Ethiopian Navy - The End of The Ethiopian Navy

The End of The Ethiopian Navy

The Ethiopian Civil War and Eritrean War of Independence both ended in 1991, and Eritrea became independent, leaving Ethiopia landlocked. The ships of the Ethiopian Navy fled in May 1991, ten of them to Yemen and others to Saudi Arabia. The Ethiopian Navy never operated again and in effect was dissolved upon Eritrea's independence.

For a time it was thought that the Ethiopian Navy might survive, based in foreign ports—at Assab in Eritrea or at Djibouti -- or that Eritrea and Ethiopia might divide the ships, with ships manned by both countries operating from Eritrean ports as a kind of successor to the Ethiopian Navy. But Eritrea soon expressed a desire to organize an entirely separate Eritrean Navy.

Some of the Ethiopian ships in Yemen were scuttled, while others remained there awaiting disposition; most of the ships in Saudi Arabia returned to their former bases in Eritrea. The ships became unseaworthy during their years of inactivity, and some were sold for scrapping; among these was Ethiopia, which became a hulk at Yemen after her May 1991 arrival there and was sold there for scrapping in 1993. Finally, on 16 September 1996, all surviving former Ethiopian Navy ships were put up for sale at Djibouti. Eritrea expressed interest in 16 of them, but finally limited itself to purchasing only four of them—an OSA II class missile boat and three Switfship patrol craft—in order to avoid exacerbating an international crisis with Yemen. Most of the rest of the ships were scrapped.