Why two military rivals are in a 'fight to the death' in Sudan
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Satellite image shows thick, black smoke drifting across the city at multiple locations an overview of fires burning in Khartoum on Sunday.Satellite image ©2023 Maxar Technologies -
Satellite view of fires burning at Khartoum International Airport Sunday.Satellite image ©2023 Maxar Technologies -
Satellite images show passenger planes burning at the Khartoum International Airport in Sudan.Satellite image ©2023 Maxar Technologies
Three straight days of conflict between two militarized factions have made once-quiet neighborhoods in and around the capital, Khartoum, feel like a war zone. More than 100 civilians have been killed and 365 others have been wounded, according to the Sudan Doctors' Syndicate. The UN World Food Program said Sunday that it was halting all operations in Sudan after three of its employees were killed in the fighting, and a humanitarian aircraft was damaged in crossfire.
NPR's Emmanuel Akinwotu described on Up First a "nightmare" for civilians, where "places they used to eat, buy groceries, see family and friends have basically been turned into a battlefield right before their eyes."
Zeinab Mohammed Salih, a journalist in Khartoum, has been sheltering at home from the bombardments and artillery fire outside.
"There's heavy gunfire all over the city. Military jets are over us all the time. There's a small market nearby but there's a shortage in food. And you can't go out," she told Up First on Monday.
Why is there fighting in Sudan?
Jeffrey Feltman, a former U.S. special envoy for the Horn of Africa, tells NPR's Leila Fadel that the days-long bloody struggle is the result of a "lust for power." It has now become what he calls a "fight to the death" between leaders of the Sudanese army and the rival paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF).
The two rival generals have been in what Jeffrey Feltman calls a "marriage of convenience" since a military coup ousted the regime of Omar al-Bashir in 2019. He says a "partnership of mutual interests" between Sudan's commander of the armed forces, Gen. Abdel-Fattah Burhan and the head of the RSF, Gen. Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo, was based on undermining civilian aspirations for democratic rule and rejecting accountability for past crimes, including genocide in Darfur.
"In the end, that partnership did not define who would end up being on top," Feltman says. "So what you have now is a fight to the death for who is going to prevail and should military rule continue in Sudan."
What we know about the warring factions
Feltman says Sudan's effort toward democracy, which had been galvanized by widespread protests, was effectively derailed in October 2021 when the civilian government was overthrown and Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok and his cabinet were jailed by the military leadership.
"They're basically contemptuous of the civilian aspirations of the population," according to Feltman.
Pro-democracy activists say both generals are guilty of human rights abuses.
Human Rights Watch accused security forces under Burhan of the unlawful detention of hundreds of protesters and the forcible disappearances of scores of people following the coup in 2021.
The RSF forces led by Dagalo, who is widely known as Hemedti, grew out of the Janjaweed militias that were blamed for a brutal crackdown and what humanitarian groups called genocide in Sudan's Darfur region. Under plans for a power-sharing military council, the RSF leader was to become Burhan's deputy. Instead, the deal was delayed by disputes over when civilians would assume oversight. And on Monday, Sudan's army chief labeled the RSF a rebellious group and ordered it disbanded.
Watching a descent toward civil war
During civilian protests and coups in Sudan, it is common for authorities to shut down internet access across the country. That has not happened this time, and Akinwotu's reporting suggests that is because there's a propaganda war going on, as well, and for that, both sides need the internet.
Diplomats – from the U.N. secretary general to the heads of the Arab League and the African Union Commission – are demanding a cease-fire.
In Japan for a Group of Seven meeting, Secretary of State Antony Blinken renewed his call for negotiations and a truce. "People in Sudan want the military back in the barracks," he said in a shared statement with U.K. Foreign Secretary James Cleverly.
Feltman, who is the John C. Whitehead Visiting Fellow in International Diplomacy in the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution, says a cease-fire "should not lead to another process by which the belligerents are able to divvy up the spoils of power under the guise of stability."
But Akinwotu told NPR's A Martinez on Up First that a democratic transition is extremely unlikely.
"The transition process was meant to be a kind of pragmatic solution to create a civilian government [and] a new normal in Sudan. But that has not happened," he said. "Instead...both of these forces [are fighting] for supremacy on who will shape Sudan going forward."
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Transcript
LEILA FADEL, HOST:
This is what Sudan's capital sounded like this weekend and today, the loud whir of jets followed by explosions.
(SOUNDBITE OF JET FLYING)
FADEL: Tensions had been building for months between the two most powerful figures in the country's military government. On Saturday, that tension turned to fighting. For three straight days, the conflict between army troops and paramilitary forces have turned once quiet parts of Khartoum into what residents are describing as a war zone. Joining me now is Jeffrey Feltman, a former State Department special envoy for the Horn of Africa. Good morning.
JEFFREY FELTMAN: Good morning.
FADEL: So what's at the center of what residents are describing as a war in their capital right now? How did this start?
FELTMAN: I mean, it's basically a question of lust for power. You had these two generals, as you mentioned, the two most powerful generals in the country and their respective security services that had a real marriage of convenience ever since the overthrow of Omar Bashir back in 2019, those heroic protests that were the engine behind the ouster of Omar Bashir. And this was a partnership based on mutual interests - mutual interests, basically, in undermining the civilian aspirations for democratic rule, a partnership based on rejecting the idea of accountability for past crimes, including genocide in Darfur.
So there's a lot of things that these two generals had in common that allowed them to overcome sort of ethnic, bureaucratic, institutional jealousies and rivalries. But in the end, that partnership did not define who would end up being on top, ultimately, once they were able to sideline or derail the civilian transition. So what you have now is a fight to the death for who is going to prevail should military rule continue in Sudan.
FADEL: So you point out this is a battle for supremacy between Sudan's military leader, Abdel-Fattah Burhan, and the commander of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, who were allies. But is this conflict now the death knell to any civilian transition in Sudan?
FELTMAN: They demonstrated their contempt for the civilian transition in Sudan all the way back in October, 2021, when they overthrew the civilian prime minister of the - of Sudan, threw him, cabinet members, others in jail. You know, they basically showed that those two generals are contemptuous of the civilian transition. But there's these heroic resistance committees that brute force have not tamed. You know, these were the engines behind the ouster of Omar Bashir back in 2019, these neighborhood, decentralized, tireless committees. And I don't think that even this violence is going to stop their aspirations and their efforts to get to a democratic civilian transition in Sudan.
Obviously, it's going to be much more harder and much more complicated, particularly if these two generals - one or both - survive this current violence, since they've already made their views clear that they will never have civilian oversight Sudan security services. So right now, obviously what is needed is a cease-fire. The region is deploying three presidents to try to broker a cease-fire. But the cease-fire should not lead to another process by which the belligerents are able to divvy up the spoils of power under the guise of stability.
FADEL: Who has the ability to stop the violence, I mean, which countries? Everybody's calling for it, including the U.S., to stop the violence. Is a cease-fire possible?
FELTMAN: You know, I think it's encouraging, first of all, to see the unity in the international community, whether you're talking about the Arab League or the African Union or various countries, you know, calling for a cease-fire. So you've got unity behind the idea of a cease-fire. But how do you implement that in practice? And the subregional organization for the Horn of Africa, a group called IGAD, yesterday appointed three presidents - president of Kenya, Djibouti and South Sudan - to go to Khartoum and try to mediate. And because the region has such interest in making sure that Sudan doesn't descend into total civil war because of the impact to the region, I think that we should all get behind the regional efforts to end this conflict now.
FADEL: That's Jeffrey Feltman, former State Department special envoy for the Horn of Africa.
Thank you so much for your time, Jeffrey.
FELTMAN: Thank you for having me. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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