ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that the Siad Barre regime created the conditions that forced the armed movements to fall. The Somali uncivil war mutated into clan-based war in 1991 after the collapse of the Siad Barre regime. The formation of the armed opposition movements was a direct response to the clanisation of the state, specifically Barre's manipulation of clanism and unleashing state terror against certain clans and communities. The first military operation by a Somali opposition movement was launched in October 1979 from Ethiopia and almost all armed opposition movements subsequently sought sanctuary in that country, since there was no safe base in Somalia. On 26 January 1991, United Somali Congress (USC) unseated the Siad Barre regime after a fortnight of house-to-house, hand-to-hand fighting in Mogadishu that began on 30 December 1990. Inspired by the USC conquest of Mogadishu, the Somali National Movement (SNM) crept up on the urban centres and seized the main town of Hargeisa.
