If you’ve been paying attention, Sudan has become engulfed in one of the worst humanitarian catastrophes in recent history. Millions have been displaced so far, a horrific war is ongoing, and pretty much any crime against humanity that you could imagine, is likely occurring.
Now, a lot of people likely are not particularly informed about Sudan, which is understandable enough, it isn’t exactly a major topic in western media, but this is why I think it is important to shed some light. This is why I decided to make this post, to shed some light on recent Sudanese political history.
Sudan is a crucial region for understanding the confusing global-system we exist in, and has been a major subject of both imperialism, and regional alliances in the middle east. What is happening in Sudan today speaks a lot about the question of hegemony in the Arab world. Let’s start from the beginning
The Man Himself
Omar Al-Bashir is far and away the most important figure for understanding Sudanese Geopolitics. To give the background, he came to power in 1989 in a bloodless military coup against the elected prime minister, Sadiq al-Mahdi. After this, Bashir would grip power for almost 30 years of rule.
Al-Bashir allied with Hassan al-Turabi, the speaker of the Sudanese parliament and head of the National Islamic Front, and then dissolved parliament, banned political parties and went on to introduce a hard-fisted Islamic law, which was naturally unpopular for the south.
This, amongst other factors, would contribute to the already existing divide between north and south. Sudan proper is mostly Sunni and Arabic speaking, while the south is mostly Christian and often English speaking. This is just an easy example of the remaining conflicts created by haphazardly drawn euro-colonial borders.
There was already conflict with the South, but this would become further intensified under Al-Bashir. He would forcefully try to crush the south through the Second Sudanese Civil war
This conflict would become a major theater for the existing enmity between Sudan and Israel.
This conflict was happening much earlier than Bashir, going back to 1967. Sudan being a Sunni Muslim and Arab country, was naturally aligned with the Arab World against Zionism. In 1973, there was even a Sudanese brigade fighting on behalf of Egypt. (A brigade that Al-Bashir actually fought with when he was younger).
“From the beginning, it made strategic sense for Israel to provide military aid to rebels in South Sudan. This would serve as a useful distraction to Egypt and Sudan, and would open a new and vulnerable front against the Arab World. However, it wasn’t until the June 1967 war that Israel truly acted upon this opportunity, following Khartoum’s decision to support Egypt in that conflict.”
Sudan was an ally of Egypt and Palestine, so it was an obvious target of Zionist destabilization.
In fact, Israel supported the overthrow of Ugandan president Milton Obote, and directly supported the installation of infamous dictator Idi Amin, to help further destabilize southern Sudan with military training and support.
“ Bar-Lev was eager to help Amin, who was serving Israel’s interests in Sudan, and he advised the Ugandan commander to form a battalion within the Army to protect himself. The Israelis would train it. This unit, consisting of paratroopers, tanks, and armed jeeps, proved instrumental a few months later when, in January, 1971, Amin overthrew the regime while Obote was in Singapore for a meeting of the British Commonwealth.”
“Just months after the Six-Day War, in 1967, Israel sold Uganda weapons worth seven million dollars. In 1969, Israel began funneling weapons through Uganda into southern Sudan, where a ragtag rebel group known as the Anyanya had been fighting the Arab-dominated Sudanese government since the nineteen-fifties. Israel’s purpose was to distract the Sudanese Army so that it would not join forces with Egypt, which was mobilizing to retaliate for the capture of the Sinai Peninsula.”
I highly recommend reading the full New Yorker piece, it gives a very detailed outline of Israeli involvement in Sudan. Even today, Israel maintains good ties with the new Ugandan dictator Museveni
The rabbit hole goes even deeper when you examine how US alongside Ethiopia helped train child soldiers in the south against Khartoum, but that’s a story for another post
Israel would continue to pursue this goal of Balkanization, especially by the start of the second Sudanese civil war in 1983. A weakened Sudan would be a major geopolitical boon by substantially weakening a regional opponent. They would extensively funnel weapons into the South Sudanese rebels for this aim.
John Garang, one of the major rebels of the south, enjoyed close ties to Israel. His rebel group (Sudan People's Liberation Movement) received ammunition, weapons, fuel, ect from Israel in the fight against the Khartoum government. He was also known for widespread usage of kidnapped Child-Soldiers. Definitely a perfect ally for the only democracy in the middle east.
In 2005, Garang was killed in a helicopter crash while returning from Uganda. Garang's successor, Salva Kiir Mayardit, continued the beneficial relation with Israel. After independence in 2011, Israel would be the first country that Salva Kiir would visit. Their alliance was as clear as could be. The creation of South Sudan was an astounding victory for israel.
It has long-time been a policy of Israel to support Balkanization and division of unfriendly regimes in the region. This goes back to the Yinon plan in 1982. Which described desired Israel Balkanization of Iraq and Syria.
“The idea that all the Arab states should be broken down, by Israel, into small units, occurs again and again in Israeli strategic thinking. For example, Ze'ev Schiff, the military correspondent of Haaretz (and probably the most knowledgeable in Israel, on this topic) writes about the "best" that can happen for Israeli interests in Iraq: "The dissolution of Iraq into a Shi'ite state, a Sunni state and the separation of the Kurdish part" (Ha'aretz 6/2/1982). Actually, this aspect of the plan is very old.”
The reason why Israel supported South Sudanese separation is the same reason they desired sectarian and ethnic separation in Iraq and Syria, Sudan was an unfriendly regime that they wanted to weaken, and division was the preferred strategy. They already had the mismanaged European colonial borders to take advantage of.
To quote Boyle from his excellent book “Destroying Libya and the world order”
“U.S./NATO/Israel planned, promoted, and brokered the secession of the oil-laden South Sudan in 2011, thus permanently debilitating the remainder of that now amputated country. Lebanon is currently being massively destabilized as part of the neoliberal Obama administration’s not-so-covert war against Syria. Iran has already been targeted as the next victim of the Pentagon’s Zionist Neo-Con/Neo-Lib murder list.”
Everything that happened in Sudan happened as it was meant to be
South Sudan also coincidentally signed an oil deal with Israel. Just like how Israel managed to get over 77% of its oil from Iraqi Kurdistan. It is really great luck for Israel, that whenever an Arab country is balkanized, they just happen to reap substantial benefits.
Now, I gave the Israeli side on this, but I should mention that Sudan did not persist through all of this without swinging back. Sudan was a fierce opponent of Israel throughout this, and would become a major-backer of Palestinian militancy, largely through an alliance with Iran
To give a concise summary
“The close connections between Teheran, Khartoum and Hamas are a matter of public record. Brigadier Bashir's regime is, with the exception of the Hamas enclave in Gaza, the only overtly Islamist and pro-Iranian government in the Arabic-speaking world. Sudan is an acknowledged member of the Iran-led regional alliance, which includes Syria, Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas and Islamic Jihad. Sudan has maintained close relations with Iran since the 1989 coup which brought Bashir to power. “
Sudan found itself in company with Tehran and Hamas, which resulted in it becoming a major target of Mossad. Sudan was a substantial smuggling hub for palestinian resistance
“The route starts on Sudan's east coast, traveling north by boat on the Red Sea to the Sinai peninsula, a notoriously lawless region where weapons smugglers operate freely outside the control of the Egyptian government. The northwesternmost tip of Sinai is where the peninsula meets the Gaza Strip. Officially, Egypt controls the border crossing with Gaza, but underneath the border, hundreds of tunnels are used to smuggle goods -– and occasionally weapons -– to Gaza.”
In 2009, there was a massive air strike which killed roughly 119 people. This was to prevent smuggled weapons from reaching Gaza and Hamas
“Israeli media has reported that the Israeli air force carried out at least two secret operations in Sudan in January and February 2009. The first involved the bombing of a convoy carrying arms through Sudan to Gaza, in which 119 people were killed. And a ship at a Sudanese port was bombed from the air. Sudan accused the US of carrying out these attacks. In June that year Binyamin Netanyahu, Israel's prime minister, told US officials there was "a steady flow of Iranian weapons to Gaza through Sudan or Syria and then by sea".”
Another Israeli strike occurred in 2011 when Israel assassinated a top Hamas official in Sudan.
“April 6, 2011 (KHARTOUM) – The target of the air strike launched by an a foreign plane was a senior official in the Islamic militant group Hamas which controls Gaza strip, according to Al-Arabiya TV channel based in Dubai… Sudan foreign minister Ali Karti accused Israel of standing behind the raid.”
And *Again* In 2012 there was another attack against the Yarmouk Munitions factory which was apparently owned by Iran.
“It is still unclear who is responsible for the attack on the Yarmouk military plant in south Khartoum, but according to past reports in the foreign media, Iran has built such facilities in order to arm Hamas.”
There was actually an Al-Jazeera interview about that specific attack
Sudan was even relatively supportive of Hezbollah as well. In 2006 there were protests across Sudan in support of Hezbollah against Israel.
There are possibly even more Israeli attacks within Sudan that we don’t even know about, but these are the recorded instances. Sudan was arming and harboring Palestinian militants (with the help of Iran), and Israel acted strongly to prevent this.
Beyond this, Bashir would soon find himself in trouble with the “international community” due to his proven and alleged affiliations with other maligned states (Such as Ba’athist Iraq and the DPRK) and support for international Islamic terrorism.
He has a controversial record of funding and hosting international Jihadis, most notably, Al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden.
“Sudan was first added to the list in 1993 after the United States said it had provided assistance to terrorist groups. The country gave safe haven to Osama Bin Laden and it was implicated in the twin bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998 and then in the bombing of the USS Cole in 2000.”
This resulted in Sudan being put on the international sponsor of terrorism list, hit with crippling sanctions, and even facing airstrikes.
The most horrific example is the Clinton-approved bombing of the Al-Shifa pharmacy in 1998. It was alleged to be a chemical weapon plant (without substantial evidence)
This bombing lead to further devastation of the already Impoverished Sudanese health sector
“Some, like Germany’s then ambassador to Sudan, Werner Daum, estimated that the destruction of the Al Shifa plant may have led to thousands of deaths, though there does not actually appear to be reliable data on the public health consequences of the bombing.”
Omar Al-Bashir called out Clinton for being a criminal, and there was massive anti-American protests in Sudan.
Little would we know, this was only the beginning of the war on terror. Sudan was just a brief example of what America was preparing to unleash on the rest of the world.
With all this said, let’s do a do a brief examination of Sudan within the global system. It’s an interesting case-study of contradiction.
As mentioned, Omar Al-Bashir was seen to be deeply aligned with the “rouge states” of the world. He opposed the usage of American soldiers against iraq during the 1991 gulf war, and similarly opposed the Iraq war in 2003.
He was also alleged to be close militarily with the DPRK. The U.S. wanted to pressure him to implement sanctions
“The July 2017 delay in the lifting of sanctions (which had been promised in January) introduced an unexpected new element to the process by seeking to ensure that Sudan was committed to the full implementation of UN Security Council resolutions on North Korea (USDoS, 2017a). Allegations of Sudanese military procurement from North Korea are not new: US démarches to Khartoum regarding Sudan's alleged efforts to procure North Korean ballistic missiles date back to early 2009”
Being under US-sanctions, China was still willing to invest and purchase Sudanese oil. It was actually one of the major suppliers for the quickly growing, energy-demanding, Chinese economy
“A little under a decade ago, Sudan was China’s 6th largest foreign oil source, supplying 5.5% of its needs. That position fell sharply when South Sudan seceded and took 80% of the once united country’s oil resources with it.”
Naturally, after Sudan was split, such investment shriveled away. Sudan proper lacked much oil after 2011. But China was still interested in South Sudan (and was even controversially a major part of the UN peacekeeping force, but that’s another subject entirely)
China and Sudan had a long-term understanding with each other since 1995, and the continued under Xi Jinping
“President Xi Jinping welcomed Omar al-Bashir's visit to China to attend the commemorations marking the 70th anniversary of the victory of the Chinese People's War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression and the World Anti-fascist War. Xi Jinping pointed out that since the establishment of the diplomatic relations 56 years ago, China and Sudan have always understood and supported each other”
This has been a long standing policy of China. They are willing work with pretty much anyone on an economic level, as long as mutual sovereignty is respected. This was convenient for Bashir, as he was a pariah on the international stage and China was a strategically important trade partner.
With regard to Russia, Omar Al-Bashir notably maintained excellent relations, and was a major purchaser of Russian grain and military equipment.
“SIPRI reports that only 8 percent of Sudanese arms are Chinese, and that Russian arms actually make up the majority, at 87 percent. Russia is the major weapons supplier to the Sudan.”
Putin and Al-Bashir both saw themselves as independent actors struggling in a multipolar world against US hegemony. Al-Bashir desired Russian protection and even compared himself to Assad in that regard.
To quote Omar Al-Bashir when he visited Moscow in 2017:
“We believe that the problems the region is now facing have been caused by US interference. We think the situation that developed in our country (the same applies to Darfur and South Sudan) has the same roots – US policy. As a result, our country split into two parts, which made a bad situation worse. We need protection from aggressive US actions.
We believe that what is happening in Syria today is also due to US interference, which resulted in such a disaster there.
We think peace cannot be achieved without President Bashar al-Assad. We believe that Syria would have been lost without Russia’s assistance.
Sudan has extensive ties in Africa and we can help Russia develop relations with African countries. Sudan may become Russian’s key to Africa. We are a member of the African Union. We have great relations with all African nations and we are ready to help. We are also interested in developing relations with BRICS.”
Al-Bashir made sure to point out the negative implication of the splitting of Sudan (which is obviously given the drastic decrease of oil supply). He also highlighted Russian intervention in Syria on behalf of Assad, whom he blamed the U.S. for creating the unstable situation in the first place.
This is in line with his earlier comments in an interview in which he accused the CIA and Mossad of supporting ISIS
It’s also interesting how he mentioned BRICS. This is an organization that has become relatively infamous in 2023, with most people seeing it as a beacon of “Multipolarity”. Even in 2017, Al-Bashir saw himself aligned with this vision.
In this context, Al-Bashir saw himself as apart of the newly emerging Russia/China aligned bloc of the global south.
Now, Despite this substantial anti-American postering, it was all a lot more farcical than you’d think. To be frank, he hardly cared about imperialism. He opposed America because he was a pariah, and therefore it was convenient. He was fully willing to align with imperial conquest as long as it was convenient and profitable
Libya is a prime example of this contradiction. Sudan and Libya have long had a complicated relationship. In 1971, Qaddafi supported then Sudanese president Nimeiry against a Soviet-backed coup. But later they would sever relations due to alleged Libyan support for terrorism. Relations would somewhat improve early on under Al-Bashir in the 90s, but this was short lived.
The biggest strain would happen in 2002 when Libya supported the Darfur liberation front against Sudan (this was during the Darfur genocide). So naturally, ties were tense.
Omar Al-Bashir had a bone to pick with Qaddafi, and during 2011 he feared his own position. He opportunistically decided to support the Anti-Qaddafi rebels in Libya.
Sudan would give logistical and military support to the opposition (With Qatari funding)
“The Sudanese armed forces alongside forces of the National intelligence and Security Service (NISS) tightened their grip on the Sudan-Libya border. The Sudanese authorities coordinated with the Libyan opposition, and offered them to provide logistical assistance, training and supply of arms, ammunition and combat equipment and security and intelligence cooperation. After that, the presence of Sudanese security and intelligence increased inside Libya, to play critical roles for the benefit of the Libyan armed revolution. On 1 May 2011, the Libyan authorities expelled the Sudanese consulate at Kufra, in southeast Libya close to the Sudanese border, and closed down the mission headquarters, accusing Sudan of interfering in favor of the revolutionaries.”
This was a big play, and helped topple Libya. This was apart of the larger strategy of Omar Al-Bashir trying to align himself with the Sunni gulf monarchs, and being affiliated with the Muslim brotherhood himself, he had a strong ideological inclination to Qatar.
Sudan actually cut off long-standing ties with Iran on this basis. As mentioned beforehand, Sudan and Iran worked together to support Hamas in Palestine, and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad even visited Sudan in 2007. In 2008, Sudanese and Iranian officials signed a military cooperation agreement, and in 2013, Iran stepped up its construction of naval and logistical bases in Port Sudan. Sudan and Iran share geopolitical objectives, and Sudan is a strategic gateway for Iran into the African continent. Sudan was the largest ally of Iran in Africa.
They had a solid relationship, but that wasn’t enough for the ruined Sudanese economy, Omar Al-Bashir decided to pivot for better funding.
He even strangely accused Iran of trying to “Spread Shia’ism” in Sudan and shut down an Iranian cultural center
Sudan decided to turn on Iran in favor of substantial gulf funding. This is a major reason the Sudanese army was sent to help pillage Yemen. He needed the money, especially after losing 80% of the oil in South Sudan.
“Khartoum recently announced that officials in the Saudi capital of Riyadh had deposited $1 billion in Sudan’s central bank earlier this year. The Qataris deposited $1.22 billion shortly after Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir visited Doha last year.
In October, Sudanese Defense Minister Awad bin Auf said, “There are 6,000 fighters from special forces, ground forces and elite troops ready to participate when requested by the leadership of the coalition. … Even if more troops and military contribution is needed, we are ready for any developments.”
Sudan would become increasingly aligned with the gulf states.
All of this makes his appraising of Bashar Al-Assad and Syria even more paradoxical. Omar Al-Bashir visited Syria in 2018 and praised him, all while his beloved gulf allies were trying to overthrow him.
One day he’s aligned with Iran and supporting Hezbollah and Hamas, the next day he’s aligned with Saudi Arabia, and strongly supporting them in Yemen, but opposed them in Syria (despite being Muslim brotherhood himself). He opposed the Americans in Iraq but supported them in Libya. He harbored Al-Qaeda in the 90s but would later call Al-Qaeda and ISIS western/Mossad backed.
None of this really makes sense, but it doesn’t need too, as long as he was getting paid, he didn’t really care.
All of this is without mentioning his various crimes in Darfur, the south, and in Sudan in general.
Let’s fast forward back to 2019, this is when Omar Al-Bashir was toppled in a series of protests, and this related to the economic war that was waged on Sudan.
As I mentioned beforehand, Sudan was under punishing sanctions from the west (and in the state sponsor of terror list) since 1997. But that doesn’t give the full scope of what was happening.
Sudan was also being horrifically brutalized by the IMF and international debt. To put in perspective now mind-bogglingly deep this neocolonialism was, Sudan owed roughly 900 million pounds to the UK, and *80* of that debt was *interest*.
“ A report in Sunday’s Observer newspaper has claimed that the war-torn country owes Britain £861m, (US$1.187 billion) of which £684m (US$943 million) is interest, accounting for nearly 80% of the total amount due.”
Yeah, you read that correctly. 80% of the debt that they owed to the UK was interest. The UK Government has been charging Sudan a compounded 12% per annum. That data point itself should be disturbing.
This massive international debt (owed to western nations) resulted in a series of brutal, and borderline murderous, austerity measurements. In 2018 Sudan was forced to devalue its currency and remove subsidies.
“In Sudan, for example, it was the IMF insistence on removing fuel and bread subsidies in 2018 that caused the price of food, medicine, and transport to skyrocket. Its demand that the Sudanese Central Bank devalue its currency was also a major contributor to higher costs on the imports needed for agriculture and other industries. These policies raised the cost of living for ordinary Sudanese people and unquestionably lead to more impoverishment.
Sudan is a country that lost its oil export revenues after South Sudan declared its independence. At the same time, it’s heavily dependent on imports like wheat, basic food, medicine, and chemicals for industry. These were factors that triggered the fall of the regime in 2019.”
So it’s no surprise then that during the 2019 protest, the major demand of the movement was bread. The Sudanese people couldn’t survive this debt
“The immediate cause of the protests, which began on 19 December 2018, was the slashing of bread subsidies in the northern Nile-side town of Atbara. Citizens saw the price of bread triple overnight and took to the streets, burning down the ruling National Congress Party (NCP) headquarters, and breaking into stores to distribute grain to the people.”
The protests continued, and eventually Omar Al-Bashir was ousted and arrested. Ending almost 30 years of his military dictatorship.
And what would you know, he would be replaced by a man named Mohamed Dagalo or “Hamedti”. This is an interesting figure who has had a long role in Sudanese politics.
Hamedti was a former member of the Janjaweed (the genocidal militia which committed crimes against humanity in Darfur). This militia was later changed to “rapid support forces” in 2013, and he was the leader of that.
He was able to maneuver the military correctly, strategically opposed Al-Bashir, and became debatably the most powerful figure in Sudan after he was toppled. Replacing one genocidal militarist with another.
“ After years of loyally supporting Bashir, Hemedti took part in the military coup that toppled the leader in April and is now a senior figure in the transitional government that is preparing the ground for elections in three years’ time. “
Hemedti was a notoriously corrupt figure, and made millions by smuggling gold out of Sudan (notably to the UAE) under the firm “Alugande”
“Current and former government officials and gold industry sources said that in 2018 as Sudan’s economy was imploding, Bashir gave Hemedti free rein to sell Sudan’s most valuable natural resource through this family firm, Algunade…The documents, covering a four-week period from the end of last year, show Algunade sent around $30 million of gold bars to Dubai, around a ton in weight.”
In short: Hamedti is a corrupt thief backed by the UAE, who worked as a warlord who worked on behalf of the Al-Bashir dictatorship to slaughter hundreds of thousands of Sudanese. The 2019 protests, essentially landed the Sudanese people under the same type of tyrant they were protesting against.
To loop all the way back the beginning, This is also in context of the Israel-Sudan normalization which was negotiated in the post-2019 government. This was something that the US had required of Sudan in order to move off the list of State-sponsor of terrorism, and hopefully get removed from sanctions
“In December 2020, after the US removed Sudan from its state sponsors of terrorism blacklist following its pledge to normalize ties with Israel, the Arab nation revoked the citizenship of top Hamas leader, Khaled Mashaal, as well as that of some 3,000 other foreign nationals accused of terror links.”
The new Sudanese Junta would designate both Hamas and Hezbollah as terrorist organizations.
The US has long used economic leverage to get normalization for Israel. This is a consistent strategy. Egypt for example, got substantial debt relief and consistent US aid for mending ties with Israel. It’s easy enough to bribe a comprador bourgeoisie leader into making a peace deal. The same trick would be continued with other Arab countries, and now Sudan.
This was all a part of the greater American strategy in the region. The Biden administration is determined to sever Sudan’s relationship with Russia and China, close Sudan’s large Red Sea port of Port Sudan to the Russian navy, and strengthen its regional alliance against both Iran and Russia.
What does this mean for the future of Sudan?
With all this said, the future is still uncertain as Sudan falls deeper into catastrophe as the beloved “International community” adds fuel to the fire, both politically, economically, and militarily. If one thing is certain, it is that the constant usage of Sudan as a geopolitical token has only had disastrous effects. The IMF and covert Israeli war on Sudan have all served the purpose of strengthening (American) hegemony in East Africa.
More posts coming soon (Maybe?)
Extremely interesting thread, giving a full summary of Sudan's geopolitical position and strategy over the last decades. Good work, comrade !