Sudan, the war in Yemen and the company you keep
Britain's allies in the war in Yemen were the paymasters of the genocidal group now laying waste to Khartoum. Perhaps the paymasters should seek to end the fighting?
“the genocide is nearly finished”
One of the lowest points of my time working in government service was hearing a civil servant from the Department for International Development (DFID - now rolled into the FCDO) discuss the issue of supplying aid to the Sudanese government around the time of the Darfur genocide. The argument isn’t straightforward: of course you shouldn’t supply aid to genocidal maniacs, but if you deny aid to the people of Sudan, many of whom live in dire poverty, is this a better outcome? In grappling with this difficult question, the DFID official uttered the unforgettable line: “the genocide is nearly finished” as an argument in favour of continuing aid.
Sudan is a complex country that has faced instability throughout its history. The legacy of British colonialism is relevant to this story, although it should be noted that Sudan was one of the first African countries to gain independence, in 1955. Lengthy wars led to the independence of South Sudan in 2011. In parallel, the Darfur Genocide, now often overlooked, was perhaps the worst of the conflicts ravaging the country, in which Sudanese Arab militias known as Janjaweed targeted ethnic groups in the west of the country that identified as ‘African’ in contrast to ‘Arab’ (these are all complex identities and I am not suggesting they are entirely satisfactory ones. But they are used by people in Sudan. For more detail this is a useful summary.)
As has been widely reported, the Janjaweed evolved into the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in 2013. It remains under the command of Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, better known as Hemedti. The actions of the Janjaweed in Darfur, as well as other elements of the Sudanese state, including former president Omar Al-Bashir, were hideous, and clearly outlined in the International Criminal Court’s investigation which found clear evidence of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.
But that did’t stop Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates from seeing a potentially convenient opportunity. To bolster their faltering military escapade in Yemen in 2015, effectively, the RSF became a vast mercenary force in the pay of Abu Dhabi and Riyadh as they attempted to defeat Yemen’s Houthi rebels.
Portrayed as a military intervention to shore up the internationally recognised government of Yemen against Iranian-backed Houthis, the Saudi-led intervention quickly spiralled out of control in the chaos of a guerrilla war. The Saudis carried out multiple bombings of civilian targets, often equipped with British-supplied munitions. This was in spite of the fact that the court of appeal had found Britain’s support to the Saudis to be ‘unlawful’ in 2019. The British would parrot the well-worn line “there is no military solution to the war in Yemen” whilst supplying one side with arms and even deploying its own forces to fight against the Houthis.
Put simply, Britain’s was fighting on the same side in the war in Yemen as a genocidal force of rapacious mercenaries.
But the role of the RSF in Yemen has not been particularly well-understood. The Saudis didn’t limit their ambitions to defeating the Houthi rebels: they also sought to plunder Yemen’s mineral resources, using Sudanese RSF fighters to try to seize gold mines in the Hadhramawt region of Eastern Yemen. Put simply, Britain’s was fighting on the same side in the war in Yemen as a genocidal force of rapacious mercenaries.
Yemen’s Houthis are not simply a front for Iran’s interests
Proxy wars?
It is important to resist the temptation to call everything a proxy war. One of the reasons for the resilience of Yemen’s Houthis is that they are not, as many outsiders lazily assume, merely a front for Iran’s interests in the Arabian peninsula. They may well be an unpleasant, vicious group, but they are also a legitimate force in what is a very divided country. Similarly, what is happening in Sudan, isn’t all about outsiders, even if they are, as you would expect, involved. Back in Sudan, the RSF has access to significant resources (again, much of it from gold mining activities) and its relations with the Saudis and Emiratis have been strained over times, with disputes over payment and accusations that the Sudanese were treated as cannon fodder in Yemen. It would be simplistic to say that the RSF is a front for Gulf interests, not least because this removes agency from the Sudanese themselves. But it cannot be denied that there are significant lines of influence that run from Riyadh and Abu Dhabi into Khartoum, including directly to Hemedti.
These played out in 2019 as Sudanese people attempted to bring about a democratic revolution in their country. With support from Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Egypt, democracy protesters were violently dislodged by the Sudanese military which took power in a coup. In 2021, Facebook reported that it had taken down a network of fake accounts that were linked to the RSF. This was a huge network that was reaching 60% of the online Sudanese population, specifically targeting and undermining the democracy movement. As Amil Khan of Valent Projects told me, Gulf monarchies, as well as Russia and China, were all involved in this online manipulation. And of course Russia has its own agenda in Sudan: it is using Wagner group to supply the RSF with missiles.
The regular Sudanese military that the RSF is fighting is no ‘good guy’: it is a sclerotic, corrupt and vicious force. So the purpose of this post is not to pick sides in what is becoming a bloody civil war.
No easy answers - but perhaps time for Gulf countries to step up?
International relations are never simple. Countries need to do business with those they don’t like. Sometimes, we need to work with those that are, frankly, hideous. But there was never a serious national or international interest served by our tendentious involvement in Yemen. The Saudi-led intervention deepened and extended the conflict, and we helped them. It also gave greater power and influence to the RSF, which has significantly contributed to the crisis in Sudan.
One of the features of the Sudan crisis is the extent to which European countries, and ‘the West’ in general seem to be missing in action. Yes, there have been bold and effective evacuations of diplomatic staff. But beyond calling for ceasefires, the West has been marginal. There is, of course a war on in Europe, which is demanding a lot of attention.
So might it be time for the Gulf countries, particularly the UAE and Riyadh, with their close connections both to the RSF and to General Al-Burhan, the de facto head of state, as well as Egypt, to take up the slack. After all, the Saudis no longer feel bound by the decades old peace arrangement they have with the United States to stabilise oil prices in return for security (I wrote about this here). They are enjoying the fruits of their decision to keep oil prices high, benefiting from the Ukraine war. As the saying goes, “with great power, comes great responsibility”.
Except, sadly, there is no evidence that Muhammad bin Salman, or his allies in Cairo, Abu Dhabi and Moscow see it that way.
Another good article.