Addis Ababa, February 17, 2026 — The Ethiopian National Defence Forces have repositioned significant troop contingents toward the northern border with Eritrea over the past two weeks, according to multiple reports circulating in Addis Ababa and corroborated by Ethiopian security analysts. The government has simultaneously issued a recall of former military personnel, a step that regional observers say carries unmistakable strategic weight.
What is confirmed: ENDF units have been redeployed northward, drawn in part from positions in the Oromia and Amhara regions. The government's formal recall of reserve and discharged military personnel is documented and publicly acknowledged. What remains contested — and must be stated clearly — is the precise scale of the build-up, the full strategic intent behind it, and whether Asmara has made any reciprocal troop movements.
The Current Strategic Calculus
'What we are seeing is consistent with contingency posturing rather than imminent offensive action,' said a Horn of Africa security analyst based at a regional policy institute, who requested anonymity citing the sensitivity of the situation. 'The troop recall is significant — it is not something governments do lightly — but it does not by itself signal a decision to go to war.'
The tensions sit within a deteriorating post-Tigray security environment that has already stretched the ENDF across multiple internal theatres. Forces have been engaged in counterinsurgency operations against the Oromo Liberation Army in the west and southwest, and have contended with the persistent presence of the Tigray Defence Forces despite the November 2022 Pretoria Agreement. The northern redeployment, analysts note, now adds a third directional pressure on an army that has been in near-continuous combat since 2020.
The question animating security circles in Addis Ababa and Nairobi is whether Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed's government could realistically prosecute a confrontation with Eritrea while managing active armed challenges internally. 'The strategic logic of opening a northern front is very difficult to construct,' said one East African defence researcher. 'Unless Addis has made a calculation that military pressure on Eritrea can be leveraged diplomatically — which would be a very high-risk gamble.'
The Shadow of 1998-2000
The last full-scale war between Ethiopia and Eritrea — a devastating conflict from 1998 to 2000 that killed an estimated 70,000 to 100,000 people and left hundreds of thousands displaced — remains a generational wound on both societies. The war began, deceptively, over a disputed border town and escalated into one of the deadliest interstate conflicts of the post-Cold War era.
That history is essential context, but it should not be read as prophecy. The 2018 rapprochement brokered by Abiy Ahmed — which earned him the Nobel Peace Prize — formally ended a two-decade state of no-war, no-peace. That agreement has since frayed badly. Eritrea played an active and at times devastating role in the Tigray war, and relations between Asmara and Addis Ababa have deteriorated sharply since the Pretoria accord, which President Isaias Afwerki notably did not sign and has publicly criticised.
'The conditions are worse than they were in 1998 in one important respect,' said a political scientist who studies the Horn of Africa at a university in Nairobi. 'In 1998, the two governments had just come through a period of close cooperation. Today, they have gone through a war together and emerged as mutual adversaries. The trust deficit is near total.'
What Both Sides Stand to Lose
Eritrea is one of the most militarised states in Africa, with a conscription system that has driven hundreds of thousands of citizens into exile. Its armed forces are battle-hardened and, on per-capita terms, formidable. Ethiopia, despite its larger population and economy, is an army fighting on multiple fronts with supply chains under strain.
A new war would be catastrophic for both nations and for the wider Horn. Sudan is already in the grip of its own civil war. Somalia's fragile government would face additional destabilisation. The implications for food security — Ethiopia is already experiencing drought-related crises in its southern and eastern zones — would be severe.
International Response Remains Muted
The African Union, headquartered in Addis Ababa, has not issued a formal statement on the reported troop movements. The Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), the regional bloc with the most direct mandate over Horn of Africa security, has similarly been quiet. Western governments — the United States, the United Kingdom, and the European Union — have not issued public warnings as of this writing.
The silence is itself notable. 'The international community was slow to engage on the Tigray war until the situation had become catastrophic,' the Nairobi-based researcher noted. 'There is a risk of repeating that pattern.'
For now, the ENDF repositioning and reserve recall stand as the confirmed facts. Whether they represent a government preparing for a war it intends to fight, a government signalling resolve to deter Eritrean action, or a government caught in an escalation dynamic it cannot fully control — that question remains open. The answer matters enormously for 130 million Ethiopians and for the most volatile region on the African continent.
Reporting from Nairobi. Additional sourcing from regional security analysts in Addis Ababa and Kampala.
