Egypt’s shadow over Ethiopia is not new; it stretches across centuries, wearing different faces but driven by one obsession: the Nile. From the very beginning, Cairo saw Ethiopia not as a neighbor but as a threat, a state that could hold back the waters that Egypt believes were gifted to it by history. The hostility is older than the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD). It is stitched into the memory of wars, rebellions, propaganda broadcasts, and proxy militias, all shaped by Egypt’s unyielding determination to keep Ethiopia weak and divided, ensuring that Addis Ababa never rises to challenge Cairo’s claimed dominance over the river.

The first encounters go back to the 19th century, when the Egyptian Khedive Isma’il Pasha dreamed of building an empire on the Upper Nile. Egypt’s troops marched into Ethiopia in the 1870s, only to be crushed at the famous battles of Gundet and Gura, battles fought on today’s Eritrean highlands. These defeats etched in Ethiopian history showed two truths that remain alive today: Egypt will always seek to control Ethiopia, and Ethiopia, through its resilient resistance, will always deny it. But the military route was only the beginning. When direct conquest failed, Egypt shifted its strategy toward indirect control, using proxy groups and alliances to weaken Ethiopia from within, a tactic that has persisted through the ages as Cairo innovates new ways to undermine Ethiopian sovereignty.

During the 20th century, Egypt’s weapons turned from rifles to radio waves. By the time of Emperor Haile Selassie, Cairo had refined its strategy into something more insidious. Radio Cairo, broadcasting in both Amharic and Somali, became a weapon of psychological warfare. It carried not only Nasser’s pan-Arabist vision but also the seeds of division messages designed to stir unrest inside Ethiopia, to encourage separatists, and to isolate Addis Ababa from its own peripheries. These broadcasts were not abstract; they were the prelude to concrete support for insurgencies. The airwaves became as sharp as bayonets, cutting Ethiopia’s image abroad while whispering rebellion at home, setting the stage for more direct interventions through neighboring states and rebel movements.

Somalia became Egypt’s significant partner in this campaign. As pan-Somalism rose in the 1960s and 1970s, Egypt poured resources into Mogadishu, strengthening its military, supplying weapons, and training officers. When Somalia went to war over the Ogaden in 1977, Egyptian advisors and support were not far from the battlefield. Cairo’s fingerprints were everywhere in diplomatic backing, in weapons shipments, in the ideological encouragement that the Ogaden was not simply a Somali claim but part of a larger struggle against Ethiopia’s supposed domination. Every Somali bullet fired in the Ogaden carried Egypt’s shadow behind it.

This conflict also highlighted Egypt’s tactic of fueling local separatist movements, as the Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF) sought self-determination, ambitions that were fueled by Somalia and Egypt through their support for the Western Somali Liberation Front (WSLF), which was actively involved in the Ogaden War. This toxic alliance of Somali irredentism and Egyptian realpolitik created a model that Cairo has not forgotten and may plan to replicate again, using similar proxies to exploit Ethiopia’s eastern vulnerabilities.

The Eritrean secession movement is perhaps the clearest case of Egypt’s hand at work. While Eritrean nationalism had local roots, its organizational foundation was laid in Cairo itself. The Eritrean Liberation Front (ELF) was established in the Egyptian capital in July 1960 by Idris Mohammed Adem, Idris Osman Geladewos, and Mohammed Saleh Hamid. In 1962, Hamid Idris Awate’s small guerrilla band was strengthened by defecting Eritrean members of the Sudan Defence Force (SDF), forming the core of a struggle that would bleed Ethiopia for three decades.

Egypt gave not only political space but also moral legitimacy to these movements, seeing in Eritrea’s secession a long-term victory for its Nile strategy. For Cairo, the secession of Eritrea was not about Eritrean rights but about locking Ethiopia out of the Red Sea and keeping Addis Ababa permanently vulnerable, a strategic masterstroke that continues to echo in today’s northern tensions.

Then came the Ogaden War of 1977–1978, when Somalia, under Siad Barre, launched a full-scale invasion to carve away Ethiopia’s Somali region. Cairo sided with Mogadishu, once again choosing Ethiopia’s enemies as its friends. The Ethiopian leadership at the time accused Anwar Sadat’s Egypt of fueling pan-Somalist ambitions as part of its larger project of surrounding Ethiopia with hostile states. The accusations were not mere paranoia. Egypt’s support for Somalia during the Ogaden War was deliberate, another attempt to cut Ethiopia down at the knees, reinforcing the pattern of using proxies to drain Ethiopian resources and unity.

Fast forward to the present, and the pattern has not changed only the names of the rebel groups have. In Benishangul-Gumuz, where the GERD rises on the Blue Nile, Ethiopian officials accused Egypt of aiding Gumuz militias bent on destabilizing the region. In Oromia, Addis Ababa once charged Cairo with supporting the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF), pointing to evidence of Egyptian agents engaging with OLF leaders. More recently, during the TPLF and federal government of Ethiiopias conflict in Tigray, government figures alleged that Egypt was quietly backing the TPLF, not out of solidarity but because a distracted, fragmented Ethiopia would mean less resistance to Cairo’s water hegemony.

This strategy of encirclement extends to all fronts: in the north through alliances with Eritrea, residual TPLF elements, and even Fano militias; in the west via the Murle and Benishangul-Gumuz militias; in the east through OLF, ONLF, and other separatist remnants; and in the south by leveraging Al-Shabaab’s influence through Kenya. Ethiopia must keep its eyes on every direction, not just the Somali region, as Cairo seeks to exploit these multi-front pressures to weaken the entire nation.

But the most dangerous sign of Egypt’s continuity lies in Gambella, where whispers of Cairo’s support to the Murle community echo old strategies of proxy warfare. Reports suggest that arms have reached Murle militias through the Sudan Armed Forces (SAF), Egypt’s close ally and military partner. The Murle, infamous for cross-border raids and child abductions, inhabit the fragile borderland between Ethiopia and South Sudan. If Cairo is indeed arming them, the message is clear: Egypt has moved its old game into new territory, targeting Ethiopia’s peripheries where state authority is weakest. Just as it once exploited Eritrea, the Ogaden, and Oromia, Egypt now tests the fault lines of Gambella, adding another layer to its comprehensive encirclement.

This is not random. The Nile dispute hangs over everything. Egypt fears Ethiopia’s rising power, symbolized by the GERD, which threatens to end Cairo’s historic monopoly on the river. Every rebel movement Egypt flirt with, every borderland it destabilizes, is a pressure point against Addis Ababa. By stirring trouble far from the dam, itself, Cairo hopes to exhaust Ethiopia, drain its attention, and prevent it from consolidating power around the Nile, ensuring that Addis Ababa remains preoccupied on multiple fronts rather than focusing on its rightful development.

Today, Egypt’s strategy has expanded to Somalia, not to fight Al-Shabaab as it officially claims, but to counter Ethiopia’s maritime ambitions. The African Union recently approved Mogadishu’s request to include Egyptian troops in the AU Support and Stabilization Mission in Somalia (AUSSOM), with the first batch of Egyptian forces deployed after completing their training program.

But the arrival of Egyptian forces in Mogadishu in August 2025 months before the AU and UN finalize funding and operations exposes the reality: Egypt is positioning itself directly on Ethiopia’s doorstep, extending its encirclement southward while maintaining threats elsewhere.

Even more alarming are reports of Egyptian plans to deploy troops to the Gedo, Hiraan, and Lower Shabelle regions. These are not arbitrary locations. Ethiopia already has troops stationed in Gedo and Hiraan under AU sector responsibilities and on a bilateral basis to enforce a buffer zone along its border. For Addis Ababa, this deployment is a direct threat to its national security. For Kenya, which also maintains forces in Gedo, the implications are equally serious. If Egyptian troops move into Beled Hawo a border town that Somali forces captured from Jubbaland in July 2025 Cairo would establish a military base within meters of Ethiopian territory.

This is not stabilization; it is encirclement. Some reports even suggest Egypt could replace Djiboutian positions in Hiraan or Kenyan positions in Gedo. Yet both Ethiopia and Kenya are highly unlikely to cede their hard-won buffer zones to Egyptian forces. To do so would be tantamount to outsourcing their border security to a state whose record shows it seeks leverage, not peace. Allowing Egyptian troops into these critical areas would effectively hand Cairo the keys to Ethiopia and Kenya’s national security, amplifying the multi-front strategy that demands Ethiopia’s vigilance everywhere.

As an Egyptian journalist bluntly put it: “If war were that easy, we would have destroyed the dam earlier… Thinking of invading Eritrea is military suicide for Ethiopia, and Egypt will not allow the seizure of the port of Assab at any cost.” These words expose the true intent. Egypt’s presence in Somalia is less about countering insurgents and more about strangling Ethiopia’s ambitions on the Red Sea, while simultaneously stoking instability on northern, western, eastern, and southern fronts to complete the circle of pressure.

The question then is not whether Egypt will stop it is which group or region comes next. If Cairo supported Eritrean separatists in the past and Murle militias today, tomorrow it may turn again to Oromo factions, Gumuz fighters, Fano militias, or any group that can disrupt Ethiopia’s cohesion. History shows that Egypt does not need to win wars directly; it only needs Ethiopia to remain trapped in internal ones, divided across all directions and unable to focus solely on one threat like Somalia.

Ethiopia’s answer cannot be defensive alone. It must build a forward strategy that recognizes Egypt’s pattern: the use of proxy groups, the weaponization of neighbors, and the manipulation of Ethiopia’s ethnic fissures across every front. Addis Ababa should fortify Gambella and Benishangul, deepen ties with South Sudan, and expand its engagement with Somaliland as a counterweight to Cairo’s Somali diplomacy. Most importantly, it must recognize that Egypt’s war is not about GERD alone; it is about Ethiopia’s very survival as an independent power on the Nile, requiring constant awareness of northern threats from Eritrea, TPLF, and Fano; western disruptions via Murle and Benishangul-Gumuz; eastern tensions through OLF and ONLF remnants; and southern insecurity from Al-Shabaab through Kenya.

For over a century, Egypt has tried to control Ethiopia through invasion, propaganda, rebel sponsorship, and proxy wars. Today’s troop deployments in Somalia, the arming of the Murle, and the constant meddling in Ethiopia’s ethnic conflicts are not new policies but old wars in new clothes. The challenge for Addis Ababa is to stop seeing them as isolated crises and instead confront them as parts of one long Egyptian strategy of encirclement on all fronts. Only then can Ethiopia turn Cairo’s century-old shadow into a fading memory rather than a living threat, securing its destiny as a strong, unified guardian of the Nile.

By Surafel Tesfaye, Researcher, Horn Review

Reference

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