Western Somali Liberation Front

The Western Somali Liberation Front (WSLF) was a nationalist armed organization of the Somali-inhabited Ogaden, committed to the region's independence from Ethiopia and its unification with Somalia. It operated in the Ogaden and backed the "Greater Somalia" concept of uniting Somali-inhabited territories with Somalia.

Roots and founding

The organization grew out of Somali insurgent networks that resisted rule by the Ethiopian Empire in the early 1960s. The 1963–65 Ogaden rebellion (Nasrallah, Ogaden Liberation Front) formed the foundation of the future WSLF. The rebellion had mostly subsided by 1965, but insurgent elements remained active until the WSLF's formation in 1973. In 1963 an Ethiopian Imperial Army division based out of Harar torched Somali villages and carried out mass killings of livestock, while watering holes were machine-gunned from aircraft to deny Somalis access to water. Thousands of residents were driven from the Ogaden into Somalia as refugees. The 1963–65 rebellion was led by Mukhtal Dahir, a founding member of the Somali Youth League, whom 300 men of Nasrallah picked to lead an insurgency at Hodayo. After the 1964 armistice he declared he would ignore the truce, saying, "My people are under no one's jurisdiction and take orders from no one but me."

The founding year is disputed. In January 1976 a general conference of Western Somali society was held 100 km north-west of Mogadishu. A twenty-five-member committee was elected to lead the WSLF, and Abdullahi Hassan Mahmoud became its first leader when the organization was formally founded at that conference. Other accounts date the founding to 1974 or 1975; UCDP notes that "the group was set up in 1974 or 1975, reports diverge." Contemporary sources reported next to nothing about it until it began launching military attacks in 1976.

Some analysts argue that the launch of the WSLF was simply a reactivation of the older organisation. The leader, however, was not the same, nor was the name or most of the rank and file, and so UCDP treats the WSLF as a new, independent actor.

Organization and programme

Abdullahi Hassan Mahmoud was the WSLF's first leader, secretary-general and military commander. On 24 August 1977 he confirmed that the conflict was fought over the status of the greater Ogaden and that the population would decide whether to join Somalia or opt for independence, while the movement's attitude to independence wavered between full independence and autonomy within Somalia. On 4 September 1977 the secretary-general specified the territory claimed: all land east of a line running from Moyale on the Ethiopian-Kenyan border through Awash, about 100 miles east of Addis Ababa, to El Adde on the Djibouti border, described as inhabited by Somali people. Though Somali-oriented, the WSLF also included many Harari and Oromo members of Ethiopia's Muslim population who supported the Somali cause.

Insurgency and the Ogaden War

Guerrilla warfare began in both the northern and southern regions in early 1976 and spread to southeastern Bale and Sidamo by the end of the year. Infiltrating from the Somali Republic, the guerrillas dismantled the state's presence by destroying government offices and targeting police and civilian administration. The WSLF had four brigades, known in Somali as "Afar Gaas".

UCDP codes the date of first use of armed force as 14 December 1975, and most sources agree that the WSLF began infiltrating fighters across the border into Ethiopia from late 1975; the first battle-related death is dated 3 January 1976. A rival claim has the rebels under the WSLF banner beginning operations in 1974.

In June 1977 the offensive on Gode, Degehabur and Kebri Dahar was repulsed with heavy casualties: at Gode alone 300 WSLF guerrillas and 14 high-ranking Somali National Army officers were killed. After this the decision was made to invade Ethiopia in support of the WSLF. According to UCDP, Somalia had already provided substantial material support and allowed rear bases in Somalia, the main one at Hargeisa, and in mid-1977 sent about 3,000 soldiers to fight alongside the rebels. On 13 July 1977 the Somali National Army invaded Ethiopia. The Somali government refused to declare war, insisting in the media that all military actions were taken by the WSLF. By September 1977 the SNA and WSLF had overrun 90 per cent of the Ogaden and captured Jigjiga. In early 1978, however, the Ethiopian government, with a new arsenal of Soviet equipment and spearheaded by Cuban combat troops, pushed the SNA and WSLF forces back.

The war's escalation was entangled with Cold War alignment. Somalia's invasion drew Soviet disapproval; the Soviet Union withdrew support for Somalia and backed Ethiopia instead. Ethiopia was saved by a $1 billion airlift, more than 12,000 Cuban soldiers and airmen and 1,500 Soviet advisers. The war's infobox lists 25,000 civilians killed and 500,000 Somali inhabitants of Ethiopia displaced.

In contemporary international mediation, Ethiopia rejected the WSLF's political standing. At the August 1977 Libreville talks the mediation ended when Somalia demanded that the WSLF be included, which Ethiopia refused, holding that the WSLF was "a farce" and "financed, controlled and staffed by the regular Somali Army".

UCDP codes two parallel conflicts: the interstate one pitting Ethiopia against Somalia, and the intrastate one in which the WSLF continued to fight the Addis Ababa regime. The WSLF's insurgency phase is thus separate from the interstate war, and the group "more or less functioned as the former's ancillaries".

Division, counterinsurgency and dissolution

Internal division limited the WSLF. The group was made up of nine clan-based divisions that were "fiercely competitive", so that when attacked by government forces they were often reluctant to aid one another. In 1979 an Isaaq wing, Afraad, came into conflict with the main Ogaden clan forces after an incident in which a WSLF fighter committed rape that escalated into murder and further violence.

The Ethiopian state's response imposed a heavy civilian toll. According to international relief officers, the army's response was "a systematic campaign of terror and violence against the civilian population". In late 1979 the population was forced into "protected villages", with offensives targeting all people and economic assets outside them. In August 1980 "Operation Lash", aided by the Cuban mechanized brigade, pushed the rebels out of Ethiopia into northern Somalia. Six divisions, 60,000 men, were deployed, and by December 1980 the Ogaden was reportedly cleared of insurgents. In June 1978 the WSLF had reclaimed Gode, killing 300 Ethiopian and Cuban troops and disabling the only viable air base in the area. By the end of the 1970s it was estimated at 18,000 men, the second-largest rebel group in Ethiopia after the EPLF. In the early 1980s the Ethiopian government turned the Ogaden into a vast military zone with indiscriminate aerial bombardments and forced resettlement, and the Derg engineered artificial droughts and famines to weaken Somali resistance.

The WSLF was also targeted through Ethiopian-sponsored Somali proxies. Ethiopia used the newly formed Somali Salvation Democratic Front (SSDF) to hunt down WSLF fighters, and from 1982 to 1984 the Ethiopian-backed Somali National Movement (SNM) fought intense clashes with the WSLF in northwestern Somalia. In December 1984 an SNM offensive forced the WSLF out of its rear bases in northern Somalia.

The organization also split politically. At a 1981 conference young radicals who wanted to distance the movement from Somalia and aim for "true self-determination" defeated the veteran Central Committee led by Abdullahi Hassan Mahmoud and his deputy Abdi Nasir. A new executive was elected with Mohammed Diriyeh Urdoch as secretary-general, and central committee membership was increased from 25 to 50.

The WSLF as an organization, and not only the Ethiopian army, was itself a perpetrator of violence. In 1979 the military governor of Harar designated a 10-man delegation to meet the rebels after the government accepted an invitation to discuss a ceasefire; instead of talks, a concealed WSLF force killed seven of the delegation and captured three, apparently aiming to take hostages.

The WSLF's end as a political-military factor is tied to interstate agreement. An April 1988 Ethiopia-Somalia agreement ended the organization's operations as the Somali government withdrew support and restricted it; Siad Barre renounced claims on Western Somalia (the Ogaden) and forbade WSLF activity. The WSLF, the ONLF and other liberation organizations condemned the new Mogadishu foreign policy, and the agreement intensified domestic opposition to Barre, especially within the Ogaden clan. By 1989 the WSLF had ceased to be an effective guerrilla force in Ethiopia. In the early 1990s several hundred people still identified themselves as the WSLF.

In the years after the war many WSLF supporters became disillusioned with its increasing reliance on Mogadishu and frustrated by portrayals of the Ogaden struggle as merely an Ethiopia-Somalia border matter. A group of the WSLF's youth faction formed the Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF) in 1984, immediately banned by Siad Barre's government.