Civil war is reigniting in Ethiopia, and before long the usual voices in Washington will demand American taxpayers foot the bill for someone else's conflict.
The Tigray People's Liberation Front has launched a fresh offensive against Ethiopia's federal government, seizing airports and attacking neighboring regions—threatening to plunge the Horn of Africa back into a war that already killed an estimated 600,000 people between 2020 and 2022. The question for Americans isn't who's right in this fight; it's whether any politician in Washington will keep us out of it.
On Wednesday, TPLF forces took control of three airports from federal police. Ethiopian Airlines, the state carrier, suspended flights to the region. The TPLF then pushed attacks into the neighboring states of Afar and Amhara, with a humanitarian source telling AFP that Tigrayan forces launched heavy artillery attacks trying to seize the town of Yallo near the Tigray border. A foreign security source confirmed to AFP that the TPLF also took the town of Abala on the Tigray-Afar border, with additional fighting reported around Weldiya—one of the few routes to the capital.
The Ethiopian army claimed Thursday it repelled the attacks and killed, wounded, or captured more than 500 enemy fighters. The TPLF has not commented on those claims, and independent verification remains impossible.
TPLF vice-president Amanuel Assefa left no room for ambiguity: "We are in the situation of full-blown war now." He confirmed Tigrayan forces are fighting alongside local armed groups in Afar and Amhara.
This offensive follows Sunday's announcement of a seven-group rebel alliance—the Ethiopian Peoples' Forces Alliance for Survival—aimed at overthrowing Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed's government. Notably, the alliance includes Fano, an insurgent group that fought with the government against the TPLF in the last war. The enemy of my enemy is now my friend.
The BBC framed the escalation through the lens of civilian suffering in Tigray—residents describing cash shortages, banks running dry, and the federal government denying budgets to civil servants. The Guardian buried the Eritrean angle deeper in its reporting: analysts say the TPLF now has support from Ethiopia's neighbor and historic adversary Eritrea, which fears landlocked Ethiopia may try to invade its territory for Red Sea access. Abiy's spokesperson Billene Seyoum directly accused alliance members of collaborating "with the financial backing of Eritrea." Eritrea has denied this. Amanuel Assefa told AFP the TPLF has "no information about Eritrea's plan" and would not request Eritrean intervention—"Not yet."
Meanwhile, Ethiopia's president used his UN General Assembly speech Wednesday to decry "the forces of destruction and mayhem" and "interference in our internal affairs by adversarial elements"—convenient rhetoric to invite international legitimization of a federal response.
Residents near the fighting are already bracing for the worst. A resident of Adigrat told Reuters of panic-buying and emptying shops: "Food shortages are worsening as market shelves sit empty... Essential medicines remain scarce and astronomically expensive. Daily survival has become a constant calculation."
The last war drove the region to the edge of famine. This one may go further. And every time a foreign conflict flares, the permanent Washington class finds a reason to spend your money and risk American lives on it. The last Ethiopian war cost this country nothing directly because Washington—rarely—kept its distance. The test now is whether both parties can manage that basic discipline twice, or whether the think-tank chorus will manufacture a reason to make it America's problem.
