Eritrea has 33 Brigadier Generals and 11 Major Generals.  But only one full general—General Sebhat Ephrem. Out of roughly 4 million citizens, only one citizen is fit to be a General.  You can explain this as a grand testimony to the military’s meritocracy.

That is not the amazing part.  This is: in 2000, before the May Offensive, Eritrea had two full Generals: the aforementioned Sebhat Ephrem and Oqbe Abraha.  

Sebhat Ephrem, then as now was Eritrea’s Defense Minister—the most senior military official when Eritrea experienced the most shocking assault and penetration of her land.  He got to explain away the “handebetnet” of Ethiopia’s 2000 Offensive without any loss of rank or prestige. The other general, Oqbe Abraha, who had nothing to do with the war, but had, in a momentary lapse of audacity, the temerity to co-sign a critical letter to the Chief Commanding Officer, received a demotion, was accused of treason, thrown to jail, and died in jail.

Consider what we are saying, statistically: 50% of Eritrea’s Generals are heroes and 50% of the Generals are traitors. 

This is an absurdity and, as Voltaire said, “Those who can make you believe in absurdities can make you commit atrocities.” To support PFDJ requires a high threshold for atrocities and a very, very low opinion of the Eritrean people.  You must be willing to believe that people who spent all their adult lives demonstrating heroism are traitors. Once you believe that, hell, you can believe anything.  You will believe parents should be punished for escaping youth, you will believe it is ok to torture people (what is it called now? "enhanced interrogation"?), you will believe that Eritrean youth are escaping to Tigray, one of the poorest places on God's Green Earth, and being trapped there for years because they are seeking "economic opportunities."   

Of course, to the believers, what the PFDJ asks them to believe are not absurd and they committed no atrocities, just plain national defense. A PFDJ supporter cannot sense these absurdities any more than we Earthlings can feel the Earth’s rotation around its axis—even as it spins at around 1,000 miles/hour.  

There are explanations for this ranging from the philosophical to the polemic and those in the opposition who have any interest in persuading people may want to look into them. Or, they can just insist on having their frequent head-exploding moments and throw up their hands in disgust.

If you are into philosophy, there is an interesting (interesting, in this case, means “difficult to read”) book by Søren Kierkegaard which explains that truth is not necessarily objective. In fact, the most famous quote from the book (confession: the only one I remember) is “Subjectivity is truth.”  The book is called Concluding Unscientific Postscript to the Philosophical Fragments and, yes, with that title, you bet I read it only because it was a “required reading” at some point in my life. (Paging Burhan Ali: your column awaits.) According to Kierkegaard, on certain matters dealing with ethics and morality, our experiences and instincts have a great deal to do with our conception of the truth.  In this case, their instincts and experiences make them value things like "duty first, rights later", "secrecy is good", and teach them that the leaders of the PFDJ are uncorrupt, heroic, self-denying liberators which just does not mesh with the reality of the PFDJ as corrupt, gun-toting, compulsively-gambling, womanizing, cowardly, self-indulging, slave-drivers.

If you are into polemics, Bob Altemeyer, a Canadian associate professor at the University of Manitoba, has published a groundbreaking book on the personality traits of those attracted to authoritarian leadership.  Entitled “The Authoritarians”, his entire book is available online —for free, no less.  It is not about the authoritarian leaders; it is about those who follow authoritarian leaders.  Read it, and equip yourself well in understanding the personlity type that believes the authorities should be given the benefit of doubt and rabble-rousers should be doubted.     

Know your opponent, but remember he is just an opponent—not your enemy. Only then can you try to persuade.  Look, this ride we are on may take a long time: the opposition is stuck in Operation NetSelai Habuni* and the PFDJ hasn’t exhausted its absurdities and atrocities. But so far, if you are keeping a tally, the PFDJ is winning by a landslide: after expelling the Comboni missionaries, I fully expect the PFDJ to go after the Boy Scouts and the late Mother Theresa.  After that, maybe Isaias Afwerki can go on his own axis of evil tour: visit North Korea, Syria and Cuba. Then maybe burn an effigy of Nelson Mandela using an American flag.    

John Bolton & His Book

"I ain't no DJ, and I don't take requests" is my usual attitude to people who pick topics for me on what to write. The Bolton book? Ok, if you insist...but I am not sure this is what you had in mind.
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As juicy (and completely expected to people like this author who welcomed his appointment) as Bolton’s revelations were, the most important piece of information in Bolton’s book is not inside the pages, but on the cover: the name of the publisher. Bolton’s book is published by Threshold Editions, a division of Simon & Schuster. Threshold Editions is run by Mary Matalin (assistant to VP Dick Cheney, who is a permanent nemesis of Powell, Rice and the entire State Department). Threshold specializes in publishing the kind of books that say that the State Department and other US cabinets are full of fifth columnists undermining America. You can get a taste of their masterpieces here. 

Eritrea is now a pawn in America’s internal feuds—between the left wing intelligentsia (who love the Isaias Administration) and the right wing intelligentsia (who are no big fans.) Between the mostly unilateralist Pentagon (historically, the Musharaffs and Isaias were their kind of guys) and the multilateralist State Department (who hate him because he doesn’t speak in their language of capacity building and institutionalism.)  

When Rice and Frazer retire, some other division of Simon & Schuster, (probably one that specializes in telling people how terrible the Defense Department is), will publish their books which will, of course, say that Bolton was hallucinating when he made his accusations. And some Ethiopian website will feature those pages much the way they did when some other US official (Holbrooke? Lake?) wrote a book favorable to their spin.

And so on, and so on.  After people are done celebrating their sense of vindication, it would be nice if they explained how the Bolton vs Rice or Cheney vs Powell feud is in any way remotely in the interest of Eritrea.  A journalist who is very sympathetic to Eritrea gave this free advice 4 years ago while criticizing the shortcomings of Isaias Afwerki, the “he” in the excerpt below: 

He did not seem to understand that U.S. foreign policy is often a synthesis of what the State and Defense Departments are comfortable with, and that therefore Foggy Bottom alone cannot be blamed for Eritrea's image problems in the United States. 

But whether it is on the subject of dealing with the US or dealing with the UN, the Eritrean government (and its supporters) seem to derive more pleasure from having its complaints echoed by somebody else (vindication at last!) than from actually solving the problem.  It is like the fisherman who relishes telling stories about the big one that got away and instead of spending his energies catching a fish, he spends all his time and energy lining up witnesses to support his tale.  And how does this feed his family?  

Beyond that, what the Bolton book reminds us is of the self-correcting mechanism that is in-built in democracies, something sorely lacking in dictatorships like the one in Eritrea.  If the government of Eritrea makes a strategic blunder, we all have to cross our fingers and hope they will find their mistake and correct it.  This is because there is no free press, no competing political parties, no ombudsman, no advisory committee, no peer review, no think tank, to speed up the correction process.  

Now, using the Bolton example, let’s see how democracies press the auto-correct button whether you are on the Bolton side or the Rice side:

1. Freedom of Thought: Bolton has a long history as republican scholar and government official where he earned a reputation for candor and a principled but controversial worldview.  He was, among other things, a signatory to a couple of letters issued by the Project for New American Century (PNAC.)  In case you forget, PNAC was the think tank that advocates muscular American diplomacy to take advantage of its sole-superpower status which, again in case you forgot, is, according to Isaias Afwerki, a “dangerous” proposition.  

2. Checks and Balances: His controversial views earned him many friends, including President Bush, and enemies, including Democratic Congressmen. When Bush nominated him to be the ambassador to the UN, the congress blocked it.

3. Executive Power: Then Bush used one of the powers granted to him by the constitution—recess appointment—to name him ambassador. 

4. Popular Mandate: But the constitutional power has a limit.  When that limit expired, and Bush came to the realization that the Democratic Congress, now a majority following the 2006 elections, could not confirm his appointment, Bolton resigned a month later. 

5. Freedom of Expression: A year later, in November 2007, Bolton, exercising his right to free speech, wrote a book where he, among other things, criticized his bosses (Rice and Powell.)  The book is #96 on the Amazon.com bestseller list and has already seen its price slashed from $27 to $16.  (I will wait for the garage-sale copy.) If the book sells well, there will be a follow-up; if not, he will go back to one of the many think tanks.

The next self-correction of the system will be January 2009: George Bush and his entire State and Defense Department will be replaced by whomever the auto-correcting machine (the ballot box) says they should be replaced by.

Meanwhile, Isaias Afwerki, who will have seen one term of George Bush Sr, two terms of Clinton and two terms of George W. Bush, is likely to still be in power then. By then, Eritrea will have spent 11 out of its 18 years of existence arguing about its border and explaining why yet another American government official (most likely in the State Department) is conspiring against Eritrea. 

On the plus side, there will be new great songs cursing the darkness (with nary a song about sparking the light) and there will be even bigger hizbawi mekete meetings.  If we are lucky, Eritrea may even get a second general.

*when we were kids, women could never leave the house without their NetSela, their head shawl.  A guest visiting a house would always threaten to go, and the host would insist she stay longer—and the best way to do this was to hold the NetSela hostage.  “why don’t you give me my NetSela so I can leave?” was a good natured complaint from the guest.  NetSela is also some kind of warrior garb because women also said "NetSelay habni" when they were heading off to a fight. Our opposition are sure they want to do something, they just can’t find their NetSela. They’ve been looking for their NetSela for ages now, but any decade now, they are sure to find it. 

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