Three things have happened in the Horn of Africa in the past three weeks. President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud's term has expired in Somalia, and the opposition's rejection of parliamentary extensions has produced open armed clashes in Mogadishu. The Jonglei conflict in South Sudan has tipped into near-famine, with children reportedly surviving on leaves and water lilies and food aid traded as de facto currency. Ethiopia and Eritrea are publicly warning of imminent renewal of the Tigray war.
These are independent events with independent driving conditions. They are happening at the same time.
Why the simultaneity matters
The Horn has plenty of bad weeks in the historical record. What makes this one different is that the three crises are running in three different countries, each with its own logic, all at the same time. The historical pattern in the region is that crises sequence: one country's collapse takes the diplomatic, humanitarian and military attention that might otherwise have been available to its neighbour. When three crises run in parallel, the available regional and external bandwidth gets divided in ways the long-run base rates do not capture.
Political scientists call this "cascading state failure". The second and third country crises stop being independent of the first, because the response capacity of the wider system has been consumed. Base-rate forecasting tools that price each country crisis independently will systematically under-price what happens next.
Somalia: a constitutional rupture, not a security one
The Mogadishu situation is being reported as a security crisis. It is more accurately a constitutional one. The expiration of President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud's term and the opposition's rejection of parliamentary extensions are at root a disagreement about who has legitimate authority. The armed clashes are the secondary consequence. The federal government is contesting whether Puntland can hold separate military recruitment in its territory. Government investigations against former leaders for alleged involvement in the clashes have deepened the divisions.
The forecasting implication is that the resolution path runs through constitutional and political mechanisms, not through tactical security operations. A military "win" in Mogadishu does not resolve the underlying authority dispute. The risk picture worth pricing is the one in which contested authority becomes the new equilibrium and Somalia exits the brief 2012 to 2025 period of contested-but-recognised federal authority.
At the same time, there is a credible risk of IPC Phase 5 famine in the Bay Region on erratic rains and high food prices. Somali institutional capacity to respond to that famine signal while Mogadishu is in armed dispute over presidential authority is approximately zero.
South Sudan: Jonglei has crossed a threshold
The Jonglei pattern has shifted. The conflict has driven widespread displacement and famine conditions. Humanitarian reporting indicates that food aid packages are increasingly traded as de facto currency. Juba faces electricity rationing on fuel shortages. The SPLM-IO alleges an assassination plot against First Vice-President Riek Machar. The Governor of Eastern Kapoeta County was killed in localised insecurity. A humanitarian organisation has suspended staff movements in Yei.
The base-rate literature on famine episodes shows that the threshold for IPC Phase 5 declaration is set high enough that crossing it is itself the signal: the conditions that produce a declaration are catastrophic conditions. Once the formal declaration is made, the downstream pattern is well-rehearsed and runs on a 90 to 180 day timeline. Mass population movement across borders. Regional spillover into Sudan and Ethiopia. Sustained displacement long after the immediate food-security signal has eased.
The US has linked election support to peace-deal implementation. Juba has rejected the linkage. The diplomatic mechanism that might have made a difference at this threshold is not engaged at the level the situation requires.
Ethiopia and Eritrea: the worst-case scenario is being signalled openly
The Tigray People's Liberation Front has announced reinstatement of its pre-war regional administration and drafted a proclamation mandating compulsory military mobilisation. Addis has warned of TPLF preparations for major assaults on federal defence bases. Ethiopia accuses Eritrea and the Sudanese Armed Forces of backing insurgents. President Afwerki was on an official visit to Egypt focused on bilateral relations and Red Sea security; both governments asserted that littoral states hold exclusive responsibility for the Red Sea, a positioning consistent with preparing for renewed regional conflict.
The 2020 to 2022 Tigray war produced casualty estimates ranging from 300,000 to 600,000 depending on methodology. Public signalling about renewal of that conflict is now happening on Tigrinya state media and in Ethiopian federal statements. The pattern in the political-science literature is that publicly signalled inter-state conflict in the Horn proceeds to engagement on a 30 to 120 day timeline once the signalling reaches this register.
DR Congo: the related but separate eastern story
The eastern DRC Ebola outbreak has reached 676 cases and 136 deaths on recent reporting. The US, UK, Belgium, Switzerland and Canada have all updated travel guidance over the past 48 hours citing the expanding outbreak, crime and terrorism. The ADF killed 21 civilians in Beni territory. Clashes continue between Wazalendo groups and M23/AFC in Masisi. Violent clashes broke out at an opposition rally in Kinshasa protesting proposed constitutional changes.
The DRC eastern conflict pattern is structurally separate from the Horn but operationally connected through cross-border population movement, particularly with South Sudan and Uganda. A worsening Horn picture pushes the DRC trajectory in the same direction.
What we are watching
The first signal is whether the Mogadishu clashes produce a fragmented authority outcome. A clean military resolution either way is the lower-tail outcome. The base case is now that contested authority persists, with downstream implications for federal-state finance, AMISOM/ATMIS posture and Al-Shabaab opportunism.
The second is whether IPC Phase 5 is formally declared for South Sudan. The declaration is itself a forecasting signal worth more than most underlying indicators because the methodological threshold for declaration is high enough that crossing it implies the conditions are already catastrophic.
The third is whether the Tigray signalling moves to engagement. TPLF mobilisation orders and federal warnings of TPLF base assaults are the late-stage signals in this pattern. A 30 to 120 day window is the relevant horizon.
The fourth is whether the DRC eastern Ebola outbreak crosses into Uganda or South Sudan in volume. Cross-border spread converts a contained-but-serious outbreak into a region-defining one.
The Crisis Radar daily monitor tracks Somalia, South Sudan, Ethiopia, Eritrea and DR Congo across the indicators that feed each of these threads.