Sting operations by Sudanese army intelligence, including the use of financial incentives, are behind a string of high-profile defections to the military from the rival Rapid Support Forces, The National has been told.
Experts and analysts say prewar ties between senior RSF commanders and their army counterparts have also played a part in persuading the paramilitary's generals to switch sides.
Brig Ali Rizqallah, better known as Savanah, this week became the latest senior RSF commander to defect to the military and the third to defect since 2024.
“The defections are the outcome of patient and carefully planned sting operations by military intelligence operatives to lure them away from the Rapid Support Forces,” Sami Saeed, a US-based Sudanese expert, said of the recent defections.
“But monetary incentives also played a part,” he told The National.
Abu Aqla Kaikal, a battle-seasoned and charismatic RSF officer, was the first senior paramilitary commander to defect in October 2024. He went on to play a vital role in the army's campaign to seize back central Sudan and Khartoum from the RSF.
Gen Al Nour Ahmed Adam, also known as Al Qouba, followed, arriving in the northern city of Donqola this month. He has met Gen Abdel Fattah Al Burhan, the army chief and Sudan's de facto leader.
Gen Al Qouba was stripped of his rank and, in his absence, sentenced to death by an RSF military tribunal. His defection clearly demonstrates the military's involvement.
Army drones, sources told The National, blasted RSF checkpoints stationed along his escape route from Darfur to northern Sudan, suggesting the military knew of his intentions.
There had been speculation in Sudan about Brig Rizqallah's desertion for nearly two weeks, but it was only confirmed on May 11. The experts said there had been other defections that had gone unpublicised for security reasons and the safety of the defectors.
Rivals with shared past
Before the war, the Sudanese military and the RSF had close ties dating back for years, with troops fighting under one command against rebels in the western region of Darfur, the neighbouring Kordofan region and Blue Nile state in the south.
They also fought side by side in Yemen as part of the Saudi-led coalition that intervened there on the side of the internationally recognised government against the Iran-backed Houthi rebels.
A significant number of army officers also served with the RSF over the years, boosting the paramilitary's capabilities. Some resigned their commissions to join the RSF because pay was higher or tribal bonds linked them to the paramilitary.
The RSF, whose forerunner was the notorious Janjaweed militia, is mainly made up of members of Arab tribes from western Sudan who fought alongside the army against ethnically African rebels in the 2000s. The RSF was accorded legal status in 2013 as part of the armed forces, although it was allowed to retain a large degree of autonomy.
Its patron, former dictator Omar Al Bashir, looked to the RSF as the protector of his regime against ambitious generals. He ordered them to deploy to Khartoum to quell the 2018-2019 popular uprising against his rule, but they stayed neutral and later supported the generals who removed him.
It was ironic that Gen Al Burhan was personally responsible for upgrading the RSF's capabilities before the uprising. He and Gen Mohamed Dagalo, the RSF commander, were also allies and jointly staged a coup in 2021 that toppled a civilian-led transitional government.
But the experts caution that the defections, while possibly demoralising to the RSF, should not be seen as indicating serious ills within the group.
The RSF is in control of the entire Darfur region – an area roughly the size of France – after it seized the army's last foothold there. It also holds sway over parts of Kordofan, where it is allied with a powerful rebel movement that controls large areas of territory. It also maintains a presence in the Blue Nile state.
Furthermore, the RSF's arsenal of long-range drones has allowed it to strike as far afield as Port Sudan on the Red Sea – the seat of the military-aligned government – as well as Khartoum and areas to the south of the capital.
In Darfur, the birthplace and stronghold from which Gen Dagalo hails, the paramilitary enjoys the loyalty of the major Arab tribes, who look at the paramilitary as their saviour from decades of marginalisation by the ruling northern Sudanese clique in Khartoum.
However, the defections are interpreted by the pro-army media as a breakthrough for the military and proof that the balance of power is tipping in its favour.
Strategic analyst Amin Ismail Magzoub, a retired Sudanese army general, links the defections to what he says is rapidly spreading corruption within the RSF and to growing discontent over the heavy casualties suffered by the RSF in the three-year war.
“The defections will eventually undermine the cohesion of the Rapid Support Forces. The officers who switched sides are experienced field commanders with knowledge of the tribal structure and dynamics in the west,” he said.
But to ordinary Sudanese, the defections are somewhat baffling, given the hard-line, anti-RSF rhetoric routinely used by Gen Al Burhan, who insists that the paramilitary is a mutinous militia that he will fight until it surrenders or is vanquished.
“There's something that does not add up,” mused Nader Kamal, a resident of Khartoum who has been living in Atbara in northern Sudan since the war's early days. “People, me included, are confused by those desertions. How did they come about and what do they exactly mean?”
Others, such as political activist Muhgah Youssef, are dismayed by the warm welcome that news of the defections receives.
“They should not be allowed to join the military because of their poor human rights record. They are responsible for terrorising civilians, looting and destroying homes,” she said.
But the same can be said about the army, whose indiscriminate shelling since the start of the war in April 2023 has killed thousands across Sudan, and which used chemical weapons against the RSF in Khartoum in 2024.
Tens of thousands have been killed in the war in Sudan, with at least 12 million displaced. A humanitarian crisis has developed, with more than half the population – 25 million people – facing hunger.
Both Gen Al Burhan and Gen Dagalo insist they are fighting to bring democratic rule and inclusion to the religiously and ethnically diverse Afro-Arab nation. However, the two men, who are accused by the US and the UN of war crimes, are widely believed to be fighting for domination of the country.
Al Shafie Ahmed contributed to this report from Kampala, Uganda
