Haile Selassie
The heir to a dynasty that traced its origins to the 13th century, and from there by tradition back to King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, Haile Selassie is a defining figure in both Ethiopian and African history.
At the League of Nations in 1936, the Emperor's condemnation of the use of chemical weapons against his people was a pivotal moment in the onset of World War II, as well as a foreshadowing of the "barbarism" which was to come. His internationalist views led to Ethiopia's becoming a charter member of the United Nations, and his political thought and experience in promoting multilateralism and collective security have proved seminal and enduring. His suppression of rebellions among the nobles (mekwannint), as well as what some perceived to be Ethiopia's failure to modernize adequately, earned him criticism among some contemporaries and historians.
Haile Selassie is revered as the religious symbol for God incarnate among the Rastafari movement, the number of adherents of which is indeterminate due to the loose structure of the religion, but is estimated between 1 and 2 million. Begun in Jamaica in the 1930s, the Rastafarian movement perceives Haile Selassie as a messianic figure who will lead the peoples of Africa and the African diaspora to a golden age of peace, righteousness, and prosperity.
Name
Haile Selassie I was born Lij Tafari Makonnen (Ge'ez ልጅ፡ ተፈሪ፡ መኮንን; Amharic pronunciation lij teferī mekōnnin). "Lij" translates literally to "child", and serves to indicate that a youth is of noble blood.
He would later become Ras Tafari Makonnen; "Ras" translates literally to "head" and is the equivalent of "duke", though it is often rendered in translation as "prince". In 1928, he was elevated to Negus, "King".
Upon his ascension to Emperor in 1930, he took the name Haile Selassie, meaning "Power of the Trinity". Haile Selassie's full title in office was "His Imperial Majesty Haile Selassie I, Conquering Lion of the Tribe of Judah, King of Kings of Ethiopia and Elect of God" (Ge'ez ግርማዊ፡ ቀዳማዊ፡ አፄ፡ ኃይለ፡ ሥላሴ፡ ሞዓ፡ አንበሳ፡ ዘእምነገደ፡ ይሁዳ፡ ንጉሠ፡ ነገሥት፡ ዘኢትዮጵያ፡ ሰዩመ፡ እግዚአብሔር; girmāwī ḳadāmāwī 'aṣē ḫāylē śillāsē, mō'ā 'anbassā za'imnaggada yīhūda nigūsa nagast za'ītyōṗṗyā, siyūma 'igzī'a'bihēr).
This title reflects Ethiopian dynastic traditions, which hold that all monarchs must trace their lineage back to Menelik I, who in the Ethiopian tradition was the offspring of King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba.
To Ethiopians Haile Selassie has been known by many names, including Janhoy, Talaqu Meri, and Abba Tekel. The Rastafari employ many of these appellations, also referring to him as HIM, Jah and Jah Rastafari.
Biography
Early life
Ras Makonnen, father of Haile Selassie I, in 1902
Haile Selassie I was born Tafari Makonnen from a mixed Oromo, Amhara, and Gurage family on 23 July 1892, in the village of Ejersa Goro, in the Harar province of Ethiopia.
His mother was Woizero ("Lady") Yeshimebet Ali Abajifar, daughter of the renowned Oromo ruler of Wollo province Dejazmach Ali Abajifar. Haile Selassie's father was Ras Makonnen Woldemikael Gudessa, the governor of Harar; Ras Makonnen served as a general in the First Italo–Ethiopian War, playing a key role at the Battle of Adwa. He inherited his imperial blood through his paternal grandmother, Princess Tenagnework Sahle Selassie, who was an aunt of Emperor Menelik II, and as such asserted direct descent from Makeda, the Queen of Sheba, and King Solomon of ancient Israel.
Ras Makonnen arranged for Tafari as well as his first cousin, Ras Imru Haile Selassie to receive instruction in Harar from Abba Samuel Wolde Kahin, an Ethiopian capuchin monk, and from Dr.
Tafari was named Dejazmach (literally "commander of the gate", roughly equivalent to "count") at the age of 13, on 1 November 1905. Shortly thereafter, his father Ras Makonnen died at Kulibi, in 1906.
Governorship
Tafari assumed the titular governorship of Selale in 1906, a realm of marginal importance but one that enabled him to continue his studies. In 1907, he was appointed governor over part of the province of Sidamo. It is alleged that during his late teens, Haile Selassie was married to Woizero Altayech, and that from this union, his daughter Romanework Haile Selassie was born.
Following the death of his brother Yelma in 1907, the governorate of Harar was left vacant, and its administration was left to Menelik's loyal general, Dejazmach Balcha Safo.
Balcha Safo's administration of Harar was ineffective, and so during the last illness of Menelik II, and the brief reign of Empress Taitu Bitul, Tafari was made governor of Harar in 1910 or 1911.
On 3 August he married Menen Asfaw of Ambassel, niece of heir to the throne Lij Iyasu.
Regency
The extent to which Tafari Makonnen contributed to the movement that would come to depose Iyasu V is unclear. Iyasu V, or Lij Iyasu, was the designated but uncrowned Emperor of Ethiopia from 1913 to 1916.
Iyasu's reputation for scandalous behavior and a disrespectful attitude to the nobles at his grandfather Menelik II's court damaged his reputation, and his flirtation with Islam was considered treasonous among the Ethiopian Orthodox Christian leadership of the empire, leading to his being deposed on 27 September 1916.
Contributing to the movement that deposed Iyasu were conservatives such as Fitawrari Habte Giorgis Dinagde, Menelik II's longtime war minister. The movement to depose Iyasu preferred Tafari, as he attracted support from both progressive and conservative factions.
Ultimately, Iyasu was deposed on the grounds of conversion to Islam. In his place, the daughter of Menelik II ( the aunt of Iyasu) was named Empress Zewditu. Tafari was elevated to the rank of Ras and was made heir apparent.
In the power arrangement that followed, Tafari accepted the role of Regent (Inderase) and became the de facto ruler of the Ethiopian Empire (Balemulu Siltan).
Empress Zewditu ruled as Regent during the minority of Tafari Makonnen from 1916 until her death in April 1930.
During his minority, the new Crown Prince developed the policy of cautious modernization initiated by Menelik II. He secured Ethiopia's admission to the League of Nations in 1923 by promising to eradicate slavery; each emperor since Tewodros II had issued proclamations to halt slavery, but without effect: the internationally-scorned practice persisted well into Haile Selassie's reign.
In 1924, Ras Tafari toured Europe and the Middle East with a group that included Ras Seyum Mangasha of western Tigre Province, Ras Hailu Tekle Haymanot of Gojjam Province, Ras Mulugeta Yeggazu of Begemder Province, Ras Makonnen Endelkachew, and Blattengeta Heruy Welde Sellase.
Although patterning many reforms after European models, Tafari remained wary of European pressure. To guard against economic imperialism, he required that all enterprises have at least partial local ownership. Of his modernization campaign, he remarked, "We need European progress only because we are surrounded by it.
That is at once a benefit and a misfortune."
Throughout Ras Tafari's travels in Europe, the Levant, and Egypt, he and his entourage were greeted with enthusiasm and fascination. He was accompanied by Seyum Mangasha and Hailu Tekle Haymanot who, like Tafari, were sons of generals who contributed to the victorious war against Italy a quarter century earlier at the Battle of Adwa. Another member of his entourage, Mulugeta Yeggazu, actually fought at Adwa as a young man.
The "Oriental Dignity" of the Ethiopians and their "rich, picturesque court dress" were sensationalized in the media; among his entourage he even included a pride of lions, which he distributed as gifts to President Poincaré of France, George V of the United Kingdom, and the Zoological Garden of Paris. As one historian noted, "Rarely can a tour have inspired so many anecdotes".
In this period, the Crown Prince visited the Armenian monastery of Jerusalem. There, he adopted 40 Armenian orphans (አርባ ልጆች Arba Lijoch, "forty children") who had escaped the Armenian genocide of the Ottoman Empire. The prince arranged for the musical education of the youths, and they came to form the imperial brass band.
King and Emperor
In 1928, the authority of Tafari Makonnen was challenged when veteran General Balcha Safo went to Addis Ababa with a sizeable armed force.
The general paid homage to Empress Zewditu, but snubbed Ras Tafari. However, while Balcha Safo and his bodyguard were in Addis Ababa, Tafari had Ras Kassa Haile Darge buy off his army and arrange to have him displaced as the Governor of Sidamo Province.
Even so, the gesture of Balcha Safo empowered Empress Zewditu politically and she attempted to have Tafari tried for treason. He was tried for his benevolent dealings with Italy including a 20-year peace accord. Popular support, as well as the support of the police, remained with Tafari.
Ultimately, the Empress relented and, on 27 October 1928, she crowned Tafari Negus (Amharic: "King").
The crowning of Tafari as King was controversial. He occupied the same territory as the Empress rather than going off to a regional kingdom of the empire.
Two monarchs, even with one being the vassal and the other the Emperor (in this case Empress), had never occupied the same location as their seat in Ethiopian history. Conservatives, including Balcha Safo, agitated to redress this perceived insult to the dignity of the crown, leading to the rebellion of Ras Gugsa Welle.
On 31 March 1930, Gugsa Welle was met by forces loyal to Tafari and defeated at the Battle of Anchem. Gugsa Welle was killed in action. News of Gugsa Welle's defeat and death had hardly spread through Addis Ababa when the Empress died suddenly on 2 April 1930.
Although it was long rumored that the Empress was poisoned upon the defeat of her husband, or alternately that she died from shock upon hearing of the death of her estranged yet beloved husband, it has since been documented that the Empress succumbed to a flu-like fever and complications from diabetes.
Cover of Time magazine, 3 November 1930
With the passing of Zewditu, Tafari himself rose to Emperor and was proclaimed Neguse Negest ze-'Ityopp'ya, "King of Kings of Ethiopia". Among those in attendance were George V's son Prince Henry, Marshal Franchet d'Esperey of France, and the Prince of Udine representing Italy.
Emissaries from the United States, Egypt, Turkey, Sweden, Belgium, and Japan were also present. British author Evelyn Waugh was also present, penning a contemporary report on the event. Benito Mussolini's fascist regime was keen to avenge the military defeats Italy had suffered to Ethiopia in the First Italo-Abyssinian War. A conquest of Ethiopia could also empower the cause of fascism and embolden its rhetoric of empire. Ethiopia would also provide a bridge between Italy's Eritrean and Italian Somaliland possessions.
Ethiopia's position in the League of Nations did not dissuade the Italians from invading in 1935; the "collective security" envisaged by the League proved useless, and a scandal erupted when the Hoare-Laval Pact revealed that Ethiopia's League allies were scheming to appease Italy.
Mobilization
Following the 1935 Italian invasion of Ethiopia, Haile Selassie joined his northern armies and set up headquarters at Desse in Wollo province. He issued his famous mobilization order on 3 October 1935:
On 19 October 1935, Haile Selassie gave more precise orders for his army to his Commander-in-Chief, Ras Kassa:
When you set up tents, it is to be in caves and by trees and in a wood, if the place happens to be adjoining to these―and separated in the various platoons.
When three or four bullets have hit it, the aeroplane is bound to fall down. In time of war it suits the enemy to aim his guns at adorned shields, ornaments, silver and gold cloaks, silk shirts and all similar things.
Whether one possesses a jacket or not, it is best to wear a narrow-sleeved shirt with faded colours. When we return, with God's help, you can wear your gold and silver decorations then.
We offer you all these words of advice in the hope that no great harm should befall you through lack of caution. At the same time, We are glad to assure you that in time of war We are ready to shed Our blood in your midst for the sake of Ethiopia's freedom..."
Compared to the Ethiopians, the Italians had an advanced, modern military which included a large air force.
The Italians would also come to employ chemical weapons extensively throughout the conflict, even targeting Red Cross field hospitals in violation of the Geneva Convention.
Progress of the war
Starting in early October 1935, the Italians invaded Ethiopia. During this offensive, the Italians were forced back in places and put on the defensive.
Following the defeat and destruction of the northern Ethiopian armies at the Battle of Amba Aradam, the Second Battle of Tembien, and the Battle of Shire, Haile Selassie took the field with the last Ethiopian army on the northern front. On 31 March 1936, he launched a counterattack against the Italians himself at the Battle of Maychew in southern Tigray.
The Imperial family disembarked at Haifa and then went on to Jerusalem. Leaving the Holy Land, Haile Selassie and his entourage sailed for Gibraltar aboard the British cruiser HMS Capetown.
By doing this, the government of the United Kingdom was spared the expense of a state reception.
Collective security and the League of Nations, 1936
Mussolini, upon invading Ethiopia, had promptly declared his own "Italian Empire"; because the League of Nations afforded Haile Selassie the opportunity to address the assembly, Italy even withdrew its League delegation, on 12 May 1936. It was in this context that Haile Selassie walked into the hall of the League of Nations, introduced by the President of the Assembly as "His Imperial Majesty, the Emperor of Ethiopia" (Sa Majesté Imperiale, l'Empereur d'Ethiopie). The introduction caused a great many Italian journalists in the galleries to erupt into jeering, heckling, and whistling.
As it turned out, they had earlier been issued whistles by Mussolini's son-in-law, Count Galeazzo Ciano. Haile Selassie waited calmly for the hall to be cleared, and responded "majestically" with a speech often considered among the most stirring of the 20th century.
Although fluent in French, the working language of the League, Haile Selassie chose to deliver his historic speech in his native Amharic. He asserted that, because his "confidence in the League was absolute", his people were now being slaughtered.
He pointed out that the same European states that found in Ethiopia's favor at the League of Nations were refusing Ethiopia credit and war matériel while aiding Italy, which was employing chemical weapons on military and civilian targets alike.
It was at the time when the operations for the encircling of Makale were taking place that the Italian command, fearing a rout, followed the procedure which it is now my duty to denounce to the world. Special sprayers were installed on board aircraft so that they could vaporize, over vast areas of territory, a fine, death-dealing rain.
Groups of nine, fifteen, eighteen aircraft followed one another so that the fog issuing from them formed a continuous sheet. In order to kill off systematically all living creatures, in order to more surely poison waters and pastures, the Italian command made its aircraft pass over and over again.
That was its chief method of warfare.
Noting that his own "small people of 12 million inhabitants, without arms, without resources" could never withstand an attack by a large power such as Italy, with its 42 million people and "unlimited quantities of the most death-dealing weapons", he contended that all small states were threatened by the aggression, and that all small states were in effect reduced to vassal states in the absence of collective action. It is the confidence that each State is to place in international treaties...
Have the signatures appended to a Treaty value only in so far as the signatory Powers have a personal, direct and immediate interest involved?
The speech made the Emperor an icon for anti-Fascists around the world, and Time Magazine named him "Man of the Year". He failed, however, to get what he most needed: the League agreed to only partial and ineffective sanctions on Italy, and several members even recognized the Italian conquest.
Exile
Haile Selassie in 1942
Haile Selassie spent his exile years (1936–1941) in Bath, United Kingdom, in Fairfield House, which he bought. His activity in this period was focused on countering Italian propaganda as to the state of Ethiopian resistance and the legality of the occupation. He spoke out against the desecration of houses of worship and historical artifacts (including the theft of a 1,600-year old imperial obelisk), and condemned the atrocities suffered by the Ethiopian civilian population. He continued to plead for League intervention and to voice his certainty that "God's judgment will eventually visit the weak and the mighty alike", though his attempts to gain support for the struggle against Italy were largely unsuccessful until Italy entered World War II on the German side in June 1940.
The Emperor's pleas for international support did take root in the United States, particularly among African American organizations sympathetic to the Ethiopian cause. In 1937, Haile Selassie was to give a Christmas Day radio address to the American people to thank his supporters when his taxi was involved in a traffic accident, leaving him with a fractured knee. Rather than canceling the radio appearance, he proceeded in much pain to complete the address, in which he linked Christianity and goodwill with the Covenant of the League of Nations, and asserted that "War is not the only means to stop war":
With the birth of the Son of God, an unprecedented, an unrepeatable, and a long-anticipated phenomenon occurred.
He was born in a stable instead of a palace, in a manger instead of a crib. So that the spirit of the cursed will not gain predominance over the human race whom Christ redeemed with his blood, all peace-loving people should cooperate to stand firm in order to preserve and promote lawfulness and peace.
During this period, Haile Selassie suffered several personal tragedies.
His two sons-in-law, Ras Desta Damtew and Dejazmach Beyene Merid, were both executed by the Italians. The Emperor's daughter, Princess Romanework, wife of Dejazmach Beyene Merid, was herself taken into captivity with her children, and she died in Italy in 1941. His daughter Tsehai died during childbirth shortly after the restoration in 1942.
After his return to Ethiopia, he donated Fairfield House to the city of Bath as a residence for the aged, and it remains so to this day.
1940s and 1950s
British forces, which consisted primarily of Ethiopian-backed African and South African colonial troops under the "Gideon Force" of Colonel Orde Wingate, coordinated the military effort to liberate Ethiopia. The Emperor himself issued several imperial proclamations in this period, demonstrating that, while authority was not divided up in any formal way, British military might and the Emperor's populist appeal could be joined in the concerted effort to liberate Ethiopia.
On 18 January 1941, during the East African Campaign, Haile Selassie crossed the border between Sudan and Ethiopia near the village of Um Iddla.
Two days later, he and a force of Ethiopian patriots joined Gideon Force which was already in Ethiopia and preparing the way. Italy was defeated by a force of the United Kingdom, the Commonwealth of Nations, Free France, Free Belgium, and Ethiopian patriots. On 5 May 1941, Haile Selassie entered Addis Ababa and personally addressed the Ethiopian people, five years to the day since his 1936 exile:
Today is the day on which we defeated our enemy.
Therefore, when We say let us rejoice with our hearts, let not our rejoicing be in any other way but in the spirit of Christ. Do not indulge in the atrocities which the enemy has been practicing in his usual way, even to the last.
Take care not to spoil the good name of Ethiopia by acts which are worthy of the enemy.
We shall see that our enemies are disarmed and sent out the same way they came. In 1948, the Ogaden, a region disputed with Somalia, was granted to Ethiopia. On 2 December 1950, the UN General Assembly adopted Resolution 390 (V), establishing the federation of Eritrea (the former Italian colony) into Ethiopia. Eritrea was to have its own constitution, which would provide for ethnic, linguistic, and cultural balance, while Ethiopia was to manage its finances, defense, and foreign policy.
Despite his centralization policies that had been made before World War II, Haile Selassie still found himself unable to push for all the programs he wanted.
In 1942, he attempted to institute a progressive tax scheme, but this failed due to opposition from the nobility, and only a flat tax was passed; in 1951, he agreed to reduce this as well. Ethiopia was still "semi-feudal", and the Emperor's attempts to alter its social and economic form by reforming its modes of taxation met with resistance from the nobility and clergy, which were eager to resume their privileges in the postwar era. Where Haile Selassie actually did succeed in effecting new land taxes, the burdens were often passed by the landowners to the peasants. Despite his wishes, the tax burden remained primarily on the peasants.
Between 1941 and 1959, Haile Selassie worked to establish the autocephaly of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. The Ethiopian Orthodox Church had been headed by the abuna, a bishop who answered to the Partriarchate in Egypt. Mark. Finally, in 1959, Pope Kyrillos VI elevated the Abuna to Patriarch-Catholicos. The Ethiopian Church remained affiliated with the Alexandrian Church. In addition to these efforts, Haile Selassie changed the Ethiopian church-state relationship by introducing taxation of church lands, and by restricting the legal privileges of the clergy, who had formerly been tried in their own courts for civil offenses.
In keeping with the principle of collective security, for which he was an outspoken proponent, he sent a contingent under General Mulugueta Bulli, known as the Kagnew Battalion, to take part in the UN Conflict in Korea.
It was attached to the American 7th Infantry Division, and fought in a number of engagements including the Battle of Pork Chop Hill. In a 1954 speech, the Emperor spoke of Ethiopian participation in the Korean conflict as a redemption of the principles of collective security:
Nearly two decades ago, I personally assumed before history the responsibility of placing the fate of my beloved people on the issue of collective security, for surely, at that time and for the first time in world history, that issue was posed in all its clarity. My searching of conscience convinced me of the rightness of my course and if, after untold sufferings and, indeed, unaided resistance at the time of aggression, we now see the final vindication of that principle in our joint action in Korea, I can only be thankful that God gave me strength to persist in our faith until the moment of its recent glorious vindication.
Haile Selassie, Emperor of Ethiopia, photographed during a radio broadcast
During the celebrations of his Silver Jubilee in November 1955, Haile Selassie introduced a revised constitution, whereby he retained effective power, while extending political participation to the people by allowing the lower house of parliament to become an elected body.
Modern educational methods were more widely spread throughout the Empire, and the country embarked on a development scheme and plans for modernization, tempered by Ethiopian traditions, and within the framework of the ancient monarchical structure of the state.
Haile Selassie compromised when practical with the traditionalists in the nobility and church. In 1954 he visited West Germany, becoming the first head of state to do so after the end of World War II. Many elderly Germans still vividly recall the Emperor's visit, as it signaled their acceptance back into the world, as a peaceful nation.
He donated blankets produced by the Debre Birhan Blanket Factory, in Ethiopia, to the war-ravaged German people.
1960s
Haile Selassie contributed Ethiopian troops to the United Nations Operation in the Congo peacekeeping force during the 1960 Congo Crisis, to consolidate Congolese integrity and independence from Belgian troops, per United Nations Security Council Resolution 143. On 13 December 1960, while Haile Selassie was on a state visit to Brazil, his Imperial Guard forces staged an unsuccessful coup attempt, briefly proclaiming Haile Selassie's eldest son Asfa Wossen as Emperor.