Was the fall of Gaddafi a blessing or curse for Sudan?

The world was stunned in 2011 as it witnessed the spark of revolution in Benghazi, Libya, on February 17. At the time of the uprising, Colonel Muammar Gaddafi had ruled for over forty years. Reflecting on his reign, Alex De Waal described Gaddafi as a “divisive, controversial and ambiguous figure”. This long period was enough to create hostilities with one country at one time, then shift to friendship at another, depending on political fluctuations. In his early career, continues De Waal, Gaddafi could be “relied upon as a consistent and vocal pole of opposition to Africa’s former colonial powers and the United States”. Towards the end, he was colluding with the same West he had spent his entire career berating. Tony Blair, the UK Prime Minister, who a year earlier had supported George Bush’s invasion of Iraq, was speaking about his belief that London and Tripoli had found a “common cause” in stamping out extremism across the Middle East. When his new friends in Europe and North America turned against him, Gaddafi was left with nowhere to turn.  

Even Khartoum, a government which itself had been isolated by the West for years, seized the opportunity presented by the region’s instability and turned against Gaddafi, contributing to his downfall. This move was fueled by a long history of mutual suspicion, bad relations and desiring harm for one another—sometimes hidden, sometimes overt—between the two countries. However, when the opportunity to oust Gaddafi came, Khartoum ignored the advice of N’Djamena, which warned that removing the beleaguered dictator would open Pandora’s box. Now, Sudan is reaping what it has sown, though it is likely not the harvest the previous regime had hoped for.

Even Khartoum, a government which itself had been isolated by the West for years, seized the opportunity presented by the region’s instability and turned against Gaddafi, contributing to his downfall.

Sudan and Gaddafi’s shifting policies

Due to its geographical proximity, Sudan was deeply entangled in Gaddafi’s foreign policy shifts. In the late 1960s, Gaddafi was spearheading a plan to unite Libya, with Sudan and Egypt to create a new Arab federation. Khartoum and Tripoli had recently experienced revolutions that brought regimes to power which appeared to draw inspiration from Gamal Abdel Nasser. It was a tough decade for Nasser, who was defeated in Yemen and by Israel during the Six-Day War, and saw the break-up of his other federation with Syria.  

Another federation was just the win he needed. In 1969, the Tripoli Charter was signed and though Nasser suddenly died in 1970, Anwar Saddat initially pressed ahead. After an agreement was signed, Saddat reportedly said the grouping would have “one President, one flag, one anthem and one federal capital.” Its name would be the Federation of Arab Republics (FAR), which a new regime in Damascus would also join. Sudan, although involved in the early stages, got cold feet and refrained from further involvement due to a lack of domestic consensus on the issue.  

Powerful communists around Jaafar Nimeiri, Sudan’s then-leader, opposed the plan, and Gaddafi had told Nimeiri that they had to be removed for progress on integration to be made. Nimeiri also faced opposition in the south, where an insurgency was taking place among the country’s non-Arab groups, who were also opposed to further engagement with FAR.  

In 1971, Gaddafi aided Sudan’s former president, Jaafar Nimeiri (1969–1985), when communists attempted a coup on 19 July. As their plane crossed Libyan airspace, Gaddafi intercepted it, arresting the coup leaders, Major Babiker al-Nour and Major Farouk al-Hamdallah, before handing them over to Nimeiri, who had regained power three days later. Some of the coup leaders were reported to have flown in from London and Gaddafi forced them to land in Benghazi before sending them to Sudan.  

However, when the Sudanese government signed the Addis Ababa Peace Agreement with the Sudanese People's Liberation Army (SPLA) in 1972, Nimeiri began distancing himself from the priorities of Gadaffi and sought to stabilise his own government. Gaddafi wasn’t onboard with the agreement, and thought it would weaken ties between Khartoum and the Arab world. He also wanted Sudan to be a “bridgehead for Arabism in Africa”. Nimeiri eventually abandoned the FAR project, resuming relations with the United States in 1972 to explore and develop ties with the US.  

In response, Gaddafi supported the Sudanese opposition coalition, the National Front, providing them with training camps in an effort to overthrow Nimeiri militarily. The last attempt was the failed coup of 2 July 1976, led by retired Brigadier General Mohammed Nour Saad and backed by Libya.

After the National Reconciliation Agreement in 1977, Gaddafi continued meddling in Sudan. In 1983, he backed the southern rebellion as soon as it reignited, followed by an airstrike on Sudanese radio and television headquarters in Omdurman in 1984.

During Sudan’s Third Democracy (1986-1989), after Nimeiri was ousted by the March-April 1985 uprising, relations between Khartoum and Tripoli improved. The two governments even cooperated in ousting Hissène Habré in Chad and replacing him with Idriss Déby in the early 1990s.  

“Returning the visit”: why did Bashir flip on Gaddafi?  

Despite initially aligning with Gaddafi, Sudan’s Islamist government also suffered from his erratic policies. Gaddafi exerted leverage over Khartoum through the Darfur conflict, which erupted in 2003. The region had previously served as a battleground during the Libyan-Chadian war in the 1980s, but this time, the nature of intervention was different.

Gaddafi’s approach to the Darfur crisis was inconsistent—at times, he supported the Sudanese government in resisting international intervention, and at other times, he harboured and funded armed opposition groups. His so-called peace efforts often concealed hostility towards Khartoum. Notably, he backed Chadian President Idriss Déby when Sudan’s relations with N’Djamena were tense, most visibly during the Darfur rebel group Justice and Equality Movement’s (JEM) “Long Arm” operation in May 2008, an attempt to topple Bashir’s regime with Chadian and Libyan support.

Gaddafi’s approach to the Darfur crisis was inconsistent—at times, he supported the Sudanese government in resisting international intervention.

When Bashir and Déby reconciled, their improved ties resulted in a framework agreement between the Sudanese government and JEM in February 2010, facilitated by Déby. However, when Chad later denied JEM leader Khalil Ibrahim entry into its territory after he threatened to withdraw from the Doha peace negotiations, he found refuge in Libya. A furious Khartoum demanded he be immediately ejected. In June that year Sudan closed its small border with Libya.  

With the outbreak of the Libyan revolution in Benghazi, many Western and European countries saw an opportunity for revenge against Gaddafi. Under the pretext of protecting civilians, Nato intervened in Libya, overriding African Union efforts to find another way out. UN security council resolution 1973, initially aimed at safeguarding civilians, effectively became a means to overthrow Gaddafi’s Jamahiriya regime.  

Reports at the time indicated that several countries supported Nato’s Operation “Unified Protector,” which involved bombing Libya. Sudan was among them, offering its airspace to facilitate Nato’s enforcement of the no-fly zone.

Speculation abounded over Sudan’s involvement. Was it an attempt to win favor with the international community? Did Sudanese authorities, believing the Arab Spring to be an Islamist movement’s rise, see an opportunity in Libya? Or was there another reason altogether?

In a public rally in October 2011, deposed President Bashir confirmed that Sudan had intervened in Libya and supplied weapons to the Libyan rebels as retribution against Gaddafi for his long history of supporting insurgencies in Darfur. “Praise be to Allah that we were able to return the visit,” Bashir said in front of supporters. He declared that Sudanese weapons had played a role in liberating Tripoli and had reached “every Libyan city”.  

At the time, North Darfur Governor Osman Youssef Kibir considered Gaddafi’s downfall a bigger step toward peace in Darfur than the Abuja and Doha peace agreements. Meanwhile, Amin Hassan Omar, the chief Sudanese negotiator in Doha, claimed that with Gaddafi gone, Sudan’s crisis had turned into an opportunity. Sudan’s government further aided Libya by assisting in the capture of Gaddafi’s intelligence chief, Abdullah al-Senussi. However, was Sudan’s celebration premature?

The revolutionary front

With Libya becoming unsafe for Khalil Ibrahim, he decided to return to Darfur in September 2011, something Khartoum had long sought to prevent. His return coincided with a major development in Sudan’s armed opposition: the formation of the Sudan Revolutionary Front (SRF). On 11th November 2011, Sudan’s main armed groups—the Sudan Liberation Movement factions of Abdel Wahid and Minni Minnawi, JEM, and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-N)—united under the SRF with the goal of toppling Bashir’s regime.

Despite Khalil Ibrahim’s assassination in December 2011, the alliance remained intact under his brother, Jibril Ibrahim, Sudan’s current finance minister. In February 2012, the SRF launched an offensive in South Kordofan, capturing Jau and Troji, securing a corridor between SPLM-N strongholds in the Nuba Mountains and South Sudan.

JEM later participated in the April 2012 occupation of Heglig, backed by South Sudan. Despite the occupation lasting briefly, it severely impacted Sudan’s economy, causing the Sudanese pound to lose over 20% of its value and inflicting $700 million in damages to an oil field responsible for nearly half of Sudan’s oil production.

Following the collapse of negotiations between the Sudanese government and SPLM-N in April 2013, the SRF launched an assault on April 27, capturing Umm Rawaba and Abu Karshola in Kordofan. Although they withdrew from Umm Rawaba within hours, they held Abu Karshola for a month. According to SRF spokesperson Yasir Arman, the operation aimed to seize El-Obeid and ultimately advance towards Khartoum.

Rapid Support Forces

The combat tactics of the armed movements posed a serious challenge to the government, as they relied on speed and heavy firepower. To counter this, in 2013, Khartoum restructured its Border Guards and Arab militias into the Rapid Support Forces (RSF). The RSF achieved notable successes, defeating Minnawi’s forces in the 2014 Battle of Donki al-Baashim and crushing JEM in the 2015 Battle of Goz Dango.

Naturally, the RSF was deployed along the Sudan-Libya border to cut off rebel supply lines. However, a 2018 Small Arms Survey report highlighted the RSF’s involvement in illicit activities, including human trafficking (despite receiving EU funding to combat migration), arms smuggling, and drug trade in the border triangle of Sudan, South Sudan, and the Central African Republic.

Former President Bashir’s reliance on RSF commander Mohamed Hamdan “Hemedti” Dagalo grew and also led to an overlooking of their many abuses. He even declared the RSF to be one of his best decisions. He would likely later regret this when they joined the army in turning against him, but it was his decisions that allowed Hemedti’s wealth, power, and influence to grow, granting him the autonomy to even pursue his own foreign policy that involved sending troops to Yemen and Libya. Hemedti developed ties with the Emiratis providing them with foot soldiers and shock troops in the various theatres where they had interests.  

The Libyan wars

The Sudanese government decided to intervene in Libya to eliminate sources of instability in Sudan, particularly Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, believing that his removal would end the threat. However, Khartoum was unprepared to deal with the Libyan war and its consequences. The Libyan war negatively impacted Sudan’s stability in two keyways: the Sudanese government's stance and the involvement of Darfurian armed movements in the conflict.

In 2014, the transition in Libya came to a head when the General National Congress elected in 2012 in the country’s first post-Gaddafi elections proved ineffective at the task of uniting a fractured country. It extended its mandate in 2014 but Khalifa Haftar rejected the move. The emerging chaos presented an opportunity for stakeholders to improve their positions vis-a-vis each other.  

Sudan supported the Libya Dawn coalition, an Islamist-oriented group that controlled western Libya, by providing military equipment through Mitiga Airport. This stance led to deteriorating relations with eastern Libya, which Khartoum accused of threatening its national security by harbouring Darfurian armed movements. As a result of this deterioration, the Libyan side withdrew from the joint border security forces in 2015, particularly as the tribal groups forming the Libyan contingent of the force were receiving their salaries from Abdullah al-Thinni’s government in eastern Libya.

The Libyan war became a major gateway for mercenary activity, as hiring foreign mercenaries was more cost-effective than recruiting Libyans. The death of a mercenary did not require paying compensation to their family, unlike Libyan fighters, whose families demanded blood money. Darfurian armed movements managed to rebuild and rearm themselves by fighting alongside Libyan factions—especially in eastern Libya. They also benefited from arms, vehicle, and fuel smuggling operations from Libya to Darfur, according to a UN report. Despite the close relations between Khartoum and western Libya, the authorities in Tripoli at times sought assistance from the Justice and Equality Movement.

The Libyan war became a major gateway for mercenary activity, as hiring foreign mercenaries was more cost-effective than recruiting Libyans. The death of a mercenary did not require paying compensation to their family, unlike Libyan fighters, whose families demanded blood money.

To this day, Libya remains a transit point for weapons and fighters in Sudan’s ongoing war. A report by the UN Panel of Experts on Libya, published in late 2024, revealed that the RSF is the primary beneficiary of the role played by the Libyan National Army (LNA), led by Khalifa Haftar. The RSF benefits from artillery training and secured air and land supply routes within Libyan territory.  

Fourteen years after Sudan’s intervention in Libya, the situation appears darker than ever. Sudanese authorities sought to eliminate what they saw as a source of trouble but failed to prevent its recurrence. Whether the Sudanese government was fully aware of its actions or not, and whether supporting Gaddafi’s ouster was worth the price Sudanese people are paying today, one thing is certain: the current situation in Libya poses a greater challenge to Sudan’s national security than it did during Gaddafi’s rule.