The author says Sudan’s army has shifted from Iranian Mohajer-6 drones (seen at Wadi Sayyidna last year) to Turkish Bayraktar Akıncı wreckage after Iran’s own war consumed its stocks and the SAF paused Tehran purchases to look better in Washington.

Turkey (Baykar kit said to exceed $120 million; reports of Akıncı flights from Egypt’s East Oweinat), Egypt (training, TB2s after Burhan’s 2023 Ankara trip, guidance after El-Fasher), and Pakistan (a reported $1.5 billion package including Mohafiz vehicles, Shahpar drones, K-8s, 200-plus UAVs, possibly JF-17s, with a Saudi-brokered finance story) are described as filling the gap.

Gold smuggled from army-held north (~60% per Chatham House, into Egyptian circuits) plus Gulf money, especially Saudi interest in the Red Sea, is framed as the war chest—opportunity after Iran’s retreat, not a shared ideology.

Last year, Sudan’s army was flying drones with a clear origin. Satellite images caught Mohajer-6 airframes parked on the runway at Wadi Sayyidna — an Iranian-designed platform the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) said it had shot down over Omdurman for the third time. Tehran, seeking a foothold on the Red Sea, had quietly become the Sudanese Armed Forces’ (SAF) most important military patron, running cargo flights into Port Sudan and reportedly negotiating restored diplomatic ties as the drones landed.

This year, the wreckage in Sudan’s fields carries a different label. In May, the Sudanese army used a Turkish-made Bayraktar Akıncı to shoot down a........

© Eurasia Review