Today's Somalia is divided to
warring parts engaged in a civil war, and it has been partly invaded by the
Abyssinian death squads of Meles Zenawi.
13. This is comical; I do not see how a war between Somalia and Abyssinia
may be perpetual. It will only last as long as it takes for Ogaden to be
liberated. That’s all. Certainly Egypt, as an ally of Somalia in the Arab League,
would find the development positive, but so would any person and any
political authority supporting Freedom, Human Rights, Humanism, and
Democracy. If Egypt conceived and machinated a perpetuated war in Ogaden

without any winner, this would be at the detriment of the Somali nation; it
would not be a friendly act and attitude. I find again no reason for such
duplicity, and – which is more important – we never attested a diplomatic
attempt of the sort!
'Unitary Somalia' is also a fallacious term; do you expect, when reading any
article in any newspaper and portal, to read expressions like "unitary
Norway", "unitary Portugal" or "unitary Australia"? It's ridiculous. Of course,
when we speak of a nation, we mean a "unitary" nation. "Unitary Somalia" is a
pleonasm, a redundancy; Somalia is only 'unitary Somalia', and this will be
the end of the civil war, and of the partly invasion.
14. The sentence is said without any evidence to support it; it is an aphorism
like all the so-called arguments of Mr. Sabeyse. There is no proof that Egypt’s
national interests would demand something like that.
15. There is no 'people of Somaliland' because Somaliland is an illegitimate
pseudo-state. The Somalis comprised within the undemocratic realm that is
ruled by high traitors – puppets of the Abyssinians are the Somalis of the
Somali North, but they are Somalis like all the rest.
I will complete our criticism in a forthcoming article.
Note
Picture: Punt houses and landscape as depicted on the reliefs of the Western
Wall of the Southern part of the Second Colonnade of Queen Hatshepsut's
mortuary temple ar Deir el Bahari, Thebes West (Luqsor). A picture of
Somalia before ca. 3500 years!
By Prof. Dr. Muhammad Shamsaddin Megalommatis
Published: 4/10/2008

Futureless Somaliland, Somalia, Abyssinia, and Egypt (2008)

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Futureless Somaliland, Somalia, Abyssinia, and Egypt (2008)