EDITORIAL: Sudan devastated by inter-imperialist rivalry

At least 500 workers have been killed and hundreds of thousands more displaced since the start of a bloody civil war in Sudan’s capital, Khartoum. This will always be the fate of the working class under capitalism, a system built on competition and exploitation, and which in times of crisis resorts to fascism and war.  As the U.S. bosses—the most criminal rulers of them all–call for “democracy,” we remind our working-class brothers and sisters to not be fooled by this trap. The capitalist bosses will never have our interests at heart. We call on workers in Sudan and across the globe to join Progressive Labor Party in the fight to smash this profit-driven system and create a communist world.

Imperialism creates instability in Sudan
Less than four years ago, the two current warring generals and capitalist thugs, Abdel Fatahl al-Burhan and Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo, were championed by millions of Sudanese workers (and the U.S. ruling class) as they partnered in a coup d’etat against Omar al-Bashir, the blood-soaked dictator aligned with the Chinese imperialists. But as CHALLENGE pointed out (7/27/19), this fake campaign for “democracy” was in reality a violent push by the U.S. ruling class to limit the Chinese bosses’ influence over the region’s energy and trade routes. 

As we noted at the time, the main contradiction in Sudan is the same one shaping events worldwide: inter-imperialist competition among a rising China, a resurgent Russia, and a declining U.S.  We warned that workers in Sudan will be “sharing” power with the very forces responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of workers in Darfur and Yemen. Whenever workers are duped into compromising with the bosses, the consequences are deadly. Sudan, the third largest country in Africa, is now a tinderbox for an expanding regional war. As the desperate U.S. rulers keep losing ground to their rivals, their inability to control events will inevitably lead to a global conflict that will sacrifice millions of workers. The working class needs international communist consciousness more than ever to turn imperialist war into class war against the capitalists! 

Russia, China target Sudan’s riches
Sudan rests between two critical choke points on the Red Sea, a passageway for 10 percent of all global trade. The Suez Canal connects markets in Asia and Europe; the Bab-el-Mandeb strait links the Red Sea to the Arabian Sea. Sudan is also where the White Nile and Blue Nile rivers converge, a critical intersection for trade and access to fresh water. Additionally, it contains large reserves of gold and uranium, and houses critical infrastructure for refining and transporting oil from South Sudan. No imperialist power will easily let go of such a large prize. Russia’s interest in Sudan predates the current conflict.

In 2017, President Vladimir Putin joined with al-Bashir to form Meroe Gold, a subsidiary of the Wagner Group of Russian mercenaries. After al-Bashir was deposed and jailed, Putin strengthened ties with General Degalo, a criminal best known as a leader of the genocidal Janjaweed militias in Darfur, a region of western Sudan. Degalo built a vast pool of wealth and political power by leveraging his ties with al-Bashir to seize some of the richest gold mines in Darfur (Guardian, 4/17). The Janjaweed evolved into the Rapid Support Forces that are now at war with Sudan’s military.  Sudanese gold now appears to be financing Russia’s war with Ukraine in return for weapons and training for Degalo’s militia (CNN, 4/21).

Meanwhile, China has long relied on Sudan’s minerals for Chinese industry. Between 2011 and 2018, as part of its Belt and Road Initiative, China made hundreds of millions of dollars in loans to Sudan and invested in oil pipelines, textile factories, railways, and bridges across the Nile. China is Sudan’s largest trading partner and their biggest supplier of goods. Stability in the region is a priority for the Chinese bosses.

U.S. complicity in Darfur genocide
Ever since Chevron discovered oil in Sudan in the 1970s, the U.S. ruling class has kept a hand in the country (Human Rights Watch, 2003). Under presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama, the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency worked closely with the notorious General Salah Gosh, who rose to become head of intelligence for Sudan (The Daily Beast, 1/9/2019). Between 2003 and 2008, al-Bashir, al-Burhan, Degalo, and Gosh were responsible for the mass murder of at least 300,000 workers in Darfur and for displacing 2.7 million more. In return for al-Bashir’s help with a “counter-terrorism” campaign against Al Qaeda in Iraq, the U.S. bosses turned a blind eye to the genocide and kept sharing intelligence with Sudan.

Before the latest armed conflict broke out, the Joe Biden administration continued to negotiate with these war criminals to find a path back to “democracy,” the bosses’ word for capitalist dictatorship. But like the CIA support for U.S.-friendly pro-democracy coups in the Arab Spring in Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, and Syria, U.S. moves in Sudan have backfired and further exposed the weakness of the U.S. ruling class.  

Fight for communism!
Liberal democracy is a nationalist tool to mislead and pacify the working class. From Sudan to the U.S., we are asked to choose between one mass murderer and another. When we are fooled by the bosses into thinking that their fight is our fight, we lose sight of the essence of capitalism: imperialism and war.
The only solution is communist revolution and a dictatorship of the working class, a society run by and for workers. It is our task to expose this dogfight between the bosses and the slippery slope to World War III. We must connect the attacks on workers in Sudan to attacks on workers everywhere. Join us! Build a fighting PLP!