On April 15 of this
year the 5.7 million residents of Khartoum woke up in the middle of a
vicious pitched battle between two heavily armed military forces.
Tanks rumbled through normally quiet suburbs, artillery shells rained
down on informal settlements, fighter jets roared overhead and
soldiers raided the food and medical supply warehouses of
international aid agencies and wandered the streets looting whatever
they could find. The road from the city to Port Sudan on the Red Sea was closed, cutting the city off from supplies and making escape from the city impossible.
To understand how the largest city in Sudan, its political, economic and social center turned into a battlefield with no escape and nowhere to hide, we need to revisit Sudan's recent history.
We can skip over some 5,000 years of recorded history by noting that the Blue Nile flowing from Ethiopia and the White Nile flowing from Tanzania meet at Khartoum and then flow north to create Egypt. The 1884 Berlin Conference on Africa "gave" Egypt to the United Kingdom although the British always had to pretend that they were really just guests of the Kingdom of Egypt. It also gave Britain control of the territory south of Khartoum through the Sahara desert down into sub-Saharan Africa and for good measure, the British territory extended far to the west. The arbitrary lines on a map lumped together a majority population that had been influenced by the Arab and Islamic invasion of the 8th and 9th centuries and is largely semi-nomadic camel and sheep herders, some of whom had been key middlemen in transporting Black African slaves across the Sahara. A significant minority of the people included in the south and west of Sudan are Black African subsistence farmers who were Christians or traditional animists. A final segment of the population are the urbanized citizens of Khartoum, linked to Egypt historically, culturally and economically.
A Hopeful Future
When Sudan gained independence in 1956, there was immense optimism that the waters of the Blue and the White Nile could be used to create an enormous agricultural area. There were dreams of Sudan as "The Bread Basket of the Middle East." But instead Sudan endured 40 years of political instability with weak and inept civilian governments alternating with equally inept military regimes. That ended in 1989 when Omar al-Bashir led yet another military coup but managed to consolidate power and create an increasingly repressive regime. Despite the facts that a significant minority of Sudanese were not Muslim and Islam as practiced in Sudan was tolerant and relaxed, al-Bashir forged an alliance with conservative Islamist clerics and announced plans to "Islamicize" Sudan. That led to two major revolts, one in the South and the other in the western province of Darfur. The brutal and bloody civil war in the South dragged on until 2011 when the al-Bashir regime gave up and a poplar referendum ratified the creation of the new nation of South Sudan. With the regular army preoccupied with the fighting in the South, the rebellion in Darfur was opposed by a series of militias from the semi-nomadic camel herders. The various militias were quickly organized into a single force by Mohamed Hamdan “Hemedti” Dagalo with direct support from al-Bashir as the "Janjaweed" and began a rampage of arson, rape, murder and looting against the Black African farming villages that resulted in an estimated 400,000 deaths and over 2 million refugees in camps dependent on international aid organizations. [The atrocities perpetrated in Darfur became an international cause celebre in the early 2000's and led the International Criminal Court to indict Omar al-Bashir for crimes against humanity.] al-Bashir worked with Hemedti to reorganize and re-brand the Janjaweed as the Rapid Support Force (RSF) as an important counter weight to the Sudanese military and additional prop for his rule.
Hopes Dashed Again
By 2021 Sudan was increasingly isolated and the foreign aid that was a major element of the economy was drying up. The government's response to shortages of food and supplies and spiraling inflation was so inept that a coalition of Khartoum civilian elites and senior military officers ousted al-Bashir and installed a transitional government with a strong civilian presence and both army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and the RSF's Hemedti. It seemed Sudan was on the verge of a democratic future. That dream did not last and al-Burban and Hemedti took power in (yet another) coup with al-Burban the ostensible number 1 and Hemedti as number 2. They oversaw the indictment and conviction of al-Bashir on bribery and corruption charges and put him in jail for two years but refused to turn him over to the International Criminal Court.
Almost immediately the pair began arguing over plans to integrate Hemedti's RSF forces into the Sudanese Armed Forces. Once the RSF disappeared into the regular army, Hemedti would be without a power base and source of income. The three years al-Burban offered was hardly enough time to prepare for a comfortable retirement; Hemedti figured ten years would be about right.
This was not an abstract argument about personnel and organizational flow charts. Most of the roughly 100,000 RSF fighters had come to the Khartoum area to support Hemedti's role in the coup leadership and it was not clear how long he could find the money to support them. Not surprisingly there were very tense relationships between the RSF fighters and the Sudanese soldiers as they patrolled the streets of Khartoum.
WAR 2023
It is not clear what ignited the violence between the two armed groups in April but much of the violence was aimed at controlling international aid agencies, medical facilities and food warehouses as well a civilian infrastructure like electricity generation, roads into and out of Khartoum, and the airport.
There is no easy escape for the millions of people caught in the fighting in the capital. The airport is a battleground and there are no flights. The United States, the United Kingdom and Saudi Arabia manged to broker a brief cease fire to allow the evacuation of international aid workers and embassy personnel overland to Port Sudan on the Red Sea and on to Egypt. But the ceasefire evaporated and the highway from Khartoum to Port Sudan was closed again. Even when sporadic cease fires are negotiated to allow shipments of food and medical supplies into Khartoum, civilians are unable to leave since they lack transport and the all-important exit visas they need to leave Port Sudan.
The explanation for the attacks on international aid agencies, medical facilities and food storage sites lies, I think, in the nature of the RSF forces. The typical recruit is a young man from rural northern Sudan with little education and not much future beyond semi-nomadic camel herding. Joining a militia means getting a regular paycheck, meals and housing, a group to belong to and the thrill of firing an assault rifle. It is just plain cool to put on your camo fatigues and ride around in the back of a Toyota pickup with your gun and buddies. It also offers the chance to extort money or goods from villagers or even to attack and loot hapless farmers who are the traditional enemies of nomads. The RSF troops have the equipment and weapons of a modern army and some military training (from Wagner group mercenaries and others) but they do not have the discipline and focus of professional armies which puts civilians who cross their path in grave danger of robbery or worse. I do not know where the RSF gets its funding, but suspect it comes from oil-rich conservative Islamist individuals in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf.
In Khartoum, aid organizations and medical centers are attacked because they have things that are worth taking and civilians in their houses are attacked because city dwellers are resented and scorned for their Westernized ways and they have things worth taking. Once fighting broke out in the capital, it meant the government and regular army could no longer control the rest of the country and the RSF unleashed a furious assault in Darfur, resurrecting the nightmare of rape, mass murder and pillage of 2003 -2005. The fortunate ones will be able to make it to refugee camps in Chad which still shelter thousands of people from the horrors of 20 years ago.
Perhaps because of the limits on my knowledge of the situation and the key players, it is difficult to see and quick or easy solution. For the two major players: the Sudanese Armed Forces' al-Burban and the RSF's Hemedti, this is both business and personal. The business part is straightforward -- controlling the government presents opportunities to skim and divert foreign aid funds and tax revenues and to collect a little something for approving plans for construction or mining operations. (When al-Bashir was accused and convicted of bribery and corruption, his long time cronies in the government and military and Khartoum's civilian elites were shocked, yes, shocked and appalled to think that such things were being done ...) That might allow for some sort of power (and revenue) sharing agreement but the conflict is also personal. The two men neither like nor trust each other and any attempt to integrate the RSF into the regular forces means the end of Hemedti's career as player in Sudanese politics. There is no way to split the difference.
As I mentioned, the United States, the UK and Saudi Arabia, along with Egypt, are playing the central role in trying to end the violence. Sudan's neighbors, such as Chad and Libya, are greatly concerned about Sudan's impact on their own stability and internal conflicts. I think the only hope for at least a temporary solution is the withdrawal of RSF forces from Khartoum and Darfur. As long as the fighting continues the 5.7 million citizens of Khartoum are trapped in their homes with dwindling food supplies, limited access to water and non-existent medical services. Thousands of Darfur citizens are reported on the move from their villages to the comparative safety of refugee camps in Chad amid rumors and reports of atrocities evoking the agony of 20 years ago.
