US Cold War arms policy favored Abyssinia over Somalia

Evidence

Osman, diary, April 17, 1963. President Osman was equally concerned about the American strategy, noting in his diary on April 17, 1963, “With corroborating documents in hand [General Hersi] said that the Abyssinians are receiving 54 tanks from the USA, while experts from the same nation have come here to study how to help us militarily. They speak of giving us only a complement to the aid from Italy and Germany… . The occidental powers want to have ‘their cake and eat it too.’ They do not want us to get help from the east but they also are not inclined to satisfy our needs.” Existing evidence indicates that, in the Cold War context, neither the American nor the USSR government could understand what nonalignment meant. — Abdi Ismail Samatar, Africa’s First Democrats, 1388

Categorization

• QUESTION: The US armed Abyssinia with 54 tanks while Somalia was at war with it over the Ogaden — worth chasing the diplomatic record on whether this shaped Somali drift eastward.