November 6 News Roundup

A controversial former American leader dies, while Sudan's tragedy darkens further

Well, Richard Bruce Cheney is dead.

There will certainly be many of my readers who believe that Cheney was the Prince of Darkness, Darth Vader, Lord Voldemort, or any other sinister archetype one can concoct. While the death of the 46^th Vice President of the United States may not preclude tremendous mourning, it would be rude of me to speak ill of the dead. According to Fox News Analyst Brit Hume, Cheney was an intelligent and soft-spoken man who embodied the dictionary definition of low-key. Hardly a Prince of Darkness if you ask me.

There is no doubt that Dick Cheney was a remarkably skilled political animal. Cheney rose the ranks of the Washington hierarchy starting from his appointment as White House Chief of Staff in 1975 under President Gerald Ford at the young age of 34. In 1978, Cheney was elected to House of Representatives as the lone representative from Wyoming, where he earned a reputation as one of the most conservative members. In 1989, Cheney was appointed Secretary of Defense by George HW Bush, an office from where he directed the December 1989 invasion of Panama and January 1991 Operation Desert Storm in Kuwait. With the overwhelming success of both operations, Cheney’s political prestige increased significantly. After 5 years as CEO of the upstream oil company Halliburton, Cheney accepted future President George W. Bush’s invitation to be running mate in 2000. By 2001, Dick Cheney was not only sworn in as Vice President of the United States but was on course to become the most powerful holder of the office in American history.

Today, it is impossible to divorce Dick Cheney’s legacy from Operation Iraqi Freedom, the 2003 US-led (with support from the United Kingdom, Australia, and Poland) full-scale military invasion of Iraq. The Iraq War, begun when I was 8 years old, was the first real political event stored in my memory (9/11 is much hazier to me.) I vividly remember our family visit to Washington, DC as war appeared imminent and the thousands of protestors screaming “No war in Iraq!” by the North Lawn of the White House. As it became clear that “slam dunk” intelligence reports of Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq were false, the security and moral arguments for the war collapsed and with it public trust in the Bush Administration and the entire US national security establishment. While the brutal and mad tyrant Saddam Hussein was removed and eventually executed, Iraq was plunged into more than a decade of sectarian chaos that culminated with the rise of the barbarians of ISIS in 2014.

As one of the architects of the war, Dick Cheney’s name, once deeply respected, became mud.

Dick Cheney’s descent into public disfavor intensified in 2004 as questions surged regarding a rushed contract awarded without any competitive bidding process to Kellogg, Brown, & Root (KBR). KBR, a then-subsidiary of Cheney’s former company Halliburton, was to rebuild all the Iraqi oil infrastructure which had largely been destroyed by the 2003 invasion. While the Pentagon at the time claimed that the extraordinary act of denying an open bidding process was a necessary step to protect national security, it became clear as time went along that the project was rife with overbilling, fueling accusations that Cheney was corruptly enriching himself at the expense of American taxpayers. Years after the whole Halliburton debacle, the final coup de grace cementing Dick Cheney’s political pariah status came with his surprising endorsement of Democratic Presidential nominee Kamala Harris. After his Iraq adventures had already caricatured his villain status among much of the American public, Cheney’s final public act was to burn his final bridge with his own political party.

A sad end to the life and career of the once-untouchable Washington insider. Regardless of

the positive traits Dick Cheney exhibited, his legacy will forever be stained by the Iraq War.

Sudan’s Tragedy

Away from our shores, Westerners have finally been exposed to a conflict that, while not as headline-grabbing as Ukraine or Palestine, certainly rivals both their brutalities. I am of course talking about the devastating civil war in the Republic of Sudan. To clarify, the Sudanese conflict, unlike recent reports of massacres of Christians in Nigeria, has no religious dimension. Unlike Nigeria’s 50-50 demographic balance of Christians and Muslims, Sudan is overwhelmingly Muslim. Instead, Sudan’s civil war is the result of a personal grudge.

In April 2023, rebel militants loyal to militia leader Muhammad Hamdan Dagalo Musa, commonly known as Hemedti, attempted to seize weapons depots and other military bases under the command of Hemedti’s archenemy Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) leader Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan in the Sudanese capital of Khartoum. Suddenly, the city descended into full-blown war as the country of Sudan descended into total anarchy. For a country with a long and dark history of sectarian violence and state terrorism, few outsiders were surprised that Sudan’s once-promising path to democratic reform was derailed by the selfish ambitions of two power-hungry generals. Simply put, these generals, Sudan’s two most powerful men, failed to negotiate a power-sharing arrangement and instead want control of the whole country for themselves. With both Hemedti and Burhan’s forces accused of widespread war crimes, the United States has little alternative except to watch from the sidelines.

There is no good guy in the Sudanese Civil War.

However, other less morally scrupulous foreign powers have taken a different approach. While the SAF has the strong backing of Russia, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt, it is the United Arab Emirates, the lone financial and military supporter of Hemedti’s Rapid Support Forces (RSF) that has been the most controversial. In recent weeks, reports from US intelligence have revealed a sinister trail of weapons, including high-tech Chinese drones as well as machine guns, artillery, and mortars through Somali and Libya destined for the bloody hands of the RSF. And bloody was the fate of the city of El Fasher, in that famously volatile region of Darfur where a devastating 18-month blockade culminated last month with an indiscriminate massacre by the RSF of the entire non-Arab population of El Fasher. According to the United Nations, albeit a highly flawed organization, the RSF exhibited a “total disregard for human life” as they took control of the city. A massive L for humanity here.

Forget Dick Cheney— if you’re looking for a real-life war criminal or Lord Voldemort, look no further than Hemedti.

In the words of a former US government official, “the war would be over if not for the UAE. The only thing keeping (the RSF) in this war is the overwhelming amount of military support that they’re receiving from the UAE.” So why would the UAE support something so heinous? Beyond Abu Dhabi’s desire to prove its worth as a regional power on par with Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Iran, as well their resolute anti-Islamist stance (something I most certainly agree with), the UAE craves access to Sudan’s vast gold reserves. For anyone who’s ever been to Dubai or Abu Dhabi, you’ll know exactly how dearly the Emiratis treasure planet earth’s most precious metal. Despite recent evidence to the contrary, Emirati officials have consistently denied any support for Sudanese rebels and have publicly supported all peace efforts. Such honesty.

Despite deep institutional links between the UAE and governments around the world (Abu Dhabi has insisted they seek friendship with all nations), it appears that pressure is finally building on the rich Gulf State to shut down their bloody trail and find a new path forward for Sudan. While ending a conflict decades in the making will certainly be a herculean task, here’s to hoping that something works out. However, as with Israel and Palestine, the specter of war seems highly unlikely to retreat from Sudan anytime soon.