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They were actually thought to encourage good, healthful posture and to keep the internal organs in proper alignment. And the extreme practice of removing ribs to slim the waist, rumored to have flourished in the Victorian era, simply didn’t exist

Today’s approach to gender-specific colors would confuse—and likely amuse—our 19th-century counterparts. White was the preferred color for babies and children of any sex until they reached the age of about 6 or 7, mainly because white clothes and diapers could be bleached. As they grew older, children were dressed in paler versions of the colors adults wore. Red was considered a strong, virile, masculine shade, while blue was dainty, delicate, feminine. So young boys were more frequently seen in pink, while young girls favored pale blue. It wasn’t until the early 20th century—quite possibly as late as the 1940s—that pink began to be universally assigned to girls and blue to boys.

Mr. Abiy succeeded partly by mobilizing ordinary citizens to take up arms to block the Tigrayan advance. “Nothing will stop us. The enemy will be destroyed,”

Drones have also hit refugee camps in Tigray and killed dozens of civilians. Despite recent releases of political prisoners by Mr. Abiy, which prompted a phone call with President Joe Biden, the prospect of a cease-fire seems distant.

The conflict threatens to tear apart Ethiopia, a once-firm American ally, and further destabilize the volatile Horn of Africa region.

But after he took office in 2018, he set about draining the group of its power and influence in Ethiopia, infuriating the Tigrayan leadership, which retreated to its stronghold of Tigray. Tensions grew.

In September 2020, the Tigrayans defied Mr. Abiy by going ahead with regional parliamentary elections that had he had postponed across Ethiopia.

Two months later, T.P.L.F. forces attacked a federal military base in Tigray in what they called a pre-emptive strike against federal forces preparing to attack them from a neighboring region.

The Ethiopian military suffered a major defeat in June when it was forced to withdraw from Tigray, and several thousand of its soldiers were taken captive.

Through it all, civilians have suffered most. Since the war started, witnesses have reported numerous human rights violations, many confirmed by a U.N.-led investigation, of massacres, ethnic cleansing and widespread sexual violence.

The T.P.L.F. was born in the mid-1970s as a small militia of ethnic Tigrayans, a group that was long marginalized by the central government, to fight Ethiopia’s Marxist military dictatorship.

Tigrayans make up just 6 or 7 percent of Ethiopia’s population, compared with the two largest ethnic groups, the Oromo and the Amhara, which make up over 60 percent.

But at home, the Tigrayan-dominated government systematically repressed political opponents and curtailed free speech. Torture was commonplace in government detention centers.

Mr. Abiy, a onetime T.P.L.F. ally, moved quickly to purge the old guard. He removed Tigrayan officials from the security services, charged some with corruption or human rights abuses and in 2019 created a new political party. The Tigrayans refused to join.

At the same time, he strengthened his ties to President Isaias Afwerki, the authoritarian leader of Eritrea, who nursed a bitter, longstanding grudge against the Tigrayans.

But by mid-2020 that peace pact had become an alliance for war on Tigray.

Children are dying of malnutrition, soldiers are looting food aid, and relief workers have been prevented from reaching the hardest-hit areas, according to the United Nations and other aid groups. Since July, a government-imposed blockade of Tigray has kept desperately needed aid from reaching the area. In late November, the World Food Program announced that 9.4 million people across northern Ethiopia required food aid.

In western Tigray, ethnic Amhara militias have driven tens of thousands of people from their homes as part of what the United States has called an ethnic cleansing campaign.

Ethiopia’s ties to the United States, once a close ally, have come under great strain. Mr. Biden has cut off trade privileges for Ethiopia and threatened its leaders with sanctions.

He freed political prisoners, abolished controls on the news media and helped mediate conflicts abroad. His peace deal with Eritrea and its authoritarian leader, Mr. Isaias, caused the Ethiopian leader’s international profile to soar and led to his Nobel Peace Prize in 2019.

But even before the war erupted in Tigray, Mr. Abiy had resorted to old tactics of repression — shutting down the internet in some areas, arresting journalists and detaining protesters and critics.

In a stark speech in November, Mr. Abiy called on soldiers to sacrifice their “blood and bone” to bury his enemies in “a deep pit” and “uphold Ethiopia’s dignity and flag.”

That playbook is how Washington typically tries to punish objectionable regimes. But the result has been catastrophic for civilians.

Isolation was fast and easy to do: It cost no money or political capital and satisfied the imperative of expressing disapproval.

Funding for emergency aid delivered by the United Nations and humanitarian organizations has grown, with Washington providing the largest share, nearly $474 million in 2021. The U.S. government also has gradually broadened humanitarian carve-outs from its sanctions and has taken the lead in getting the Security Council to issue exemptions from U.N. sanctions, making it easier for those delivering aid to carry out their work without legal risk.

But these steps are insufficient.

The United States should draw a distinction between the Taliban as former insurgents and the state they now control.

It will help curb growing migration from the country and rising illicit narcotics production by Afghans desperate for income. It could also produce at least limited opportunity for getting the Taliban to cooperate with the United States to suppress terrorist threats from the Islamic State affiliate in Afghanistan and other groups.

And appearing to turn a blind eye to the Taliban’s past and current human rights violations is deeply unappealing.

But I’ve seen over the past two decades how Western powers have consistently overestimated their ability to get Afghan authorities — whoever they are — to acquiesce to their demands. Governments that were utterly dependent on U.S. security and financial support brushed off pressure to adopt Washington’s preferred peacemaking, war-fighting and anti-corruption strategies.

The Taliban are never going to have a policy on women’s rights that accords with Western values. They show no signs of embracing even limited forms of democratic governance.

But the alternative is worse, foremost for the Afghans who have no choice but to live under Taliban rule and who need livelihoods.