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The Ethiopian Revolution: War in the Horn of Africa. By Gebru Tareke, with foreword by Donald Kagan and Frederick Kagan. Yale Library of Military History. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2009. Pp. xx, 437; maps, appendices, notes, bibliography, index. $45.00.
Gebru Tareke's recent book is a provocative and meticulously researched study of the revolutionary wars of modern Northeast Africa. The author evaluates the military defeat of the Derg by EPLF (Eritrean People's Liberation Front) and TPLF (Tigrayan People's Liberation Front) insurgents by considering the social and political dimensions of organized violence. In his view, since "village Ethiopia was at once the site and the means of the conflicts" (p. 8), the ability to maintain morale was key, and in this respect, the guerrillas were vastly more effective than the military regime, which ultimately failed to deliver on its revolutionary promises. For the Derg, "the abysmal disorganization at the fronts was only a reflection of the deep popular disenchantment and turmoil at the rear," and "the front could not hold without the rear" (p. 175). Thus the interplay between the social, the political, and the military is key.
The author elegantly presents this argument by dividing his analysis into two sections. After introductory chapters outlining the problem, the first section...