The Afro-American and the Italo-Ethiopian Crisis,

Although numerous studies of the reaction of white communities to the Italian invasion of Ethiopia in 1935 have been made, very scanty attention has so far been paid to the varied interest which Africans and persons of African descent took in the affairs. i It is true that technically, the issue was an international one involving the sovereignty of a small member state of the League of Nations. Afro-Americans became seriously involved, not directly in the diplomatic aspects of the crisis, but indirectly in the impact which the conflict had on their thought and activity. For, in the eyes of the most articulate Negroes and pan-Africanists of the 19 3 Os, the Italo-Ethiopian struggle represented fascist aggression against a ’black ’ state and Europe’s cynical connivance at such a flagrant breach of international law. In their view the conflict was essentially a racial war; what occurred in Ethiopia directly con-cerned other parts of Africa and the entire black world. It was another aspect of white aggression upon black, the final ’Caucasian victory’. This article will attempt to throw greater light on this much negiected aspect ot the ltalo-Ethiopian contlict. It will seek to present briefly the nature of the impact of the Italy-Ethiopian struggle on the American Negroes and the development of their attitudes towards Africa