Why Now? What Is Abiy Trying to Prevent?

The attacks on Tigray may be preparation for another war. But I think something else may also be happening: Addis may be trying to force us to move before the new strategic relationships around Tigray become strong enough to change the balance.

The situation in Tigray is becoming more dangerous by the day. Since the beginning of August, we have seen fighting around Shererina, drone attacks in Merewa, attacks around Mariam Kubi and Dandera, and now bombing in Mekelle itself. People are being wounded, families are afraid, and once again Tigrayans are living with the fear of another war. For me, this is not news I follow from a distance. I speak with family, friends and people in Tigray every day, and I know the fear, the anger and the questions people are carrying. Like every Tigrayan, I also know what another full war could mean for our people.

The obvious explanation is that Abiy Ahmed wants Tigray to react. If we retaliate, Addis can say Tigray started another war and then use that as justification for a larger attack. That may be part of the calculation, and we should not dismiss it. But I do not think it fully explains what is happening. We also have to ask whether provoking Tigray is really the main objective, or whether Addis is acting now because it sees something developing around Tigray that may become much harder to deal with later.

Only twelve days ago, in The Next Mistake May Not Come From Weakness, I argued that Tigray is slowly recovering some room to act. After years in which others decided almost everything around us, we are again beginning to have choices. That is important, but choices also bring danger because they can be used well or badly. In that essay, I was mainly asking whether we ourselves could misuse the room that is beginning to open. Now I want to look at the same issue from the other side: what if Addis also sees that Tigray’s position is changing, and what if it is trying to shape our choices before that change becomes stronger?

Addis has survived by keeping its problems separate

For years, Abiy has faced many opponents, but one of his advantages has been his ability to deal with them separately. Fano is treated as an Amhara problem, the OLA as an Oromia problem, Tigray as a northern problem, and Eritrea as a separate interstate problem. He does not need to solve all these problems at once. He only needs to stop them from becoming his problem at the same time. As long as the pressures remain separate, Addis can fight one, negotiate with another, delay another, and move forces from one area to the next. That ability to decide the order has helped the federal government survive several crises without truly resolving them.

The situation may now be changing. The most important development, in my view, is the strategic relationship Tigray has been building with Eritrea and the contacts and understandings developing with elements of Fano. I am not saying these forces have become one alliance, and we should not pretend that their serious differences have disappeared. Tigray and Eritrea have a terrible recent history, while Tigray and Fano still face the unresolved question of Western Tigray. These are fundamental issues, not small disagreements. The OLA is different again. I do not see enough current evidence to say that it is part of the same northern arrangement, but it does not have to be. If the OLA keeps federal forces busy in Oromia while Fano keeps pressure elsewhere and tensions rise around Tigray and Eritrea, Addis still faces several pressures at the same time.

That may be the real danger for Abiy. It may not be a grand alliance. It may simply be the loss of his ability to decide who he deals with first, who he delays, and when he moves from one front to another. If several pressures begin to overlap, even without a common command or common political program, the federal government loses part of the freedom it has enjoyed to manage each problem separately.

Perhaps the timetable is the target

This is why I look at the recent attacks on Tigray differently. If the only purpose is to provoke us, then our restraint should make that strategy less useful. Yet the pressure has continued. Perhaps Tigray’s retaliation is not the principal target. Perhaps Tigray’s timetable is.

The relationships developing around us need time. They need time for people who once fought each other to understand where their interests meet and where they do not, to build trust where trust is possible, and to discuss serious disagreements that cannot simply be pushed aside. Time also allows the different pressures on Addis to become harder to manage separately. If the federal government understands this, then it has a reason to create pressure now rather than later.

Military pressure can force us to turn inward and focus only on defending our towns and people. It can test how serious Eritrea is about its current relationship with Tigray, reopen the contradiction between Tigray and Fano over Western Tigray, force relationships into the open before they are ready, or push one front to act while others are not prepared. In that sense, Addis does not have to destroy every relationship. It may only need to destroy the timing. If Tigray is forced to move today while others remain unprepared or focused elsewhere, Addis can once again deal with the different pressures separately. That is why I think the timetable may matter more than the trigger.

We should not romanticize the new relationships

There is also a danger on our side. Because Tigray has been isolated for so long, every new relationship can easily look bigger than it really is. We should not make that mistake. Eritrea has its interests, Fano has its interests, OLA has its interests, and we have ours. Today we may need each other because we face a common danger; tomorrow our interests may separate again. That is normal politics, and it is why a common opponent does not automatically create a common future.

I made this point in my last essay when I warned against confusing a temporary alignment with a permanent interest. It is even more important now. For Tigray, every relationship should be judged by what it actually gives us. Does it help protect our people, return displaced Tigrayans to their homes, restore our territory, reduce the chance that Tigray will again be surrounded and isolated, and give us more political choices? If the answer is yes, then the relationship has strategic value. If not, we may have more relationships but not more leverage.

Western Tigray will be one of the hardest tests. We cannot build a serious relationship with Fano by pretending that this question does not exist. The disagreement has to be faced honestly. The same is true with Eritrea. We cannot forget what happened during the war, but we also cannot allow the past alone to decide every future relationship. Our responsibility is to know what Tigray needs now and what protects Tigray in the long term.

What does Addis see?

This brings me back to Abiy. The emerging relationships may still be weak, and we in Tigray may sometimes think they are stronger than they really are. But that is only half of the question. The other half is what Addis believes. Governments do not act only on what is true; they also act on what they fear may become true.

If Addis believes that Tigray, Eritrea, Fano and the wider pressures around Ethiopia may become much harder to manage six months from now, then acting today makes sense from its point of view. That does not mean a full war has already been decided. It means waiting may no longer look safe to the federal government. The attacks, the military buildup and the pressure may therefore be telling us something about what Addis believes is changing, not only about what it intends to do militarily.

I could be wrong about this. If these relationships are weaker than they look, or if Addis would be attacking Tigray in the same way even without Fano, the OLA and Eritrea in the picture, then this may simply be preparation for war. I am raising this as a serious possibility, not as a conclusion.

This is what I think we should pay attention to. The attacks are real, and so is the military buildup. We have every reason to prepare ourselves, but we should not allow the attacks to do our thinking for us. If Addis wants us angry enough to move before we are ready, wants to break developing relationships, or wants to make sure the different pressures around it never become serious at the same time, then we need to understand that before deciding how to respond.

In The Next Mistake May Not Come From Weakness, I argued that recovering agency creates new ways to make mistakes. Today I would add one more danger: our opponent may try to choose the moment when we use those choices. We should not give him that power.

The question, then, is not only whether Abiy wants another war. I am asking something else: what does Addis see developing that it wants to stop before it becomes stronger? If we understand that correctly, we can better understand why the pressure is increasing now and, more importantly, decide our own timing instead of allowing Addis to decide it for us.

ትግራይ ትስዕር！ሰላም ንህዝብና！