Good and Bad times of Haile Selassie

My topic for this Blog is the great Ethiopian Emperor "Haile Selassie". There are a lot of questions and arguments that can be be made about this topic. Mine will be, was it a good or bad thing that he came back after their governments' independence was destroyed? Was this a good thing or a bad thing?

This was a short and colonial war. The Ethiopians had about 500,000 men and were extremely unequipped. Their weapons consisted of spears and bows while the Italians contained more modernized weapons. This war started in October 1935 and ended in May 1936. Haile Selassie was a great emperor; he directed his thoughts and ideas towards modernizing Ethiopia. He also succeeded in securing Ethiopia's entrance in the League of Nations in 1923. After Mussolini attacked Ethiopia, Haile Selassie soon fled into exile in England. Now, one of my questions was, "if it were a good or bad thing that he came back after the governments' independence was destroyed?" "Was his return for good reason"? I think that one of the biggest reasons that they were defeated was the fact that militaristically they were poorly equiped with weapons and had no Air Force. The Ethiopians were given spears and bows while the Italians obtained rifles and more advanced weapons. Also, the Italians were using chemical warfare such as "mustard gas" which the Ethiopians did not have. Plus, the Italians had 680,000 soldiers that were split up into four infantry divisions. In total, the numbers were that the Italians had up to 3,300 guns, and 200 tanks that were given from the Royal Navy. So the Ethiopians got so tired of defeat that they withdrew from the war. Soon after, Haile Selassie was exiled to England. Once he came back he confronted italy once again. I would say that the good he did was to obtain help from British Forces and freed Ethiopia from Italian control, allowing him to re-enter his capital in May. But once he returned to his capital, he found that his governements' independence was abolished. However, this was an advantage to Haile Selassie. Throughout the years he rebuilt his administration and strengthened his army. Now that Selassie was back in power he had become aware of more cautions. This meant that he allowed barely a handful of men into his government. He then worked on engendering trust with several of the major politicians so that he could keep political balance within his reign. Now, a lot of people (including myself) think Selassie did more good than bad, however this is the same man that made 500,000 of his soldiers contend with 680,000 plus Italian soldiers. Even if Mussolini had attacked again I wouldn't of sent my men out there with just bows and spears. I would try to negotiate a plan with mussolini in the League of Nations. Although Selassie had been sent to exile in England, If I were a citizen of Ethiopia I would have been proud of his accomplishments. Haile Selassie was also the basis for Rastafarianism, which has dramatically influenced the world, even to this time.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=eAfy0fhTp-c