The Ethiopian soldiers fighting in Somalia are part of a much larger military force that is battle-hardened by major cross-border wars, civil unrest and various campaigns against homeland insurgents.
The Ethiopian army is relying largely on Cold War-era hardware from the former Soviet Union, but it is also benefiting from more recent training by the U.S. military, with which it is allied in Washington's so-called war on terrorism.
According to several sources, including the International Institute of Strategic Studies and the U.S. State Department, there are about 200,000 personnel in the Ethiopian National Defence Forces, which makes it one of the most formidable militaries in Africa.
"They may be a little ramshackle in some aspects of their training, but the Ethiopians have always been tough, mean fighters and they've got a lot of experience in the army," Jane's Defence Weekly's Helmoed Roemer Heitman told Agence France-Presse.
Washington was Ethiopia's major arms supplier from the end of the Second World War until 1977, when Addis Ababa began receiving huge Soviet arms shipments worth billions of dollars.
The U.S. State Department says this hardware included transport and jet fighter aircraft, helicopters, tanks, trucks, missiles, artillery and small arms.
Some of this hardware has been used in the current conflict to help Somali transitional government forces roll over Islamic fighters retreating to their recently attained Mogadishu redoubt.
"The Islamists will not have much beyond shoulder-launched anti-aircraft missiles . . . but you can fly above that," Mr. Heitman said, referring to Ethiopia's Sukhoi-27 and MiG fighters and Mi24 attack helicopters.
Yet Martin Plaut, the British Broadcasting Corp.'s Africa analyst, says that the war in Somalia will test Ethiopian troops to their limits.
"The eastern regions of Ethiopia, through which its forces must travel, are remote and have few resources," he writes. "[Their] supply lines and communications were stretched even before they crossed the Somalia border." Mr. Heitman warned not to expect a quick rout, saying Ethiopia may be stuck in Somalia for years to come.
That view was initially shared by David Shinn, a former U.S. ambassador to Ethiopia who is now a political-science professor at George Washington University. Prof. Shinn said in an interview yesterday that he was expecting either a long, debilitating standoff outside Mogadishu or to see the Ethiopians turn the fight over entirely to Somali transitional government forces and former Somali warlords.
However, Prof. Shinn said he received information yesterday afternoon suggesting Mogadishu was in chaos in the face of the Ethiopian onslaught.
"If this recent information is accurate and things are collapsing in the city, then that creates a whole different scenario. . . . It suggests a collapse in the Islamist stronghold in Mogadishu itself that frankly I didn't anticipate or expect," he said.
The New York Times quoted a spokesperson for the U.S. military central command as saying no American troops were participating in the Ethiopian offensive or working as advisers for it.
However, there is no doubt of Washington's military assistance to Ethiopia. The State Department says on its website that with the help of the United States, the Ethiopian National Defence Forces have been in transition from their roots as a guerrilla army to an all-volunteer professional military organization.
"Training in peacekeeping operations, professional military education, military training management, counterterrorism operations and military medicine are among the major programs sponsored by the United States," the site says.
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Surrounded
Somali government troops backed by Ethiopian fighters and weapons aim to encircle the capital, Mogadishu, and force rebel Islamists to surrender the city.
Jowhar: Government-backed troops drove Islamic fighters out and an independent radio station began playing Western music,
which had been banned under the Islamists.
Baidoa: The Somali government has extended its influence beyond this stronghold to reach most of the country outside of the capital.
Mogadishu: Clan leaders in the Somali capital were reported to be considering throwing their support to government forces, which advanced to within 30 kilometres of the beleaguered city. Fighters with the opposition movement were seen changing out of their uniforms into civilian clothes.
