Just in case if you never heard
of this historical fact or did not see the movie…
The Mahdist (or Madhist) War,
also called the Mahdist Revolt, was a colonial war of the late 19th century
(1881-1899). It was fought between the
Mahdist Sudanese and the Egyptian and later British forces. It has also been
called the Anglo-Sudan War or the Sudanese Mahdist Revolt. The British have
called their part in the conflict the Sudan Campaign. It was vividly described
by Winston Churchill (who took part in its concluding stages) in The River War. The following is a link to a free
copy of his book which is now very relevant on the view of ISISL. https://archive.org/stream/riverwarhistoric00chur#page/n9/mode/2up
Following the invasion by
Muhammed Ali in 1819, Sudan was governed by an Egyptian administration. This
colonial system was resented by the Sudanese people, because of the heavy taxes
it imposed and because of the bloody start of the Turkish-Egyptian rule in Sudan. Among the forces historians see as the causes
of the uprising are ethnic Sudanese anger at the foreign Turkish Ottoman
rulers, Muslim revivalist anger at the Turks' lax religious standards and
willingness to appoint non-Muslims such as the Christian Charles Gordon to high
positions and Sudanese Sufi resistance to "dry, scholastic Islam of
Egyptian officialdom."
In the 1870s, a Muslim cleric
named Muhammad Ahmad preached renewal of the faith and
liberation of the land, and began attracting followers. Soon in open revolt
against the Egyptians, Muhammad Ahmad proclaimed himself the Mahdi, the
promised redeemer of the Islamic world. And also proclaimed the Islamic Caliphate of Sudan and, of course, also proclaimed himself the Caliph. In Islamic eschatology, the
Mahdi (English: Guided One) is the prophesied redeemer of Islam who will rule
for seven, nine or nineteen years before the Day of Judgment and of Resurrection) and will rid the world of
evil. The then-governor of the Sudan, Raouf Pasha, sent two companies of
infantry with one machine gun to arrest him. The captains of the two companies
were each promised promotion if their soldiers were the ones to return the
Mahdi to the governor. Both companies disembarked from the steamer that had
brought them up the Nile to Abba and approached the Mahdi's village from
separate directions. Arriving simultaneously, each force began to fire blindly
on the other, allowing the Mahdi's scant followers to attack and destroy each
force in turn.
The Mahdi then began a strategic
retreat to Kordofan, where he was at a greater distance from the seat of
government in Khartoum. This movement, couched as a triumphal progress, incited
many of the Arab tribes to rise in support of the Jihad the Mahdi had declared
against the "Turkish oppressors". Another Egyptian expedition sent from
Fashoda was ambushed and slaughtered on the night of December 9. The Egyptian administration in
the Sudan, now thoroughly concerned by the scale of the uprising, assembled a
force of 4,000 troops under Yusef Pasha. This force approached the Mahdist
gathering, whose members were poorly clothed, half starving, and armed only
with sticks and stones. However, supreme overconfidence led the Egyptian army
into camping within sight of the Mahdist 'army' without posting sentries. The
Mahdi led a dawn assault on June 7 which slaughtered the army to a man. The
rebels gained vast stores of arms and ammunition, military clothing and other
supplies.
With the Egyptian government now
passing largely under British control, the European powers became increasingly
aware of the troubles in the Sudan. The British advisers to the Egyptian
government gave tacit consent for another expedition. Throughout the summer of
1883, Egyptian troops were concentrated at Khartoum, eventually reaching the
strength of 7,000 infantry, 1,000 cavalry, 20 machine guns, and artillery. This
force was placed under the command of a retired British Indian Staff Corps
officer William Hicks and twelve European officers. The force was, in the words
of Winston Churchill, "perhaps the worst army that has ever marched to war
"unpaid, untrained and undisciplined, its soldiers having more in common
with their enemies than with their officers.
El Obeid, the city whose siege
Hicks had intended to relieve, had already fallen by the time the expedition left Khartoum, but Hicks continued anyway, although not confident of his
chances of success. Upon his approach, Muhammad assembled an army of about
40,000 men and drilled them rigorously in the art of war, equipping them with
the arms and ammunition captured in previous battles. By the time Hicks' forces
actually offered battle, the Mahdist army was a credible military force, which
utterly annihilated the opposition at the Battle of El Obeid. Incidentally, "Fuzzy-Wuzzy"
was the term used by British colonial soldiers for the 19th-century Beja
warriors. Also, the term
"Dervishes" may have been used as a generic and pejorative term for
the opposing Islamic entity and all members of its military, political and
religious institutions supporting the Sudanese Mahdi in the Mahdist War. They were also called an “Army of Dervishes.”
At this time, the British Empire
was increasingly entrenching itself in the workings of the Egyptian government.
Egypt was groaning under a barely maintainable debt repayment structure for her
enormous European debt. For the Egyptian government to avoid further
interference from its European creditors, it had to ensure that the debt
interest was paid on time, every time. To this end, the Egyptian treasury,
initially crippled by corruption and bureaucracy, was placed by the British
almost entirely under their control.
It was therefore decided by the
Egyptian government, under some coercion by their British controllers, that the
Egyptian presence in the Sudan should be withdrawn and the country left to some
form of self-government, likely headed by the Mahdi. The Egyptian government asked
for a British officer to be sent to the Sudan to co-ordinate the withdrawal of
the garrisons. It was proposed to send Charles 'Chinese' Gordon.
Gordon was an extremely gifted officer who had distinguished himself in several
campaigns in China. Gordon was eventually given the mission, but he was to be accompanied by the
much more levelheaded and reliable Colonel John Stewart. General
Gordon was portrayed in the 1966 movie Khartoum by Charlton Heston, with
Muhammad Ahmad played by Laurence Olivier.
Gordon arrived in Khartoum on 18
February and immediately became apprised with the vast difficulty of the task.
Egypt's garrisons were scattered widely across the country and the majority of
the territory between the
garrisons were under the control of the Mahdi. Khartoum's Egyptian and European population
was greater than all the other garrisons combined, including 7,000 Egyptian
troops, 27,000 civilians and the staffs of several embassies. Although the
pragmatic approach would have been to secure the safety of the Khartoum
garrison and abandon the outlying fortifications, with their troops, to the
Mahdi, Gordon became increasingly reluctant to leave the Sudan until "everyone
who wants to go down [the Nile] is given the chance to do so", feeling it
would be a slight on his honour to abandon any Egyptian soldiers to the Mahdi.
He also became increasingly fearful of the Mahdi's potential to cause trouble
in Egypt if allowed control of the Sudan, leading to a conviction that the
Mahdi must be "crushed", by British troops if necessary, to assure
the stability of the region. Whether or not it was the Mahdi's intention, in
March 1883, the Sudanese tribes to the north of Khartoum, who had previously
been sympathetic or at least neutral towards the Egyptian authorities, rose in
support of the Mahdi. The telegraph lines between Khartoum and Cairo were cut
on March 15, severing communication with the outside world.
Gordon's position in Khartoum was
very strong, as the city was bordered to the north and east by the Blue Nile,
to the west by the White Nile, and to the south by ancient fortifications
looking on to a vast expanse of desert. Gordon had food for an estimated six
months, several million rounds of ammunition in store, with the
capacity to produce a further 50,000 rounds per week and 7,000 Egyptian
soldiers. However, outside the walls, the Mahdi had mustered about 50,000
Dervish soldiers, and as time went on, the chances of a successful breakout
became slim. Besides, the city was too large to be defended by such a small force.
Eventually, it became impossible
for Gordon to be relieved without British troops. An expedition was duly
dispatched under Sir Garnet Wolseley. However, as the level of the White Nile
fell through the winter, muddy 'beaches' at the foot of the walls were exposed.
With starvation and cholera rampant in the city and the morale of the Egyptian
troops shattered, Gordon's position became untenable and the city fell on
January 25, 1885, after a siege of 313 days.
All soldiers and much of the population we slaughter and/or
beheaded. The heads of General Gordon, Stewart and some of their close associates were displayed at the main square where years
later his statue was placed.
The British Government,
reluctantly and late, but under strong pressure from public opinion, sent a
relief
column under Sir Garnet Wolseley to relieve the Khartoum garrison. This
was described in some British papers as the 'Gordon Relief Expedition', a title
which Gordon strongly objected to. After defeating the Mahdists at Abu Klea,
the column arrived within sight of Khartoum, only to find they were too late:
the city had fallen two days earlier, and Gordon and the garrison had been massacred.
Liberal Party Prime Minister William Gladstone suffered a deep loss in
popularity due to his reluctance to support Gordon. The Conservative Party
would win the following election.
Muhammad Ahmad died soon after
his victory in 1885, and was succeeded by the Khalifa Abdallahi ibn Muhammad,
who proved to be an able, albeit ruthless, ruler of the Mahdiyah (or the
Mahdist state). Horatio
Herbert Kitchener, the new commander of the Anglo-Egyptian Army, received his marching orders
on March 12, and his forces entered Sudan on the 18th. Numbering at first
11,000 men, Kitchener's force was armed with the most modern military equipment
of the time, including Maxim machine-guns and modern artillery, and was
supported by a flotilla of gunboats on the Nile. Their advance was slow and
methodical, while fortified camps were built along the way, and two separate railway lines were hastily constructed. It
was not until June 7, 1896, that the first serious engagement of the campaign
occurred, when Kitchener led a 9,000 strong force that wiped out the Mahdist
garrison at Ferkeh.
In 1898, in the context of the scramble for Africa, the British decided to reassert Egypt's claim on Sudan. An expedition, commanded by Kitchener, was organised in Egypt. It was composed of 8,200 British soldiers and 17,600 Egyptian and Sudanese soldiers commanded by British officers. The Mahdist forces (sometimes called the Dervishes) were more numerous, numbering more than 60,000 warriors, but lacked modern weapons. After defeating a Mahdist force in the Battle of Atbara in April 1898, the Anglo-Egyptians reached Omdurman, the Mahdist capital in September. The bulk of the Mahdist army attacked, but was cut down by British machine-guns and rifle fire. The remnant, with the Khalifa Abdullah, fled to southern Sudan. They finally caught up with Abdullah at Umm Diwaykarat, where he was killed, effectively ending the Mahdist regime.
PS.- A
quote from an 1899 book by Winston Churchill, "The River War," in
which he describes Muslims he apparently observed during Kitchener's campaign
in the Sudan:
"How
dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its votaries! Besides the
fanatical frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there
is this fearful fatalistic apathy. The effects are apparent in many countries.
Improvident habits, slovenly systems of agriculture, sluggish methods of
commerce, and insecurity of property exist wherever the followers of the
Prophet rule or live. A degraded sensualism deprives this life of its grace and
refinement; the next of its dignity and sanctity. The fact that in Mohammedan
law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property - either as a
child, a wife, or a concubine - must delay the final extinction of slavery
until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men. Individual
Moslems may show splendid qualities. Thousands become the brave and loyal soldiers
of the Queen; all know how to die. But the influence of the religion paralyses
the social development of those who follow it. No stronger retrograde force
exists in the world. Far from being moribund, Mohammedanism is a militant and
proselytizing faith. It has already spread throughout Central Africa, raising
fearless warriors at every step; and were it not that Christianity is sheltered
in the strong arms of science - the science against which it had vainly
struggled - the civilization of modern Europe might fall, as fell the
civilization of ancient Rome."
Said
by the great Sir Winston Churchill more than a century ago…and it is still an
absolute truth…updated…
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