During a hot sunny day in Berbera, the American delegation led by Senator Dewey F. Bartlett arrived. It was in 1975, and the port city, a sleepy coastal city-turned-Soviet outpost, found itself at the center of a tug-of-war. As the American senators followed the Somali military officer giving them a tour, they observed and noted any signs that confirmed the allegations that Somalia is hosting a missile center owned by the Soviets. The visit, referred to in the US diplomatic cables as the “Berbera Affair,” became important for various actors to present a geopolitical narrative suited to their interests. The US secretary of defense at the time, James Schlesinger, claimed that the Soviets had built a missile storage facility and presented pictures. It was followed by the American lawmakers using this issue as a justification for opening a military base in Diego Garcia; the Soviet Union didn’t miss the opportunity to paint the visit as another American imperialist expansion in the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean. For Somalia, though, President Siad Barre juggled loyalties to Moscow, to Washington, and above all, himself. He used the visit to project an image of independence from Soviet influence in Somalia, as the latter had enjoyed strong relations with Moscow.

Berbera again finds itself entangled with a geopolitical competition whose main actors include not only the US but also China and the middle powers of the Middle East.  Somaliland, which formally reclaimed its sovereignty from Somalia in 1991, is bargaining Berbera’s strategic value to gain something it has craved for so long: international acceptance and recognition. This piece draws parallels from historical events of the Cold War to help us understand the significance of this part of the world and why the world needs to understand what’s at stake. Berbera’s location is key to securing global shipments passing by the Gulf of Aden, one of the world’s busiest maritime corridors, a gateway to landlocked Ethiopia and South Sudan. As Houthis’ attacks on international shipments escalate as a result of Israel’s war in Gaza, this maritime route is increasingly getting the attention of major powers.

Berbera lies in the Gulf of Aden, facing the Yemeni coast in the north. For centuries, ships from Arabia, Asia, and beyond have stopped there to trade salt, goods, and hides. When British colonialism arrived, they found Berbera as a strategic location, basing their governor there before moving their administration to Hargeisa, Somaliland’s capital.

Decades later, a global power saw the same strategic promise. In 1962, the Soviets secured an agreement to build a deep seaport in Berbera, a project that was concluded in 1969, the same year the military leader, Mohamed Siad Barre, staged a military coup. By the 1970s the Soviets completed the long runway in Berbera’s airport, long enough that the Americans suspected it was serving military purposes for Moscow.

Relations with Moscow remained intact, even stronger, as the military regime decreed scientific socialism as the state ideology, a break from the multiparty democracy the civilian government had adopted. A treaty of friendship and fraternity was signed in 1974, the first of its kind that Moscow signed with an African state after Egypt. This opened the fledgling postcolonial state with much-needed support in infrastructure, military assistance, and technical expertise. For Moscow, it presented an opportunity to project power and influence in the Gulf of Aden and the Indian Ocean, something Barre agreed to as a fellow socialist comrade.

The Soviets slowly built a naval base in Berbera. Radoslav A. Yordanov wrote in his doctoral research on the Soviet Union’s relations with Ethiopia and Somalia that the Soviet construction of a missile storage site in Berbera was conducted without the knowledge or even understanding of the Somali military government. He refers to US delegation reports of perceived lack of knowledge of the Somali officers of Moscow’s activities in Berbera.

Meanwhile, the US government kept expanding its security and diplomatic relations in Africa. It remained an ally to Ethiopia, Somalia’s regional nemesis, and maintained a CIA listening station in Kagnew, in modern-day Eritrea. Washington saw an ally in Ethiopia in containing the spread of communist reach in Eastern Africa by propping up the imperial government of Ethiopia militarily and economically.

However, this did not last long. A wave of changes rocked the Horn of Africa and the Red Sea. Ethiopia’s emperor Haile Selassie was overthrown by a Marxist military regime in 1974, and seeing the fragile Ethiopia, Somalia launched a major war to annex the Somali region under Ethiopian control. The Soviets were unhappy about the two communist allies in the Horn fighting, tried to mediate first, but eventually sided with Ethiopia. At the time, The New York Times reported the expulsion of Soviet military advisors from Somalia, who numbered around 6,000 people. For long, the Soviet Union was perplexed by the territorial dispute between the two countries. Nikita Khrushchev, the Soviet leader from 1953 to 1964, noted how challenging it was for him to deal with this situation in his memoir.

Berbera again became the center of this relationship as the Carter administration suspended aid to Ethiopia. Somalia sought to align itself with America’s allies—namely, Egypt, under Anwar Sadat, and the Shah of Iran, who both promised assistance to Somalia against Ethiopia.

Half a century later, flags have changed, but the scripts remain the same. Where the Soviets operated facilities in Berbera, now it’s Emirati contractors who are paving the runways. Chinese investors were eyeing the Port of Berbera as an export point for the oil and gas from Ethiopia, and Somaliland’s leaders are playing all these cards against one another in an attempt to secure recognition. The Emirati-owned company DP World has developed the Port of Berbera into a massive project, one of the several ports DP World is managing in Africa. In today’s Horn and Eastern Africa, leaders aren’t calling Washington or Moscow in times of emergencies, but they’re calling Abu Dhabi, Ankara, and Doha, shifting the change in geopolitical order in the region. For instance,  when the Ethiopian government was embroiled in a bitter civil war in the Tigray region, it was the UAE, Turkey, and Iran that came to Ethiopia’s aid, not the US or the Russians.

Although the Emirates abandoned their base project in Berbera as their calculations in the Yemeni war changed, the base, which was initially built by the Soviets, remains up for the highest bidder. The US government expressed an interest and sent an AFRICOM delegation in what many speculate is the great American return to Berbera. The US today is not fighting a major power in the Red Sea but rather a non-state actor group in Yemen, the Houthis, who are threatening the global shipments as their conflict with Israel escalates.

Contestation for legitimacy is at the heart of Somaliland’s geopolitical calculation. As the West championed democracy promotion globally, Somaliland successfully implemented multiparty democracy with a good record of electoral success. Now, as the language of politics intensifies around great power competition, Hargeisa is aligning its narrative around geopolitics. As Bruno Maçães notes, “The case of Somaliland is really illustrative of what the US order has become.” Ten years ago, it was trying to get recognition, arguing that it had a vibrant democracy. Then it realized the US cares nothing about this, so it started arguing it could help counter China in the Red Sea and the Horn. In 2020, Somaliland formed diplomatic ties with Taiwan to the displeasure of China. As the Asian power tried to dissuade Somaliland from this, the latter seemed locked into furthering this agenda for greater cooperation with the US, and now conservative figures in the Congress and the Senate are calling on President Trump to seek deeper cooperation with Somaliland.

Russia under Vladimir Putin is also expanding its network in the African continent. As the Crisis Group recently noted, the Russian state-affiliated Africa Corps (formerly known as the Wagner Group) is currently active in multiple conflict sites in Burkina Faso, Mali, and the Central African Republic. Sudan, which was caught up in a brutal (uncivil) war, has reportedly been courted by Putin for access to a base in the Red Sea. Its foreign minister, Ali Youssouef, said that there are no obstacles to a Russian Red Sea base.

But most importantly, Russia seems not to abandon its former Soviet outpost in Berbera. In October 2017, the Russian delegation arrived in Somaliland to discuss deepening ties, and in 2025, a letter surfaced online from the Russian embassy in Ethiopia reaching out to the Somaliland government to schedule a visit. Social media users speculated about the purpose of that planned visit and the details involved, but I wouldn’t rule out the Russian glory of seeing Berbera’s base back in their fold.