Superpowers Rivalry in the Horn of Africa and the Eurocommunism Factor, Late 1970s

Abstract

This article focuses U.S. and Soviet policy toward the conflicts in the Horn of Africa in the second half of the 1970s (using the examples of the Somali-Ethiopian conflict and the national liberation movement in Eritrea), taking into account the activities of the Italian Communist Party (Italian: Partito Comunista Italiano, PCI), a leading force in the Western European segment of the international communist movement (ICM). Attempts to include the PCI in the process of settling local conflicts in the northeastern part of Africa as an independent entity have become a new phenomenon in international relations. This article concludes that 1) in the case of the Ogaden War, the Italian Communist Party could not choose one side to support; 2) the Soviet Union considered the PCI's diplomatic efforts to establish a dialogue between Ethiopia and Somalia futile; 3) The State Department, monitoring Eurocommunist's activity in Somalia and Ethiopia, noted the deepening controversy in the international communist movement over Third World issues, but did not consider the actions of the PCI a significant factor in international relations.