Ankara’s involvement in Sudan indicates its foreign policy is bereft of any values and willing to ignore sanctions intended to deter continued bloodshed.

Recent Washington Post reporting broke the story of Turkish arms manufacturers engaging in weapons sales to both the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and possibly the rebel group Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which the United States has accused of committing genocide and human rights abuses throughout Sudan’s civil war.

The report provides details of “Baykar,” a leading Turkish arms manufacturer,which is owned by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s son-in-law, Selcuk Bayraktar, of selling offensive weapons to the Sudanese Defense Industries System (DIS), the Sudanese military’s procurement agency. Baykar’s shipments to the SAF appear to violate existing U.S. and European Union sanctions.

The deal between Baykar and SAF is worth $120 million, resulting in the sale of six TB2 drones, three ground control stations, and 600 warheads in 2023. Interestingly, the sale occurred on November 16, 2023, five months after the U.S. Treasury Department imposed sanctions on DIS.

Additionally, The Washington Post report identifies “Arca Defense,” another Turkish arms manufacturer, of engaging in extensive contact with Algoney Hamdan Daglo Musa, a senior figure from the RSF, the chief procurement officer for RSF and the brother of its leader. However, whether Arca has sold weaponry to the RSF is not clear, and the firm has denied this possibility.

Sudan’s Civil War

The Sudanese Civil War began in April 2023 following escalating tensions between two rival factions: the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) led by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) led by General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo or Hemeti. The country’s two leading generals were initially allies in the 2021 coup that overthrew Sudan’s fledgling pro-democracy transitional government following the ousting of long-time dictator Omar al-Bashir in 2019. However, the two fell out over how to integrate paramilitary forces into the regular army.

The war in Sudan escalated into a major humanitarian disaster. A UN fact-finding mission in September 2024 concluded both sides have committed an “appalling range of harrowing human rights violations and international crimes,” includingmass rape, arbitrary arrests, and torture. Half of Sudan’s population is in need of humanitarian assistance—25 million are facing acute food insecurity, while the U.S. estimates the war has already killed 150,000 people.

Sudan’s Arena for Regional Proxy Conflict 

The war has dragged on for two years, in part due to the involvement of foreign powers. While Egypt and Saudi Arabia are the main backers of the SAF, manycredit the covert provision of Iranian drones for the SAF’s recent successes on the battlefield. At the same time, the United Arab Emirates has become a major backer of the RSF—a move they have justified by accusing the SAF of being a part of the Muslim Brotherhood. A Sudan Conflict Observatory report concluded with “near certainty” that between June 2023 and May 2024, thirty-two flightsshipped weapons from the UAE to the RSF, which the Biden administration has charged with genocide.

A driving force behind the involvement of Arab and African powers in Sudan’s war is access to and control of the strategic Red Sea. In February 2025, the Russian and Sudanese foreign ministers announced that they had reached a deal allowing Russia to establish a naval base in Port Sudan.

Turkey’s Interests

It is no secret that Erdogan has worked to expand Turkey’s military and diplomatic ties across the Horn of Africa. For Turkey, the interest lies in promoting itself as a major power. In December 2024, Erdogan called Sudan’s military chief, General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and offered to “step in to resolve the disputes between Sudan and the United Arab Emirates.”

Turkey has also increased its footprint on the African continent by establishing a military presence in Somalia and signing a uranium mining deal with the government of Niger. In the case of Somalia, Ankara has invested heavily, offering training and assistance to the Somali military, securing hydrocarbon exploration rights and establishing a friendly relationship with a country strategically placed on the Horn of Africa’s vital shipping lanes. With Niger, Ankara appears to be exploring options to source uranium in possible pursuit of developing nuclear weapons capabilities. President Erdogan has long dreamed of Turkey becoming autonomous and independent of the West in terms of alliance commitments and military procurement needs.

Ankara’s involvement in Sudan indicates its foreign policy is bereft of any values and willing to ignore sanctions intended to deter continued bloodshed. None of this should come as a surprise. Erdogan has been playing both sides of the Ukraine conflict. On the one hand, he pretends to live up to Turkey’s responsibilities as a NATO member, by closing off the Turkish straits to Russian vessels. On the other, he has allowed Turkey’s banking system to funnel illicit Russian finances belonging to Putin’s oligarchs, and allowed Turkish firms to selldual-use goods to the Russian military, providing vital support to Putin’s illegal war effort.

In 2012, a group of Turkish military Generals, led by Adnan Tanriverdi, who were purged from the Turkish military for Islamist proclivities in 1997, founded Turkey’s first private military company (PMC), SADAT. Tanriverdi is a personal confidant of Erdogan. Since its inception, SADAT has provided military security and training to organizations aligned with Islamist ideologies in Libya, Azerbaijan, West Africa,Syria, and Iraq. Its stated mission includes the desire to form an alliance of Islamic countries that takes its place among the world’s superpowers.

The United States and Europe should take heed. There is a growing consensus in the West that in order to confront Russia’s irredentist threats towards Europe, they must give Turkey a seat at the table, including a restart of Ankara’s stalled EU accession process. Poland’s prime minister and the secretary general of NATO are convinced that only a Europe that includes Turkey, with its vast military capabilities, can the continent meet the existential security challenges posed by Russian aggression. The question is, what makes them believe that Turkey will have Europe’s back?