“Red Terror”
By 1977 when he was firmly in power, becoming commander in chief of the Ethiopian armed forces, Mengistu launched his campaign of terror that he officially dubbed the “Red Terror.” At a rally in April 1977, in front of a huge crowd in the capital Addis Ababa, he made it known that all enemies of Ethiopia’s historic revolution would be dealt with. To stress his point, he smashed bottles that he claimed were filled with blood representing the enemies of the revolution. True to his words, the “Red Terror” of 1977-78 would see hundreds of suspected enemies of the regime being arrested, detained without trial, tortured, and killed. Those targeted were university students, intellectuals, and professionals who had opposed Mengistu’s “Soviet-style revolution”. People suspected to be members of the anti-Mengistu Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Party (EPRP) were also not spared. At the end of the day, an estimated half a million people were killed. “Thousands of civilians were caught in the crossfire of the war against northern rebels and 700,000 peasants were forcibly resettled to starve the rebels of support,” Reuters reported. When Somalia waged war against Ethiopia around 1978, Mengistu relied on the Soviet Union for arms as America was not helpful. Cuban troops also came to his end.
