Day 12 - Free Sudan

Content warning for discussion of genocide, torture, mutilation, rape, and slavery

Hey, Hi, Hello, this is the History Wizard and welcome back for Day 11 of Have a Day w/ The History Wizard. Thank you to everyone who tuned in for Day 10 last week, and especially thank you to everyone who rated and/or reviewed the podcast. I hope you all learned something last week and I hope the same for this week. This week marks the 3rd part of our mini series of currently ongoing genocides and humanitarian crises. Episode 2 was on Palestine, Episode 11 was on Congo, today’s episode will be on Sudan. The nation of Sudan is currently dealing with, among other things we’ll cover in detail later in this episode, the largest deplacement campaign of anywhere on the planet with over 9 million people being displaced from their homes by war and genocide.

It always feels a little weird transitioning into this part of the episode, but it’s now time for the Alchemist’s Table. I’ve invented nearly 90 cocktails over the past 2 years and this one remains my very favorite. It’s called the No True Scotsman. Take 2 oz of your scotch whiskey of choice, though I’d recommend a light Islay scotch, something like a Bowmore, or maybe a Campbeltown like Glen Scotia. Then add .75 oz of Frangelico, 1 oz of Maple syrup. Shake this like your life depends on it and pour over ice. Top the drink with ginger beer and enjoy.

Now, fortified as we are by uisce beatha, the waters of life, let’s get into it. So, what is happening in Sudan, right now? A civil war officially started between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the the Rapid Support Forces that grew out of the Janjaweed militias that were so prevalent in the Darfur Genocide. The war officially began on 15 April 2023 and is still ongoing. But, in order to understand what is happening right now, we need to understand what was happening in the 19th century under British and Egyptian colonialism in the region.

So, let’s starts at as much of the beginning as we can. Let’s start at the Mahdist War. Following Muhammad Ali's invasion (no, a different Muhammad Ali) in 1819, Sudan was governed by an Egyptian administration. Throughout the period of Egyptian rule, many segments of the Sudanese population suffered extreme hardship because of the system of taxation imposed by the central government. Under this system, a flat tax was imposed on farmers and small traders and collected by government-appointed tax collectors from the Sha'iqiyya tribe of northern Sudan. Throughout the century, and especially after Egypt was floundering to pay the costs of the Suez Canal, Britain got more and more involved. In the late 19th century a war broke out between the Mahdist Sudanese, led by Muhammad Ahmad bin Abdullah, who had proclaimed himself the "Mahdi" of Islam (the "Guided One"), and the forces of the Khedivate of Egypt, initially, and later the forces of Britain. Eighteen years of war resulted in the creation of Anglo-Egyptian Sudan (1899–1956), a de jure condominium of the British Empire, and the Kingdom of Egypt, in which Britain had de facto control over Sudan.

Sudan officially voted for independence in 1956 and became its own independent republic. Although it achieved independence without conflict, Sudan inherited many problems from the condominium. Chief among these was the status of the civil service. The government placed Sudanese in the administration and provided compensation and pensions for British officers of Sudan Political Service who left the country; it retained those who could not be replaced, mostly technicians and teachers. Khartoum achieved this transformation quickly and with a minimum of turbulence, although southerners resented the replacement of British administrators in the south with northern Sudanese. To advance their interests, many southern leaders concentrated their efforts in Khartoum, where they hoped to win constitutional concessions. Although determined to resist what they perceived to be Arab imperialism, they were opposed to violence. Most southern representatives supported provincial autonomy and warned that failure to win legal concessions would drive the south to rebellion.

To understand the issues in Sudan we need to understand that, ultimately, this is a religious and ethnic conflict between the mostly Islamic North and the largely Christian and animist South regions in the nation of Sudan. On November 17, 1958, the day parliament was to convene, a military coup occurred. Khalil, himself a retired army general, planned the preemptive coup in conjunction with leading Umma members and the army's two senior generals, Ibrahim Abboud and Ahmad Abd al Wahab, who became leaders of the military regime. Abboud immediately pledged to resolve all disputes with Egypt, including the long-standing problem of the status of the Nile River. Abboud abandoned the previous government's unrealistic policies regarding the sale of cotton. He also appoin...