War threatens Horn.

Byline: The Register-Guard

Ethiopia's fierce intervention in the battle between Somalia's weak interim government and the ascendant Islamic Courts Union raises the spectre of protracted regional warfare in the Horn of Africa.

Ethiopia pounded towns across central Somalia with bombs and missiles Sunday. It was Addis Ababa's first official reaction to the powerful Islamist movement that has seized control of much of Somalia since last summer - a movement that Ethiopian leaders fear is spreading its hard-line Islamic influence within their country's borders.

The conflict is as likely to spread as the droughts that regularly ravage the region. Ethiopia's arch-enemy, Eritrea, already has dispatched 2,000 troops into Somalia to fight with the Islamists against the government and, presumably, its Ethiopian allies. Hundreds of thousands of Somalian refugees are pouring into Kenya, which is unlikely to continue greeting them with open arms. The United Nations reports that 10 counties have been illegally funneling arms and equipment to both sides in the conflict.

Chaos and war are no strangers to Somalia. Since the early 1990s, it has been a failed state ruled by warlords. Last year, the warlords were toppled by a fundamentalist Islamic regime that now rules much of the country with an iron grip reminiscent of Afghanistan's Taliban. Until Ethiopia's long-anticipated intervention, the Islamists were closing in on the militarily impotent remnant of the internationally backed Somali government clinging to power near the town of Baidoa.

The conflict's outcome could have a major effect on U.S. interests. The Bush administration says four al- Qaeda leaders who are believed to have plotted the 1998 bombing of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania have become leaders in the Islamist movement, and there's a real risk that the country could become a breeding ground and haven for international terrorists.

But the United States should proceed with caution. The Bush administration should resist the temptation to fully side with Ethiopia, which lacks the resources and military might to maintain a long-term occupation of a significant swath of Somalia. Instead, Washington should work with Arab governments, especially Saudi Arabia, to play a mediating role. The White House should also support the United Nations Security Council's recent authorization of an African peacekeeping force for Somalia and of negotiations between Islamist forces and the interim government.

Administration officials should remember what happened the last time the United States intervened in a conflict between Somali factions. U.S. troops invaded in 1992 to help save starving people and pulled out in 1994 after 18 U.S. soldiers were killed in the "Black Hawk Down" battle with a Somali faction in Mogadishu. Strong U.S. support for the warlord-dominated interim government, disliked intensely by many Somalis, could further strengthen the hand of fundamentalists in the Islamic Courts Union movement.

The United States and the international community should pay close heed to unfolding events in the Horn of Africa, where years of neglect laid the groundwork for the current crisis. And where even a single misstep could help fuel a major regional war on a continent that has far too many such conflicts.