The Near East, 1972 to 1983 CE: Shifts in Alliances and Economic Challenges

Sudan: Economic Struggles and Foreign Influence

Beginning in 1972, the Sudanese government shifts toward a more pro-Western stance, focusing on increasing agricultural exports. Until the early 1970s, Sudan's agricultural production primarily satisfied domestic consumption. Plans to boost exports by mechanizing agriculture quickly encounter difficulties as global commodity prices decline throughout the 1970s. Simultaneously, the rising costs of debt servicing—due to the heavy investment in mechanized farming—compound Sudan's economic troubles.

In 1978, the Sudanese government negotiates a Structural Adjustment Program with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which further emphasizes mechanized export agriculture. This policy negatively impacts pastoralists, particularly the indigenous ethnic communities inhabiting the Nuba Mountains in South Kordofan state, exacerbating economic disparities and social tensions.

Military Alliances and Arms Acquisitions

Sudan's foreign military relations shift notably during this period. Having traditionally relied on British training and supplies, Khartoum severed ties with Western countries following the Arab-Israeli Six-Day War (1967). Between 1968 and 1971, the Soviet Union and its Eastern Bloc allies significantly bolster Sudan's military capabilities, increasing the army's strength from eighteen thousand to about fifty thousand troops and supplying tanks, aircraft, and artillery.

After the 1971 Sudanese Coup d'état, however, Sudan seeks to diversify its military partnerships. Egypt emerges as a significant supplier throughout the 1970s, providing missiles, personnel carriers, and other military hardware. Western countries resume supplying Sudan in the mid-1970s, notably the United States, which begins substantial equipment sales around 1976. Under President Ronald Reagan’s administration, American military sales peak in 1982 at $101 million, making Sudan the second-largest recipient of U.S. aid to Africa, following Egypt. Total American assistance grows dramatically from $5 million in 1979 to $200 million in 1983, predominantly for military programs.

Political Reconciliation and Instability

In 1976, the Ansars, followers of the Mahdi tradition, attempt a bloody but unsuccessful coup (Sudanese Revolt) against President Jaafar Nimeiry’s regime. Despite this violence, reconciliation follows when Nimeiry meets Ansar leader Sadiq al-Mahdi in July 1977. The government releases hundreds of political prisoners and announces a general amnesty in August, temporarily easing internal political tensions.

Strategic Developments

By 1983, Sudan agrees to significant strategic developments, including constructing four air bases to accommodate units of the U.S. Rapid Deployment Force and establishing a powerful Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) listening station near Port Sudan. These installations reflect Sudan’s deepening alignment with Western interests during the late stages of the Cold War.

Regional Turmoil and Conflicts

The Near East experiences significant turmoil and conflicts during this period. Although the First Sudanese Civil War officially ends in 1972, underlying tensions continue, eventually reigniting into the Second Sudanese Civil War in 1983, a prolonged conflict that deeply impacts the region.

In Yemen, repeated conflicts erupt between North and South, known as the North-South Yemen Wars, occurring first in 1972 and again in 1979, reflecting the region's chronic instability and ideological divisions exacerbated by the global Cold War context.

Egypt faces profound socio-economic upheaval as President Anwar Sadat introduces economic liberalization policies known as the "Infitah", which lead to severe unrest and widespread riots in 1977. Egypt also experiences a traumatic event in 1981 with the assassination of President Anwar Sadat, marking a turbulent shift in the country's political trajectory.

The complex Arab-Israeli conflict further escalates with the 1978 South Lebanon conflict, culminating in the landmark Camp David Accords (1978), reshaping regional alliances. The tension reaches a peak with the Israeli Invasion of Lebanon in 1982, significantly heightening regional instability and intensifying violent activities by the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO).

Collectively, these events profoundly shape the political and social landscape of the Near East, embedding lasting tensions and setting the stage for ongoing regional dynamics.

Legacy of the Era

From 1972 to 1983, Sudan experiences major economic challenges, shifting international alignments, and internal political instability. These factors create lasting social, economic, and political impacts, laying the groundwork for continued internal strife and complex regional dynamics in subsequent decades.

The Israeli invasion of southern Lebanon is viewed in Egypt as an Israeli attempt to destroy Palestinian nationalism, and President Hosni Mubarak is accused by his detractors of allowing Israel to take advantage of Egypt's position of disengagement.

Official relations with Israel are severely strained.

U.S. President Ronald Reagan signs a top-secret finding in 1982 authorizing ten million dollars in covert aid to Bachir Gamayel's Lebanese Christian militia.

Gamayel, President-Elect of Lebanon, is assassinated shortly thereafter.

Within two days, Israeli forces allow Phalangist units to enter Palestinian refugee camps in Beirut on a mission of revenge.

At two of these camps, Sabra and Shatilla, Israeli intelligence will calculate that there were seven hundred to eight hundred Palestinian victims, many of them women and children.

All had been massacred.

One hundred and six people have died in the course of all terrorist activities in the north of Israel since 1967, according to official Israeli army statistics.

The total number of Israelis killed in all acts of terror from 1967 is two hundred and eighty-two, less than the number of killed by Israel's air attacks in Beirut on July 17-18, 1981, in "retaliation" after a PLO response to Israeli bombing that broke the cease fire.

The invasion of Lebanon is the first war fought by the IDF without a domestic consensus.

Unlike the 1948, 1967, and 1973 wars, the Israeli public does not view Operation Peace for Galilee as essential to the survival of the Jewish state.

By the early 1980s—less than forty years after its establishment—Israel has attained a military prowess unmatched in the region.

The architects of the 1982 invasion, Sharon and Eitan, seek to use Israel's military strength to create a more favorable regional political setting.

This strategy includes weakening the PLO and supporting the rise to power in Lebanon of Israel's Christian allies.

Inside Israel, a mounting death toll causes sharp criticism by a war-weary public of the war of and of the Likud government.

Jordanian contacts with Israel had come to a halt in late 1977.

King Hussein has become increasingly alarmed at the growing popularity in Israel of the view that Jordan is, in fact, the Palestinian state, which, if recognized as such, would also resolve the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians.

Israel's invasion of Lebanon fuels fears in Amman that the first step in the process of transferring Palestinians to the East Bank is under way.

The United States tries without success to piece together a coalition Lebanese government and induce the Israelis and Syrians to withdraw.

Israel sets up a commission of inquiry to determine responsibility for the deaths at the Shatila and Sabra refugee camps.

While finding Sharon not directly responsible for the massacres, the commission finds him indirectly responsible for failing to take action to prevent the bloodshed.

Islamic suicide bombers destroy Israeli military headquarters in Tyre on November 11, leaving seventy-five Israeli soldiers dead, together with fifteen Lebanese and Palestinian prisoners.