NAIROBI, Kenya – As they talked about peace, Sudan’s generals prepared for war.
In the days before Sudan descended into a catastrophic conflict, the country’s two most powerful generals came very close to an agreement that US and British mediators hoped would defuse the rivalry. their burgeoning war, and even lead this vast African nation toward democracy.
The shares have skyrocketed. Since 2019, when a popular revolution toppled Sudan’s 30-year-old dictator, the transition to democracy has been hampered by this ruthless, belligerent pair of generals. Now, it’s only a matter of reaching an agreement to get them to hand over power.
Foreign envoys held lengthy meetings with the two generals — the army chief, General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and the paramilitary force leader, Lieutenant General Mohamed Hamdan — in an effort to achieve a agree. Promises made, concessions drawn. They even had dinner at the house of a high-ranking general.
But on the street, rival military machines are preparing for a fight.
At night, soldiers quietly swarmed into rival military camps across the capital Khartoum, where they marked each other as rival players on the football field. Paramilitary fighters have besieged a base housing fighters from Egypt, a powerful neighbor that has sided with the Sudanese Army.
And when the first shots rang out on Saturday morning, pretend the dialogue was broken for an instant.
Now, fierce fighting in Khartoum and across Sudan has claimed hundreds of lives and ushered in a volatile and unpredictable chapter for Africa’s third-largest country. On Wednesday, a new series of explosions rocked the main airport and residents said they were running out of food, as fears grew that regional powers would be drawn into the conflict.
The violence has led to debate and accusations about how it led to this. Some in Sudan and Washington are questioning whether foreign powers have tried to placate generals who have lost power — the United States and Britain, as well as the United Nations, African and Arab governments — as well. be responsible for the mess.
They say that since the generals took power in a coup 18 months ago, foreign officials have succumbed to their intransigence and threats, while at the same time defrauding pro-democracy forces. besieged Sudan aside.
Kholood Khair, a Sudanese political analyst, said: “The generals are not responsible. “Kidnapping, disappearances, mock trials, unlawful detention – the international turned a blind eye to all of that for the sake of a political process that has now gone horribly wrong. “
Despite their stark differences, the two generals for many years marched in the same direction.
Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, 62, is a serious four-star general, trained in Egypt and Jordan, who has commanded troops in Sudan’s fierce counter-insurgency campaigns to the south and west. of the country. Born in a village along the Nile, he embodies the class of officers from the riverine Arab tribes that have dominated Sudan since independence in 1956.
Mohamed Hamdan, known to many as Hemeti, was in his late 40s and a camel trader turned militia commander renowned for his ruthlessness, who steadily gained wealth and influence. .
The two generals forged their careers in the early 2000s in the violent land of Darfur, the western region where a tribal uprising erupted. President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, then the autocratic ruler of Sudan, sent General al-Burhan to help quell the uprising.
He chose General Hamdan, then the leader of the infamous Janjaweed militia, to help in the fight.
General Hamdan did such an excellent job that al-Bashir adopted him as his personal executor, jokingly calling the commander “my protector” and appointing him head of the Support Forces. Newly established Express support. General Hamdan became rich thanks to lucrative gold mining concessions and his commission from sending thousands of troops to fight in Yemen, where the United Arab Emirates paid handsomely for his services. grandfather.
Backed by the European Union, his army stopped migrants from crossing Sudan’s long border – although General Hamdan himself suspected of profiting from human trafficking. Sudan expert Alex de Waal says his career has become “an objective lesson in the political entrepreneurship of an expert on violence”.
Two generals incited Mr al-Bashir in April 2019 when protesters called for his ouster in a revolution that inspired fierce hopes for democracy.
But two months later, the generals sent their soldiers in to disperse the remaining protesters, killing at least 120 in a grisly sign that the military would not give up power as easily as he did. al-Bashir.
That message resonated even further in October 2021, when two generals joined forces to take power for themselves, toppling the country’s civilian prime minister.
The coup came as a rude surprise to the American envoy, Jeffrey Feltman, who had met General al-Burhan and General Hamdan just hours earlier and they had assured him that they would not take over.
But their deception cost them very little. Before long, instead of being ostracized, the generals were courted by Western officials who hoped to take their power. Sanctions the US has quietly threatened to impose on General Hamdan, targeting his financial interests in the Persian Gulf, have never been imposed, a former US official with knowledge of the sanctions said. negotiators as well as other officials for this article spoke on condition of anonymity. discuss sensitive politics.
Some began to regard the generals as politicians. In February, the head of the World Food Program, former Governor David Beasley of South Carolina, silenced Western embassies in Sudan when he was a guest at two consecutive public ceremonies. . First, General al-Burhan awarded him Sudan’s highest civilian award, Order of the Two Niles; the next night, you were the smiling guest of honor at a dinner hosted by General Hamdan.
But then the champions started falling out.
General Hamdan worries that the army is being infiltrated by Muslims, including those who were once loyal to the al-Bashir regime, his arch-enemy.
Military intelligence, controlled by General al-Burhan, began telling foreign officials that his opponent had been trying to secretly import armed drones from Turkey to bolster its military force.
Their rivalry also reflects deep institutional conflicts. Regular soldiers look down on General Hamdan and his paramilitary soldiers as a bunch of misfits – “a bunch of yahoos jumping off sticks, not decent soldiers,” as one Western ambassador put it. .
For their part, the Quick Support Force resented the alleged discrimination and believed it was their turn to take power in Khartoum.
“They have a victim mentality,” said Mohamed Hashim, a journalist who interviewed Rapid Support Force leaders for Sudan’s state broadcaster. “People discriminate against them, mock them, tell them they are not Sudanese.”
General Hamdan began to position himself as a future leader – traveling across the country, distributing presents to friendly tribal leaders, presenting himself as a fighter for the underprivileged. He allied with political parties, supported elections and refrained from any mention of his Janjaweed past or his military’s role in the Khartoum massacre in June 2019.
In December, Sudan’s National Human Rights Commission declared General Hamdan “person of the year” to which many residents reacted with mockery.
That same month, under pressure from Western, African and Arab countries, the generals agreed to hand power back to a civilian-led government earlier this month. But first, they had to agree on key issues, especially how quickly their forces would merge into one army – a process that General Hamdan would lose the most, as Rapid Support Force will be effectively dispersed.
Military leaders pushed to get the job done in two years. General Hamdan said it would take a decade.
Tension broke out. At one point, a senior Western official said, General Hamdan was banned from attending an important meeting chaired by General al-Burhan at the presidential palace. He was only admitted “after standing outside, literally banging on the door,” the official said.
Egypt entered the war, siding with the army. Critics worry the talks are flawed or move too quickly. Negotiators say this is Sudan’s best chance for a long-awaited transition to democracy.
“They are people with power and guns,” the senior Western official said of the generals. “We’re trying to build a political path to appease them.”
According to a senior UN official, “We worked with the tools that were on the table.”
Those tensions spiked last Wednesday, when troops from the Rapid Support Force surrounded a military base in Meroe, 125 miles north of Khartoum, where Egypt has stationed a number of fighter jets. – a sign that war is lurking. Even then, however, foreign officials still hope the two generals will mend the fence and peacefully relinquish power.
Negotiators say negotiations to unite their forces have reached a crucial final point – the military’s command structure during the transition period.
On Friday, Volker Perthes, the United Nations special envoy to Sudan, dined at the home of Lieutenant General Shams al-Deen al-Kabashi, the army’s deputy leader, for iftar, the fast-breaking meal. daily during the holy month of Ramadan. UN officials say there is no sign of a coming war.
Hours later, in the gloom before dawn, the first shots rang out across Khartoum.
