1/? The most TPLF-friendly theory of the start of this war is: Abiy sent a large team of federal police commandos to Mekelle to arrest senior TPLF leaders, who as far as the fed govt was concerned, were acting illegally. About a year ago, a similar team of commandos had been sent

2/? To capture Getachew Assefa, former head of INSA, who had been indicted for the assassination attempt on Abiy in 2018. TPLF arrested those commandos on arrival and then re-elected Getachew as the head of security for Tigray.

3/? This time, sensing a grave danger of arrest to themselves, the TPLF leaders chose to implement a plan they had pre-arranged with Tigrayan officers in the northern command of the ENDF, and attacked the federal base with huge inside help, basically a Hail-Mary to capture the NC

4/? Militarily, they were largely basing the defense of “Tigray” on informal militias and massive defensive arms captured with the NC. A lot of their rhetoric was based on anti-aircraft abilities, somehow overlooking the fact that Ethiopia has bought armed drones in 2018.

5/? (Tigray in quotes because the arrest would have only affected TPLF leadership and not Tigray). This is the most TPLF-friendly narrative, even Getachew Reda on Dec 4th said “we knew the order had been given [to arrest us]”. Just the order - the actual move is hearsay.

6/? As the list of captured/killed TPLF leaders grows, it is infuriating to think that the TPLF basically used the people of Tigray as a makeshift shield to protect themselves from the actions of their recklessness. From the moment they were ousted from their oligarchy in 2018,

7/? They engaged in nothing but confrontation, militarization, and escalation with the new fed govt. As mostly former military officers, they had to have known just how reckless they were being, and just how incapable they were of successfully defending Tigray after starting war.

8/8 Even in this unconfirmed most-TPLF-friendly narrative, their decisions were fueled by nothing except selfishness, greed, and fear of consequences. All of this carnage merely to delay an outcome that they themselves made inevitable. They were begged to avoid this.

9/8 If TPLF was run like a democratic org instead of the family mafia we know it is, perhaps cooler heads would’ve prevailed. But with ppl like Getachew Assefa & Abay Tsehaye at the helm, they did whatever it took to hold on to power, and merely delayed their demise https://twitter.com/addisstandard/status/1349386068597092354