Even those who pay attention to Africa-related news may not know how terrible the situation is in Africa, for example, that there are more conflicts on that continent now than at any point since at least 1946. Sudan is no exception. In mid-April of 2023, fighting broke out between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in Khartoum, the capital city of Sudan, and the fighting then spread throughout the country.
It is said that this is “the world’s largest internal displacement crisis.” One in four Sudanese have been forced from their homes. 150,000 people have been killed. About 25 million are suffering from hunger. Many people are starving. Rape is being used as a weapon of war.
Sudan is a rich country filled with gold, and that gold is causing much of the violence there. “Gold is destroying Sudan,” said Suliman Baldo, a Sudanese expert on the nation’s resources, “and it’s destroying the Sudanese.” “Indeed, billions of dollars in gold are flowing out of Sudan in virtually every direction, helping to turn the Sahel region of Africa into one of the world’s largest gold producers at a time when prices are hitting record highs.”
Members of the U.S. Congress from both parties agree. They worry that Sudan’s illicit gold trade enables “lucrative revenue streams” that perpetuate the humanitarian crisis in the country.
The United Arab Emirates (UAE), the United States, Russia, Egypt, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and many other countries have been interfering in the internal political situation, attempting to grab what they can in a bloody free-for-all.
A Central Backer of the War: The United Arab Emirates (UAE)
There is a consensus among experts, including the United Nations, journalists from the Wall Street Journal, Reuters, and the New York Times, U.S. Senator Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, and peace organizations such as World BEYOND War that the UAE is one of the primary culprits. For example, in the Wall Street Journal: “the U.A.E.’s covert arms shipments are fueling a war that has plunged Sudan into a humanitarian catastrophe.”
That the UAE is involved in the violence has been known since at least August 2023. The UAE has been supporting Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, a Sudanese warlord and the commander of the RSF, and a camel-trader-turned-warlord whose forces grew especially powerful after they seized one of Sudan’s most lucrative gold mines in 2017. Although the UAE denies it, they have been supporting the RSF and making deals with the government. The UAE is supporting both sides in the war and pouring fuel on the “fire.” They are now the main recipients of “blood gold,” smuggled out of the country by both Sudan’s army and by the RSF in return for weapons and cash.
U.S. Support for the UAE’s Violence
The UAE in turn has been backed by the United States, specifically the Biden administration. (What Trump will do for Sudan has yet to be seen). The UAE is so important for the U.S. that it is the single largest export market in the Middle East and North Africa region, and more than one thousand firms operate in the country. The U.S. even directly supports the UAE militarily. As Caitlin Johnstone writes, the Biden administration “has been sending weapons to the United Arab Emirates while conveniently ignoring the fact that the UAE is sending money and weapons to the RSF to use for its atrocities in Sudan.”
Senator Van Hollen submitted legislation in November in the Senate to pause U.S. weapons sales to the UAE until the U.S. certifies that the UAE is not arming the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in Sudan. And Rep. Sara Jacobs submitted similar legislation to the House of Representatives in May.
On 23 September of last year President Biden recognized the “United Arab Emirates as a Major Defense Partner of the United States, joined by only India, to further enhance defense cooperation and security in the Middle East, East Africa, and the Indian Ocean regions. This unique designation as a Major Defense Partner will allow for unprecedented cooperation through joint training, exercises, and military-to-military collaboration, between the military forces of the United States, the UAE, and India, as well as other common military partners, in furtherance of regional stability.”
On 2 August 2022, the U.S. approved “$2.2 billion for high-altitude defense for the UAE.” And on October 11, 2024, the “U.S. State Department approved a potential $1.2 billion Foreign Military Sale (FMS) to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) for advanced Guided Multiple Launch Rocket Systems (GMLRS) and Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS).”
It is widely known that the “Emirates is a staunch American ally against Iran, a signatory of the Abraham Accords to establish diplomatic relations with Israel, a potential player in postwar Gaza, and has even facilitated prisoner swaps between Ukraine and Russia.” The U.S. has repeatedly called on foreign governments to stay out of the conflict, but as General Wesley Clark told us almost two decades ago, Sudan was one of the governments that the US was planning to overthrow, that about a month after 9/11, a U.S. general told him that according to a memo he had from the secretary of defense, there was a plan to “take out seven countries in five years, starting with Iraq, and then Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and, finishing off, Iran.”
Why Sudan?
According to Jeffrey Sachs, Israel believes that Sudan is their enemy, and the U.S. follows Israel when formulating a foreign policy in the Middle East. There is civil war in both Sudan and in South Sudan. (The U.S. backed South Sudan).
The U.S. support for the RSF should not be surprising as it has regularly supported violent Islamist groups. Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, the new leader of Syria, is a “former Al Qaeda leader and ISIS deputy,” as well as the founder of the Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS).
U.S. Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield retorted, “It is shocking that Russia has vetoed an effort to save lives, though perhaps it shouldn’t be.” She added that “for months, Russia has obstructed and obfuscated, standing in the way of council action to address the catastrophic situation in Sudan and playing … both sides of the conflict, to advance its own political objectives at the expense of Sudanese lives.”
But arguably, this has the same ultimate effect as the U.S. standing in the way of peace to advance our own political objectives at the expense of Sudanese lives.
There seems to be some truth to this claim that Russia has not taken a clear side in the conflict, but most reports are recently saying that Russia is leaning toward backing the SAF. Military analysts have explained that “Russia is acting to fill a power vacuum left by the US and to counter Ukraine’s military presence in Sudan—there are between 100 and 300 Ukrainian troops on the ground, operating mostly at night alongside the SAF.” According to the defence ministry of Ukraine, Ukrainian “civilians” who used to work for Ukraine’s air force are now serving as instructors of the Sudanese air force. (Andres Schipani, Christopher Miller, Polina Ivanova, and Chris Cook, “Russians and Ukrainians help train same side in Sudan’s War.” The Financial Times, 18 September 2024). Russia and Ukraine may be enemies, but when it comes to the precious metal gold, they are on the same side.
According to Abayomi Azikiwe, the U.S. has been “heavily involved” for decades in trying to “prevent any Left-wing government from coming to power” in Sudan. In in 1971, the U.S. began supporting Gaafar Nimeiry (1969-85) through military aid, after a “pro-communist” named Major Hashem al-Atta (1936-71) attempted to overthrow Nimeiry and seize power through a coup d’etat.
On 20 August 1998, as part of Operation Infinite Reach, the U.S. bombed a factory making pharmaceuticals for Sudan. The factory had provided over half of the country’s pharmaceuticals. As Noam Chomsky has written, the 9/11 attacks on the U.S. killed fewer people than this Operation, even if we do not count the people who died from lack of medicine in the subsequent years, but this atrocity is hardly remembered in the U.S.
(“The bombing of the Al Shifa pharmaceutical factory by Clinton on 20 August 1998 in retaliation for the bombing of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania was an act of terrorism. When Chomsky was asked to comment on the September 11th attacks, he is reported to have said that the damage caused by the ‘horrible crime’ of September 11, which was carried out with ‘evilness and terrible cruelty,’ may be comparable to the results of the bombing of the Al Shifa factory by Clinton in August 1998. Furthermore, it is said that not only the lives lost directly as a result of the bombing of the factory, but also the loss of the factory, which supplied over 50% of Sudan’s medical supplies, has indirectly resulted in the loss of many lives, as chloroquine [a medicine used to treat malaria], medicine for tuberculosis patients, and medicine to treat parasitic infections in cattle ranches [this parasite is one of the causes of Sudan’s high infant mortality rate] were no longer available. The German ambassador to Sudan estimated that the number of indirect deaths may be in the tens of thousands. Furthermore, the U.S. has withdrawn American staff from the U.N. aid organization in Sudan, resulting in a suspension of aid to Sudan, where the U.N. estimated that 2.4 million people were at risk of starvation”).
Saudi Arabia, long an ally of the U.S., also supports the RSF, with the UAE. This is not surprising as it is widely recognized that, like the U.S., Saudi Arabia also promotes Islamist terrorism. According to Hillary Clinton in 2009 when she was the Secretary of State, “donors in Saudi Arabia constitute the most significant source of funding to Sunni terrorist groups worldwide.”
Conclusion
Sudan is rich in natural resources, and powerful states can easily steal those resources, so they are grabbing what they can during this crisis. And it is not difficult to imagine why people do not care about Sudan. “Africa’s current conflicts haven’t prompted the outpouring of sympathy in the West that accompanied Russia’s invasion of Ukraine or the outrage ignited by Israel’s war in Gaza. There has been no equivalent to the Live Aid concerts motivated by the Ethiopian famine in the 1980s, the protest marches over the genocide in Darfur in the early 2000s or even the #BringBackOurGirls campaign linked to the abduction of 276 schoolgirls from the Nigerian town of Chibok 10 years ago.”
People seeking help for African Muslims must compete with humanitarian missions that white, middle-class people already care about or work on, such as helping white Christians in Ukraine and helping people of various religions who are victims of the Gaza Genocide, in the “Holy Land,” a place of great historical significance for many Westerners.
Many thanks to Stephen Brivati for comments and suggestions.
This is a translation of our article in Japanese that was published at the website of Labornet Japan.