The run-of-the-mill dictum has it that America or any other nation for that matter doesn’t have permanent friends but permanent interests instead. However, they strike you as childhood friends who hit it off reminiscing about the good old days and who has taken a selfie to show it off to their extended friends and loved ones. Debretsion flanking Mike Hammer and Annette Weber did just that when Mike Hammer took the picture right before the envoys got on the plane to get back to where they came from.
The selfie is more than the naked eye can meet where a region not a nation yet captures and gravitates the power be when Tigray was almost written off when a colossal Ethiopian army, [47 Divisions], Eritrean savage army [45 Divisions] Amhara special forces, including Somali mercenaries in the company of Arab and Turkish drones invaded her. Tigray withstood, resisted with an extraordinary tenacity and perseverance and shifted the balance of power. That much takes to share a selfie with the powerful much less to be taken serious as a key player in stabilizing the region—the Horn.
One can not help it but wonder what went through their [ Abiy Ahmed and the sycophants around him] minds when they saw the selfie? In a high stake game, Abiy Ahmed bit more than he could chew and as a result relegated Ethiopia into the back-burner when Tigray sets the terms instead. The terms of peace and the terms of war as well.
Perhaps, the envoys flew to a region but departed back from a nation-state. I believe that was the impression and aftertaste they had. Both envoys particularly the American has a sense of history when his forefathers fought for independence against the British and he can clearly relate the American story with Tigray’s just cause and a just demand as well. And he also knows that no power can subdue the will of the people when Tigray’s the right to autonomy and independence is a foregone conclusion.
The contrast to Abiy’s Ethiopia can not be more striking as far as the envoys are concerned where their attempt to keep Ethiopia united and intact particularly under the incompetent and reckless Abiy Ahmed titters on futility where their attention and interest on Tigray is irresistible. Precisely because, the know-how of political maturity, military prowess, diplomatic finesse including a sense of vision and exporting stability to the entire region is there. In the final analysis, the West will have to make a choice or find someone competent enough who can work not only with an independent Tigray but who can salvage a nation—Ethiopia which is on a brink of disintegration.