1. Executive summary and key assessments

Available open-source information indicates that the relationship between Iran and authorities associated with the Sudanese Armed Forces has, since the second half of 2023, moved from a phase of political and diplomatic re-engagement toward a more advanced level of cooperation with a military dimension.

Cross-checked evidence indicates that the most significant manifestations of this cooperation include the Sudanese Armed Forces’ acquisition of Iranian-made unmanned aerial vehicles and their use during the war, alongside air activity between Iran and Port Sudan, followed by subsequent indications that channels for negotiations and military contracting between the two sides continued.

However, open sources still do not provide sufficient evidence to establish the presence of a conventional Iranian combat deployment inside Sudan. Accordingly, this paper uses the term “Iranian military intervention” primarily to refer to military, technical, and logistical support, rather than to the presence of declared Iranian forces directly participating in operations.

Iran’s return came at a highly sensitive moment. After the Sudanese war erupted on 15 April 2023, Tehran and Khartoum began discussing the restoration of relations in July of the same year, after ties had been severed since 2016, before the two countries officially announced the resumption of diplomatic relations on 9 October 2023. The official Iranian statement said the decision followed contacts between senior officials, while Reuters noted that the announcement ended seven years of estrangement. The reopening of the political channel therefore coincided with a period in which the Sudanese Armed Forces were facing considerable military pressure and seeking additional sources to strengthen their capabilities.

Open-source evidence indicates that the military dimension became apparent during the following months. Reuters, citing Iranian, regional, diplomatic, and military sources, documented the Sudanese Armed Forces’ acquisition of Iranian-made drones and linked the appearance of more effective drones beginning in January 2024 to improved army capabilities in monitoring the movements of its adversaries, conducting strikes, and supporting operations around the capital.

Flight-tracking data reviewed by Reuters showed that a cargo aircraft operated by Qeshm Fars Air made six flights between Iran and Port Sudan during December 2023 and January 2024. Reuters was unable to independently determine the cargo carried on those flights, an important distinction between establishing the existence of a logistical route and establishing the contents of every shipment.

Evidence concerning the drones was strengthened by visual investigations. Human Rights Watch concluded, after analysing images, videos, and open-source material, that the Sudanese Armed Forces had used Iranian Mohajer-6 drones and documented the appearance of wreckage from this model in January 2024. These forms of evidence make it possible to identify the origin and model through independent physical and visual characteristics. At the same time, the Sudanese government’s early denial that it had received weapons from Iran remains part of the evidentiary record and should not simply be excluded from the analysis.

Developments in 2026 also suggest that the potential military relationship cannot be reduced to limited shipments received at the beginning of the war. In April 2026, the U.S. Department of Justice announced the arrest of an Iranian national accused of acting as an intermediary in arms deals on behalf of the Iranian government. According to the U.S. criminal complaint, her alleged activities in 2025 included facilitating a contract worth more than $70 million for the supply of Mohajer-6 drones from Iran’s Ministry of Defence to the Sudanese military establishment, alongside other transactions involving military equipment and ammunition.

These allegations remain allegations within a legal framework, and no final judgment has been issued regarding them. Nevertheless, they provide an important indicator of the possibility that the relationship evolved from episodic supply during 2023–2024 toward a more organized path of military contracting.

Iran’s motives do not appear to be confined to the commercial returns from arms sales. Sudan occupies a strategic position on the western coast of the Red Sea, and Tehran’s return coincided with the growing importance of this maritime corridor in regional security calculations. Reuters reported, citing Iranian and regional sources, that strengthening relations with Sudan was itself an Iranian objective, while separate reports claimed that Tehran sought a permanent naval presence on the Sudanese coast.

The available evidence, however, does not currently allow the conclusion that Iran obtained a base or permanent naval facility in Sudan. The paper therefore treats the “Iranian base” as an aspiration attributed to Tehran that requires further evidence, rather than as an established fact.

The presence of Sudanese Islamist networks within the camp supporting the army adds another dimension to explaining the rapid restoration of the Iranian relationship. This relationship did not begin with the 2023 war. Political, security, and military links had developed between the Islamic Republic of Iran and the regime of Omar al-Bashir, whose political structure relied in important periods on the Sudanese Islamist movement.

After Bashir’s fall in 2019, Islamists lost formal control over the state, but Reuters investigations indicate that they retained networks within state institutions and the military sphere, and that thousands of fighters associated with them subsequently participated alongside the armed forces during the war. More importantly, military sources told Reuters in 2025 that prominent Islamist figures used longstanding relationships with countries including Iran to help secure support for the army, although this has not been independently confirmed and the armed forces have denied coordination with the organisation.

Accordingly, the paper’s working hypothesis is that Iran’s return to Sudan resulted from the intersection of three needs and interests, rather than from a simple ideological alliance:

1. The Sudanese Armed Forces’ need for military and technological capabilities during a prolonged war of attrition.
2. Iran’s desire to restore influence it lost after the collapse of its partnership with the Bashir regime and the severing of relations in 2016.
3. The continued existence of Sudanese political, security, and military networks with previous experience dealing with Tehran.

This overlap makes the relationship more sustainable than a single arms deal, but it does not mean that Sudan has become a fixed component of an Iran-led regional axis.

Key intelligence assessments

1. We assess with high confidence that, since at least late 2023, Iran has become an important source of some of the unmanned military capabilities used by the Sudanese Armed Forces. This assessment is based on the convergence of journalistic investigations, visual evidence, and analysis of Iranian-origin remnants and systems, as well as subsequent judicial indicators emerging in the United States.
2. We assess with medium to high confidence that Iranian support contributed to improving some operational capabilities of the Sudanese Armed Forces, particularly surveillance and targeting. However, it was not the sole factor explaining battlefield changes. Drone use coincided with manpower mobilisation, force reorganisation, the use of aviation and artillery, and other battlefield factors. It would therefore be an exaggeration to attribute changes in the war solely to Iranian support.
3. We assess with medium confidence that Tehran views military cooperation as a tool for rebuilding broader political and strategic influence in Sudan, rather than merely as an arms-selling relationship. Sudan’s position on the Red Sea gives the relationship a value extending beyond the Sudanese theater itself. However, the existence of a permanent Iranian base or naval deployment remains unproven in open sources.
4. We assess with medium confidence that Islamist networks and networks associated with the former regime are a contributing factor in understanding the restoration of relations with Iran, because they possess historical links with Tehran and retain part of their influence within Sudan’s political and military environment. Current evidence is insufficient to conclude that these networks manage Iranian-Sudanese cooperation or that the armed forces are subordinate to their agenda. This hypothesis therefore requires independent testing.
5. We assess with medium confidence that the relationship is likely to continue even if the intensity of the war declines, particularly if it evolves from the supply of ready-made systems into institutional cooperation involving training, maintenance, defence manufacturing, or broader security arrangements. Future military agreements, official visits, continued defense relations, and arrangements linked to the Sudanese coast will be important indicators in determining whether the relationship evolves from a temporary wartime partnership into long-term Iranian influence.

Overall assessment

As of August 2026, open-source information does not indicate an Iranian military occupation or a large-scale conventional Iranian combat deployment inside Sudan. It does, however, provide strong evidence of indirect military intervention based on arms supplies, technology, and defense relations, within a broader political trajectory aimed at re-establishing Iranian influence in Sudan.

The key intelligence question for the next phase is whether Tehran will remain a military supplier or succeed in transforming the dependence that emerged during the war into a permanent security and strategic partnership on the western shore of the Red Sea.

2. From estrangement to return: How did Iran re-establish its position in Sudan?

Iran’s return to Sudan after the outbreak of the April 2023 war cannot be understood as a new relationship created solely by the Sudanese Armed Forces’ need for military support. The current rapprochement rests on a political, security, and military legacy extending over more than three decades.

The most important phase of the relationship began after Omar al-Bashir came to power in 1989 with the support of the National Islamic Front. Sudan became one of Iran’s closest Arab and African partners during a period when Khartoum was suffering international isolation, while Tehran was seeking to expand its network of relations beyond its immediate surroundings.

Despite the sectarian differences between the Iranian regime and Sudan’s Islamist movement, the relationship was primarily shaped by converging political and security interests and by the two sides’ positions toward Western influence, rather than by a conventional sectarian alliance. Studies of the period show that military and security institutions were among the relationship’s central components, alongside political links between the two regimes.

The relationship gradually evolved from political rapprochement into more institutionalised defence cooperation. During the 1990s, historical sources point to cooperation in training Sudanese military and security personnel and transferring military expertise.

Iran later became associated with the development of Sudan’s defense-industrial capabilities. In March 2008, the two countries’ defense ministers signed a military cooperation agreement, reflecting the relationship’s move into a formally declared defense sphere. The same year, Iran appeared among the countries reportedly supplying arms to Sudan at a time when Sudan’s arms procurement was under international scrutiny related to the war in Darfur.

The military relationship also extended to the Red Sea. In October 2012, Port Sudan received two Iranian warships in a visit that attracted considerable regional attention because of its timing and the security relationship between the two countries. Iranian naval visits were repeated; in September 2013, the Sudanese army announced that it had received two more Iranian vessels. This was the third such visit in less than a year.

These visits did not prove the existence of an Iranian base in Sudan, but they demonstrated that Iranian military access to Sudan’s coast was not an idea that emerged with the current war; it had previously been part of the bilateral relationship.

The partnership began to decline clearly from 2014. In September of that year, the Sudanese government closed Iranian cultural centres in the country and expelled the cultural attaché and several Iranian diplomats. Sudan’s Foreign Ministry said at the time that the centres had become a social and ideological threat.

This step publicly revealed political limits to Iranian influence inside Khartoum and coincided with a gradual repositioning of Sudanese foreign policy toward the Gulf states, amid increasing economic needs and efforts by the Bashir regime to reduce its regional and international isolation.

The growing political distance became a complete rupture on 4 January 2016, when Sudan announced the severing of diplomatic relations with Iran following attacks on the Saudi Embassy in Tehran and the Saudi Consulate in Mashhad. Sudan’s decision formed part of a broader regional alignment with Riyadh after Sudan had joined the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen.

Thus, one of the longest phases of Iranian-Sudanese cooperation formally ended, and Khartoum moved from being a close partner of Tehran toward a position closer to its competing Gulf axis.

The diplomatic rupture did not erase the institutional history of the relationship. Sudanese state institutions and individuals retained experience from dealing with Iran during the Bashir era. Military industries, security agencies, and the armed forces themselves carried the legacy of three decades under a regime whose relationship with Tehran had, at certain stages, been close.

This point is essential for understanding the speed of the later return: when Sudanese actors needed to reopen a channel with Iran after 2023, the relationship was not being built from scratch. It rested on institutional memory and previously established communication networks that could potentially be reactivated. Establishing the direct role of those networks after 2023, however, requires separate evidence; historical legacy alone does not prove that the same individuals managed the current rapprochement.

The fall of Bashir in April 2019 fundamentally changed Sudan’s political environment and significantly weakened the Islamist movement and the networks of the National Congress Party that had shaped the earlier political environment surrounding relations with Iran.

In subsequent years, Sudan adopted a different foreign policy, most notably entering a process to normalize relations with Israel in 2020, a shift publicly criticized by Tehran. As a result, prospects for restoring the Iranian-Sudanese alignment appeared limited during the transitional period, until the outbreak of war in April 2023 transformed Khartoum’s needs and foreign-policy calculations.

The first major shift came less than three months after the outbreak of the war. On 6 July 2023, Sudanese Foreign Minister Ali al-Sadiq met his Iranian counterpart, Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, on the sidelines of the Non-Aligned Movement meeting in Baku. It was the first publicly announced meeting at this level since the severing of relations.

Iran’s official news agency said the talks addressed the resolution of a “misunderstanding” between the two countries and the strengthening of political and economic relations.

The importance of the meeting lies not only in its occurrence but also in its timing. The war had entered its third month, the Sudanese Armed Forces were facing major battlefield challenges, and the leadership based in Port Sudan had increasingly begun seeking to expand its external relations.

On 9 October 2023, the two countries formally announced the restoration of diplomatic relations after seven years of rupture and confirmed their intention to reopen embassies and exchange official delegations.

The decision came three months after the foreign ministers’ meeting, suggesting that restoring relations was the result of a negotiating process that began during the war rather than a sudden or symbolic step. The announcement itself was not military; it officially referred to developing bilateral relations and cooperation in pursuit of shared interests.

Nevertheless, developments during the following months make the timing highly significant from an intelligence perspective: the restoration of relations was followed by indications of logistical activity between Iran and Sudan and by the appearance of Iranian-origin systems in the possession of the Sudanese Armed Forces in early 2024.

The diplomatic side of the return was completed during 2024. Following the October 2023 announcement, the two countries exchanged ambassadors in July 2024, moving the relationship from a political decision to restore contact toward full diplomatic representation.

This occurred as the war continued and open-source evidence of military cooperation increased, making it more difficult to separate the political and military tracks. Diplomacy provided the formal framework for the relationship, while Sudan’s urgent need for military capabilities provided the strongest incentive for deepening it.

Intelligence assessment

The chronology indicates that Iran’s return was not the result of an ideological awakening inside Sudan as much as it was a process of restoring an old relationship under conditions created by the war.

The Sudanese Armed Forces needed to expand their foreign policy options, while Iran saw an opportunity to re-enter a theatre where it had lost influence since the middle of the previous decade. The previous history of military and security cooperation made rebuilding the relationship less costly than establishing an entirely new partnership.

We assess with high confidence that the military and security legacy of the relationship during the Bashir era created an institutional and political foundation that facilitated rapprochement after 2023.

We assess with only medium confidence, however, that Islamist and former-regime networks played a direct role in restoring contact. Their historical links are established, but their operational role in the current cooperation requires independent analysis of individuals, contacts, visits, and intermediary actors.

3. Nature and operational impact of the Iranian military intervention in the war

Open sources support, with high confidence, describing Iran’s role in Sudan as indirect military intervention, primarily based on the transfer of military capabilities and technology to the Sudanese Armed Forces rather than the deployment of Iranian combat units.

The strongest available evidence concerns Iranian drones, while claims about Iranian advisers, operators, or units directly linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps inside Sudan are less clear and cannot be assigned the same level of confidence.

From an OSINT perspective, one of the most important characteristics of the Iranian case is the ability to track several relatively independent links—appearance of systems, air traffic between the two countries, and subsequent developments in defence communications—and combine them into a single picture that allows an assessment of the military relationship without assuming the existence of secret agreements that cannot be publicly verified.

Drones: the clearest evidence

The Mohajer-6 represents the most significant open-source physical evidence of Iranian military support.

Human Rights Watch documented, through analysis of visual and open-source information, the presence of this Iranian model among the Sudanese Armed Forces during the war, including photographs of the wreckage of one drone in January 2024. The organisation also cited cross-checked reports indicating that Iranian drones arrived after the outbreak of the war.

The combination of visual identification of the system and multiple sources documenting its use produces a high level of confidence that the Mohajer-6 was in the possession of the Sudanese army, particularly when compared with other equipment attributed to Iran.

Other sources indicate that the Sudanese Armed Forces also used drones from the Iranian Ababil family. The European Union Agency for Asylum, in its assessment of the security situation in Sudan, reported that Iran had provided material support to the army that included Mohajer-6 and Ababil drones.

A more recent ACLED analysis indicated the continued presence of Mohajer-6 and Ababil-3 among the mix of drones used by the armed forces. However, the level of open-source evidence is not identical across the different models. Mohajer-6 has a stronger visual record, while evidence for some other models relies more heavily on the convergence of reports and analyses.

Accordingly, the paper classifies the presence of Mohajer-6 with high confidence, while the presence of some other Iranian systems is assessed with medium confidence unless additional physical evidence becomes available.

The importance of this support extends beyond simply adding another weapons system to the Sudanese army’s arsenal.

At the beginning of the war, the Sudanese Armed Forces possessed conventional air superiority over their opponents, but they struggled to translate this advantage into sustainable battlefield control within a complex urban environment.

Accounts collected by Reuters indicate that the introduction of more effective drones from January 2024 improved the army’s ability to monitor movements, identify targets, and support operations, particularly around the capital. According to a Sudanese military source who spoke to the agency, these capabilities helped halt the army’s opponents and subsequently supported its efforts to regain areas in Omdurman.

From an intelligence perspective, however, it is important to avoid establishing a simplistic causal relationship between the arrival of Iranian aircraft and battlefield changes.

The Sudanese army did not regain the initiative because of a single factor. The same period saw the reorganization of units, mobilization of additional forces, improvements in some supply lines, the use of aviation and artillery, and the entry of other arms suppliers into the war during subsequent phases.

The more cautious assessment is therefore that Iranian capabilities acted as a force multiplier during a critical phase, rather than being the sole factor that shifted the balance of the war.

The air bridge between Iran and Port Sudan

Analysis of air traffic provides one of the most important circumstantial indicators of the logistical infrastructure accompanying the appearance of Iranian drones.

Flight-tracking data reviewed by Reuters showed that a cargo aircraft operated by Qeshm Fars Air made six flights between Iran and Port Sudan during December 2023 and January 2024, directly before and during the period in which more advanced Iranian systems began appearing in operations.

Regional sources told Reuters that this channel was used to transport drones, although Reuters emphasised that it could not independently verify the cargo carried on each flight.

This distinction is methodologically important. The existence of the flights is established to a higher degree than the contents of the shipments. Therefore, the paper does not treat every Iranian flight to Port Sudan as proof that a weapons shipment was delivered.

Nevertheless, the combination of several indicators—the timing of the flights, restoration of diplomatic relations shortly beforehand, the subsequent appearance of Iranian systems in Sudan, and sources describing military transfers—makes the hypothesis that the flights formed part of a military supply bridge highly plausible.

Later assessments cited by the European Union Agency for Asylum likewise concluded with a very high degree of confidence that weapons transfers from Iran to the Sudanese Armed Forces through flights to Port Sudan continued during the period examined.

Port Sudan’s selection also reveals another strategic factor. As institutions linked to the army’s leadership moved eastward during the war, the city became the main centre of political, logistical, and external communication for the Sudanese Armed Forces.

The direct air connection between Iran and Port Sudan therefore represents not only a convenient transportation route but also the emergence of eastern Sudan as a major point of contact between the Sudanese leadership and its external partners.

From emergency shipments to military contracting

Developments in the United States during 2026 provide another indication that the relationship may have gradually evolved toward more institutional arrangements.

In April 2026, the U.S. Department of Justice announced the arrest of an Iranian national accused of facilitating military transactions with Sudan. According to the criminal complaint, the alleged activity involved a contract worth more than $70 million for the sale of Mohajer-6 drones from Iran’s Ministry of Defense to Sudan’s military establishment, in addition to coordination surrounding a Sudanese delegation’s visit to Iran.

These remain judicial allegations rather than facts established by a final judgment. Nevertheless, the nature and scale of the alleged transaction—if confirmed—would point toward a more organised relationship than the emergency shipment of limited systems.

This suggests an important hypothesis regarding the nature of Iranian intervention: Iranian support may have passed through two phases.

The first was a rapid response to the Sudanese army’s need for unmanned aerial capabilities during late 2023 and early 2024.

The second, suggested by later evidence, involves the possibility of a more organised relationship and direct contacts between the Sudanese military establishment and Iran’s defence-industrial sector.

If this pattern continues, the relationship would move closer to a medium-term defence partnership rather than a temporary wartime intervention.

Is there an Iranian military presence on the ground?

This remains one of the weakest elements of the intervention case from an open-source perspective.

Operating advanced aerial systems could imply the presence of Iranian personnel, but it could also be achieved through training conducted outside Sudan, the transfer of technical knowledge to Sudanese personnel, or limited technical teams.

As of August 2026, the open sources relied upon by this paper do not provide decisive evidence allowing a conclusion that Iranian units or Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps personnel are directly participating in combat operations.

The distinction should therefore be maintained between three different levels of intervention:

1. Equipment supply, which is established with a high degree of confidence for some systems.
2. Training and technical support, which is functionally plausible but requires additional evidence.
3. Direct Iranian participation in combat operations, which remains unproven according to the available open information.

This distinction prevents an exaggeration of Iran’s role while preserving the difference between what can and cannot be established regarding the systems used and the personnel operating them.

Operational impact: from a tactical tool to a change in the air-war structure

The significance of introducing drones to the Sudanese Armed Forces did not stop at the battles of Khartoum and Omdurman.

Subsequent developments indicate that unmanned aerial combat gradually became a fundamental component of the Sudanese war. ACLED analysis suggests that the diversification of drone sources allowed the armed forces to expand their ability to conduct aerial operations across geographically separated fronts, representing a clear development compared with their greater reliance on conventional air power at the beginning of the war in 2023.

This transformation is important when assessing the Iranian role. The value of Iranian support was no longer limited to a particular number of aircraft; rather, it contributed early to the introduction of an operational model that later became one of the defining characteristics of the war.

Between 2024 and 2026, the Sudanese war increasingly became a theatre in which reconnaissance, airstrikes, and long-range unmanned targeting grew in importance beyond direct front lines. Iran’s role should therefore be understood as part of a broader process of technological internationalisation of the conflict rather than as a monopoly over Sudanese drone capabilities.

The human cost of this transformation also became increasingly significant. In May 2026, the United Nations human rights office warned about the expanding use of drones in the war and reported that drone strikes had caused at least 880 civilian deaths between January and April 2026, representing more than 80% of the civilian deaths associated with attacks documented by the office during that period.

These figures cannot be attributed specifically to Iranian systems, because multiple parties have acquired and used drones. They nevertheless demonstrate the scale of the transformation in Sudan’s operational environment since the wider introduction of unmanned systems.

Intelligence assessment

We assess with high confidence that Iran transferred unmanned military capabilities to the Sudanese Armed Forces and that these capabilities had a tangible operational impact, particularly during the army’s recovery of the initiative around the capital in 2024.

We assess with medium to high confidence that the air route between Iran and Port Sudan formed part of the support process, although the contents of individual flights cannot be established in every case.

Conversely, we assess with low to medium confidence that there was direct Iranian human support inside Sudan in the form of training or maintenance. Open information does not yet provide sufficient evidence to establish the scale or actors involved, nor does it support the stronger hypothesis of Iranian combat units or operational elements belonging to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

4. The former regime and Islamist political networks: the old gateway to Iran’s return

Political Islam represents one of the most complex elements in explaining Iran’s return to Sudan—not because the current relationship can be reduced to an ideological alliance between Tehran and Sudanese Islamists, but because the Islamist movement and Omar al-Bashir’s regime networks were historically part of the environment in which Iranian-Sudanese relations were built.

The key intelligence question is therefore not whether the Sudanese army is “Islamist” or “pro-Iranian”, but whether networks that remained active after Bashir’s fall contributed to reopening political and military channels with Tehran when the Sudanese Armed Forces needed them after the outbreak of the war.

The roots of this relationship go back to the early years of the Bashir regime. The Sudanese Islamist movement, led by Hassan al-Turabi, represented the principal ideological and organisational force behind the new regime.

During the 1990s, relations with Iran reached a high level of political, security, and military rapprochement. Despite sectarian differences, the foundation of the relationship was less about religious unity than the intersection of interests between an Islamist Sudanese regime seeking to build security and military institutions capable of resisting external isolation and an Iran seeking an Arab and African partner that would allow it to expand its influence beyond the Gulf and Levant.

Specialized studies of Sudan indicate that this period produced extensive institutional and personal relationships between Sudanese officials and Iranian institutions, becoming part of the political and security memory of the regime that ruled Sudan for three decades.

The relationship between Sudanese Islamists and Iran, however, was neither fixed nor based on unconditional ideological loyalty.

The Bashir regime itself was capable of distancing itself from Iran when its regional interests changed, eventually severing relations with Tehran in 2016 while moving closer to Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states.

This precedent is important because it prevents interpreting the restoration of relations after 2023 as an automatic return to an “Islamist axis.” Sudanese Islamist actors, like the military establishment itself, historically dealt with foreign relations pragmatically when required by the preservation of power or domestic interests.

A recent CMI study describes Iranian-Sudanese relations as having passed through stages of close military and ideological cooperation, followed by distancing and rupture, before the 2023 war reopened the door to cooperation.

The Fall of Bashir Did Not End the Islamist Networks

The overthrow of Omar al-Bashir in April 2019 was a direct blow to the Islamist movement and the National Congress Party and led to the dismantling of parts of the former regime’s institutions and the removal of several of its leaders from official positions.

The fall of the political regime, however, did not mean the disappearance of all the networks built over three decades inside the state, security services, and military establishment.

A Reuters investigation conducted weeks after the outbreak of the war in 2023 found that figures and elements linked to Bashir-era institutions and Islamists returned to play roles in the camp supporting the army. Military and intelligence sources told the agency that thousands of individuals with backgrounds linked to the former regime participated in combat or provided information and intelligence.

The Sudanese army, by contrast, maintained that it was a professional institution with no relationship to any political party or ideology.

The importance of these networks lies in the fact that they were not limited to conventional political party structures. During Bashir’s rule, the Islamist movement extended into state institutions, the civil service, security agencies, and mobilisation structures.

Some of its personnel therefore acquired military and intelligence experience as well as accumulated foreign relationships.

Consequently, when the war began in April 2023 and the army faced shortages of manpower and intelligence capabilities on some fronts, these networks possessed resources that could rapidly be reused.

Reuters sources had already reported since June 2023 on the participation of former National Security and Intelligence Service personnel in supporting the army and collecting information, although the scale of this influence and its relationship with the armed forces’ leadership remained disputed among Sudanese actors.

By 2025, the picture had become clearer. An extensive Reuters investigation based on interviews with members of the Islamist movement, military and government officials, and an internal document from the former National Congress Party found that Islamists had not limited themselves to political support for the army.

Networks associated with them participated in mobilisation and combat. Military sources said the number of fighters directly associated with the National Congress Party may have reached approximately 5,000, while a document reviewed by the agency referred to the direct contribution of thousands of fighters and participation in training larger numbers as part of general mobilization.

The army, however, maintained that it did not coordinate with any political party, while some Islamist leaders themselves downplayed the idea that they controlled the military institution.

These findings reveal a more complicated relationship than the idea of “Islamist control of the army.” The army has its own institutions, leadership, and interests, while wartime conditions create a need for the manpower, bureaucratic, financial, intelligence, and social networks available within the pro-army camp.

Two military sources described the relationship to Reuters as a balancing process between the army leadership’s desire to prevent political forces from imposing control over the institution and its need for the support provided by Islamist networks.

From an intelligence perspective, the more accurate characterisation is therefore that Islamists are an influential internal partner within the army camp, rather than the army’s sole centre of decision-making.

The Iranian Connection: From Historical Relations to Facilitating Arms

These networks acquire particular importance in the Iranian case because some of their leaders possess foreign relationships dating back to the Bashir era.

In a July 2025 investigation, Reuters reported that military sources said that prominent Islamist figures used their longstanding relationships with Iran, Turkey, and Qatar to help secure military support for the Sudanese Armed Forces.

The agency was unable to independently establish every detail of these channels. Ahmed Haroun, former head of the National Congress Party, said he could neither confirm nor deny the information, while Iran’s Foreign Ministry did not respond to the agency’s request for comment.

This development represents the strongest open-source indication so far of the possibility that Islamist networks played the role of intermediaries or facilitators in the military return to Iran, but it does not by itself constitute conclusive evidence that they managed the relationship.

The hypothesis gained importance after the U.S. position in September 2025, when the U.S. Treasury Department imposed sanctions on Gibril Ibrahim and the Al-Baraa ibn Malik Brigade, linking the action to relationships between Sudanese Islamist actors and Iran.

The Treasury said some Sudanese Islamist elements had developed relationships with the Iranian government and received technical support from Iranian entities. More specifically, it accused the Al-Baraa ibn Malik Brigade of receiving training and support from Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

These statements are important from an intelligence perspective because they constitute an official U.S. assessment. However, they should not automatically be treated as independent proof of every detail of the relationship, since sanctions designations also reflect U.S. government assessments and policies and do not necessarily disclose all underlying intelligence.

In March 2026, Washington took an additional step when it designated what it described as the Sudanese Muslim Brotherhood. In its rationale, it linked elements of the Islamist movement and the Al-Baraa ibn Malik Brigade to support and training from Iran’s Revolutionary Guard.

From an OSINT perspective, the accumulation of these official measures increases the weight of the hypothesis that direct channels exist between some Sudanese Islamist components and Iran. It does not, however, settle the broader question of how representative these channels are of the Sudanese army itself or of Sudanese state institutions as a whole.

 

Al-Baraa ibn Malik Brigade: A nexus worth monitoring

The Al-Baraa ibn Malik Brigade emerged during the war as one of the most prominent armed formations associated with the Islamist current and fighting alongside the armed forces.

One of its leaders told Reuters in 2025 that brigade members operated under army orders and had access to some of the army’s military capabilities. U.S. sources, meanwhile, viewed the brigade as having roots in the organizational environment that developed around the Popular Defense Forces during the Bashir era.

In September 2025, the U.S. Treasury directly linked the brigade to Iranian support and the Revolutionary Guard. These allegations increase the brigade’s importance in analysing the Iranian-Sudanese relationship network.

At the same time, the Al-Baraa ibn Malik case should not be transformed into a conclusion that all forces supporting the army, or all Sudanese Islamists, operate within an Iranian network.

Sudan’s Islamist movement is not a single bloc, and the motivations of groups fighting alongside the armed forces range from ideology and political interests to positions on the war and efforts to defend influence lost after 2019.

Developments in 2026 also indicate limits to this rapprochement. CMI analysis showed that regional tensions linked to Iran placed the army leadership and the Islamist movement themselves before a difficult equation: benefiting from relations with Tehran while maintaining relations with Gulf states and avoiding further international isolation.

Are the Islamists Iran’s gateway to the army?

Available evidence allows three different levels to be identified, which should not be conflated.

First level—high confidence: There are longstanding historical relations between the Sudanese Islamist regime and Iran, and networks associated with the former regime returned to activity alongside the army during the war.

Second level—medium to high confidence: Some Islamist figures and organizations retained direct relations with Iran and used some of these relationships during the war, based on journalistic investigations and cross-checked official U.S. assessments.

Third level—unproven: That Islamists were the principal or exclusive channel through which military agreements between Iran and the army were managed. Open-source evidence remains insufficient to establish this.

An alternative interpretation must therefore also be considered.

After diplomatic relations were restored, the Sudanese military leadership and Defence Ministry could communicate directly with Iran through state institutions without requiring an Islamist intermediary. Islamist networks may have facilitated or accelerated certain communication and arms channels without necessarily controlling the final decision concerning the relationship.

This interpretation also fits the conduct of Army Commander Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, who has repeatedly emphasised that the dissolved National Congress Party will not return to power while continuing in practice to rely on individuals and figures belonging to the Islamist environment during the war.

Intelligence Assessment

We assess with high confidence that the Islamist movement and former-regime networks represent an important factor in the domestic environment that allowed relations with Iran to be rebuilt after 2023. These networks possess historical experience in dealing with Tehran, and part of them remained present within or around Sudanese political, security, and military institutions before regaining influence as a result of wartime needs.

We assess with medium to high confidence that some Islamist individuals and organisations used their foreign relationships, including relationships with Iran, to contribute to securing support for the army. This assessment is strengthened by military-source testimony collected by Reuters and U.S. measures linking certain Sudanese Islamist actors to the Iranian government and the Revolutionary Guard.

However, the actual scale of these channels and their position within military decision-making cannot be established publicly.

The hypothesis of a dominant Iranian-Islamist alliance controlling the Sudanese Armed Forces is not sufficiently supported by available open-source evidence.

The more plausible picture is a network of overlapping interests: the army needs weapons, personnel, and political support; Islamists need the army to preserve and restore their influence; and Iran needs local partners capable of facilitating the rebuilding of its presence in Sudan.

The relationship’s strength therefore comes from converging interests rather than from a unified political or ideological leadership among the three parties.

5. What Does Iran Want from Sudan and the Red Sea?

Iran’s interest in Sudan does not appear explainable through revenues from drone and arms sales alone.

Sudan’s weakened economy, the difficulties created by the war, financing risks, and the political risks accompanying military dealings with one side of the conflict make Sudan a more complicated defence market than a conventional commercial opportunity.

Accordingly, the evidence suggests that Tehran views military cooperation as a means of rebuilding political and security influence lost gradually over the past decade and as a potential window for reaching the western shore of the Red Sea.

This possibility is particularly significant because Iran’s military return occurred roughly in parallel with the restoration of diplomatic relations, rather than years after the normalisation of political and economic ties.

Iranian interests in Sudan can be divided into two interconnected levels.

The first is direct and tactical: building a relationship with a military institution that has become dependent on new sources of weapons and technology during the war. This enables Iran to expand the network of countries using its military systems and to consolidate its position as a supplier that can be turned to when Western options are limited.

The second is strategic: using the military relationship to build political and security influence that can be exploited after the war.

At this level, Sudan’s geographic position becomes more important than its purchasing power. Sudan possesses a long Red Sea coastline and lies in a region connecting Northeast Africa, the Horn of Africa, and the Arab world. Port Sudan provides access close to one of the region’s most sensitive maritime corridors.

This geographic dimension is therefore one of the main elements in understanding Iran’s interest in Sudan.

Sudan as a gateway back into Africa

The return to Sudan fits into a broader Iranian trend toward strengthening relations with Africa.

In recent years, Tehran has attached increasing importance to political and economic relations with African states, while official Iranian sources describe the continent as an important space for expanding external and economic relations.

This does not mean Sudan is merely one component of a general Africa policy. Its geographic position and relations are distinctive. Among African states, Sudan combines a Red Sea coastline with historical political and military relations with Iran and a military establishment that had previously interacted with Iranian systems before the political rupture.

Restoring relations with Khartoum therefore gives Iran a dual gain: regaining a foothold in Northeast Africa and re-entering a country that had previously formed part of its regional influence network.

This partly explains Tehran’s apparent willingness to develop cooperation quickly after 2023. It is rebuilding a relationship gradually rather than starting from zero, while the history of defense cooperation reduces institutional barriers to re-engagement compared with a country whose military and security institutions had never previously dealt with Iran.

The Red Sea: the major strategic value

The Red Sea represents the most sensitive dimension in analysing Iranian intentions.

Geographically, Sudan’s coast lies opposite the maritime area connecting the Bab el-Mandeb and the Suez Canal, a corridor of major importance to maritime security, trade, and energy.

Sudan also occupies a position that allows an external power with sustainable maritime access to expand its presence beyond the Gulf and Indian Ocean toward the African side of the Red Sea.

For this reason, competition for influence in Sudan is not simply about Sudan itself. Tehran’s interest in the Sudanese coast exists within a wider pattern in which different regional and international powers have sought to establish or use maritime facilities during recent years.

From Iran’s perspective, even theoretical access to Sudan’s coast could be highly valuable. Regular maritime or logistical relations on the western Red Sea could provide Tehran with greater ability to monitor the maritime environment and establish security relationships close to Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Yemen, and shipping routes leading to the Suez Canal.

Sudan could therefore become a potential tool for expanding Iran’s strategic depth rather than merely an isolated market for arms exports.

However, it is essential to distinguish between a geopolitical interest and evidence of a concrete implementation plan. Iran’s clear interest in the Red Sea does not automatically mean that it obtained a base or rights to use Sudanese military facilities.

Did Iran request a naval base?

In March 2024, the Wall Street Journal reportedly cited a senior Sudanese intelligence official as saying that Iran had sought to persuade Sudanese authorities to allow the establishment of a permanent naval base on the Red Sea coast and had offered advanced weapons in the context of those discussions.

According to the newspaper’s account, the Sudanese side rejected the offer because of its potential regional and international repercussions.

The account was met with denials from both sides. Sudanese officials rejected the report, while Iran denied seeking to establish a naval base in Sudan. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty also recorded the denials in the following days.

In July 2024, new Sudanese reports again discussed Khartoum’s rejection of an Iranian proposal involving permanent naval presence in exchange for continued military support.

However, these reports remained based on unnamed sources, and no final agreement or official document proving the existence of concluded negotiations was publicly released.

From an OSINT perspective, the appropriate classification is therefore:

• Iranian strategic interest in the Red Sea:high confidence.
• Serious reports concerning an Iranian request for naval access or a base:credible and worth monitoring.
• Proof that Iran obtained a Sudanese base or formal authorization:

For that reason, the phrase “Iranian base in Sudan” should not be used as an established fact.

The Sudanese denial itself also has analytical significance. If the reports about a rejected request are accurate, they would suggest that Sudan’s leadership understands the distinction between benefiting from Iranian military support and granting Tehran a permanent presence that could alter Sudan’s regional relationships.

The armed forces may view the acquisition of drones or ammunition from Iran as part of a policy of diversifying partners, while granting a permanent naval base would constitute a far more difficult strategic commitment to reverse.

Iran may not need a “base” in the traditional sense

An alternative hypothesis deserves greater attention than simply focusing on the word “base.”

From an influence perspective, Iran does not necessarily need a large military facility containing permanent forces to benefit from Sudan’s coast.

It could instead seek limited access to ports, recurring naval visits, maintenance or support arrangements, maritime security cooperation, or the presence of companies associated with transportation and port services.

Such arrangements would be more politically manageable and less provocative for regional powers while potentially providing some of the benefits associated with a formal base.

Sudan and Iran already have historical precedent in this area: Port Sudan received several Iranian warships in 2012 and 2013 without this developing into an established permanent Iranian base.

The more important scenario to monitor is therefore not merely the construction of an officially declared facility, but the gradual accumulation of military and logistical access arrangements that could produce a substantial portion of the benefits of a formal base without its political costs.

Indicators such as recurring Iranian naval visits, maritime cooperation agreements, Iranian companies entering port sectors, maintenance facilities, or agreements allowing the use of additional Sudanese facilities are potentially more significant from an intelligence perspective than waiting for an announcement of an “Iranian base.”

Building dependence as a tool of influence

Iran has another path through which it can convert current support into strategic gain: building military dependence.

Military systems do not end the relationship at the moment of purchase. They create continuing requirements for maintenance, spare parts, training, ammunition, upgrades, and sometimes communications and surveillance support.

If the Sudanese Armed Forces expand their use of Iranian equipment, institutional relationships with Tehran could gradually become more difficult to replace.

This scenario is more realistic than assuming that Iran needs direct political control over Sudan.

Tehran can acquire tangible influence by becoming a partner that is difficult to replace within a particular segment of the military institution. If cooperation later expands into local maintenance, regular training, or the transfer of certain industrial capabilities, this dependence could become more durable than the emergency support created during the war.

Current evidence does not establish that this level of integration has already occurred. What is better established is the supply of some drone systems and the existence of defense contacts. The nature of maintenance, training, and technology-transfer arrangements remains an intelligence gap.

A political card in the face of isolation

Sudan also provides Iran with a political opportunity.

Restoring relations with an Arab and African state after years of rupture gives Tehran another avenue for demonstrating that attempts to isolate it regionally are incomplete. Iranian statements surrounding the restoration of relations emphasized expanding political and economic cooperation, while the exchange of ambassadors in July 2024 indicated Tehran’s desire for a state-to-state relationship rather than merely a military channel.

For Sudan, meanwhile, maintaining alternatives to a single external partner reduces dependence on any one state and gives the leadership a negotiating tool.

Khartoum can use its rapprochement with Tehran to increase its room for maneuver with other regional powers. Therefore, every expansion of the Iranian relationship should not automatically be interpreted as evidence of exclusive Iranian success; Sudan itself may be using the relationship to improve its bargaining position with competing regional powers.

Intelligence assessment

We assess with high confidence that Iran’s objective in Sudan extends beyond arms sales and that Tehran seeks to turn the wartime cooperation into longer-lasting political and military influence.

We assess with medium to high confidence that the Red Sea is one of the main strategic motivations behind Iran’s interest in Sudan. However, this does not mean that establishing a military base is the only or even the most likely route to achieving that influence.

Iranian influence could be achieved through less visible levels of maritime access, logistics, defense relations, and technical dependence.

The claim that Iran has obtained a permanent naval base or facility in Sudan is not supported by available open-source evidence.

The scenario most deserving of monitoring is therefore cumulative influence: the relationship begins with drones and arms transfers, moves into training and maintenance, possibly develops limited maritime and logistical arrangements, and gradually turns Iran into a security partner that Sudan finds difficult to replace.

The decisive question is consequently not only “What does Iran want from Sudan?” but also “To what extent can the Sudanese leadership grant this influence without damaging its relationships with its other partners?”

This leads directly to the broader question of whether the relationship is becoming a strategic alliance or remains a transaction in which each side uses the other to meet its own needs.

6. Nature of the relationship with the Sudanese Army: strategic alliance or transaction of interests?

The existence of evidence that the Sudanese Armed Forces receive Iranian military support does not necessarily mean that Khartoum has become a strategic ally of Tehran.

A review of the army’s external relations during the war shows a more pragmatic policy based on diversifying sources of support and avoiding complete dependence on a single state.

Alongside Iran, the Sudanese Armed Forces have maintained varying degrees of close relations with Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Turkey and have used military systems from multiple sources.

A recent Reuters assessment of the war indicates that the army has received political and military support from several regional powers, including Egypt, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar, while also using Iranian and Turkish drones.

This environment makes describing the relationship with Iran as a traditional “alliance” premature. It is more accurate to describe it as a partnership of interests created under wartime pressure, which could later evolve.

Military necessity provided the clearest starting point for the rapprochement.

By the second half of 2023, the Sudanese Armed Forces were facing major battlefield challenges while the Rapid Support Forces controlled large areas of the capital and other strategic locations.

In this context, Khartoum restored relations with Tehran. Iranian drones then appeared during the following months and helped the army improve its reconnaissance, targeting, and operational-support capabilities.

Reuters accounts indicate that Iranian systems contributed to halting some RSF gains and supporting the army’s advance in Omdurman. This provides a direct explanation for the Sudanese military leadership’s interest in cooperation with Iran: Tehran was able to provide a capability the army needed during a critical phase of the war.

The relationship differs from Iran’s model of alliances with ideologically affiliated armed groups in other regional theatres.

The Sudanese Armed Forces are a state military with their own command structure, national interests, and multiple sources of support. Open-source evidence does not indicate that their military decisions are subordinate to Tehran or that an Iranian command structure exists above Sudanese institutions.

The Sudanese leadership has also not adopted a foreign policy that places Sudan inside an Iranian-led regional axis. Instead, its external conduct indicates an effort to maintain relations with states that differ sharply from Tehran on numerous regional issues, particularly Saudi Arabia and Egypt.

CMI analysis describes this as a complex balancing process in which Sudanese authorities seek to combine their need for Iran with the preservation of relations with Gulf and Arab states, as well as the unfinished legacy of the normalisation process with Israel.

The continuation of relations with Saudi Arabia is a particularly important indicator of the limits of Iranian alignment.

Riyadh remains a major actor in diplomatic efforts related to Sudan and has participated alongside the United States, Egypt, and other powers in initiatives aimed at ending the war.

Current regional developments show Saudi Arabia and Iran operating within a clearly competitive security environment. This makes it difficult to imagine Khartoum granting Tehran unrestricted strategic influence without considering the consequences for its relationships with Riyadh and Cairo.

The consideration becomes even more significant because Sudan remains economically and politically dependent on its Arab surroundings, while Iran itself lacks the economic and investment capacity that some Gulf states can provide.

Egypt is even more directly relevant to the Sudanese military’s calculations.

Cairo maintains close relations with the armed forces and views the stability and unity of the Sudanese state and its institutions as linked to Egyptian national security.

Reuters reported in 2026 that Egyptian involvement in the Sudanese file increased while the Sudanese army continued to use Turkish and Iranian drones. This means Iran operates in an environment that is not empty of competitors but rather one in which the army has geographically close, politically important, and historically established military partners, including Egypt, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar.

This plurality can be described as a strategy of “multiple strategic suppliers.”

The Sudanese army does not necessarily need to choose a single axis if it can obtain different types of support from different partners.

Iran can provide certain military and technological capabilities; Turkey can provide other systems and defence-industrial relations; Egypt can provide political, security, and military support; and Saudi Arabia and Qatar maintain political and economic channels that may be essential after the war.

In this context, Tehran becomes one of several instruments used by the Sudanese leadership to expand its room for maneuver rather than an exclusive source of influence. Reuters has pointed to this plurality in describing the network of regional supporters of the armed forces.

However, multiple suppliers do not necessarily mean Iranian influence is limited.

Tehran’s advantage lies in its ability to provide military cooperation that can create long-term dependence. The more widely Iranian systems are used, the longer the dependence on them may last.

If political circumstances constrain the army’s options, the need for training, maintenance, spare parts, and direct relations with Iranian defense institutions may increase.

This can turn dependence created by necessity into accumulated institutional influence even without a formal political alliance.

That is the trajectory that should be monitored more closely than diplomatic statements because technical and military dependence can be a stronger indicator of actual influence than declared political rapprochement.

Sudan, however, has tools to limit this dependence.

The armed forces have already expanded their use of capabilities from different sources, theoretically reducing the ability of any single supplier to impose itself as the only option.

Reuters reports indicate the army has used Turkish as well as Iranian drones, while the war itself has evolved into a complex network of external support. This diversity can reduce the risk of a monopoly over Sudan’s weapons systems or military decision-making.

Even Iranian success in building a strong military relationship therefore does not automatically mean that Iran will dominate the Sudanese side.

From the Sudanese Armed Forces’ perspective, the relationship with Iran provides several overlapping benefits:

1. Access to military capabilities during wartime.
2. A broader supplier base that reduces dependence on any single partner.
3. A negotiating card in Sudan’s regional relationships.

The more alternatives available to the army, the lower the ability of any single state to use support as absolute political leverage.

Iran, by contrast, receives a broader return than the financial value of weapons sales alone. Its position as a military supplier provides a lasting channel of communication with an important Sudanese state institution and allows it to rebuild networks lost after 2016.

It also gives Tehran a presence in calculations concerning the Red Sea and Northeast Africa without necessarily requiring a formal military base or alliance.

The relationship therefore rests on a clear exchange of needs: the army needs capabilities and partners, while Iran needs access and influence.

The exchange, however, is not perfectly balanced. As the army’s external options increase, Iran’s ability to convert support into political influence declines. Conversely, as Sudan’s options shrink or its international isolation increases, Tehran’s value to Khartoum increases.

Limits on Iranian influence

Three principal constraints limit the transformation of the relationship into a full alliance.

First is the regional plurality of the army’s external relationships, particularly its continuing relationship with Egypt and its channels with Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Qatar.

Second, Sudan’s long-term economic interests are deeply connected to the Arab world, the Gulf, international markets, and international institutions, making full alignment with Iran politically and economically costly.

Third, historical experience itself demonstrates that Khartoum can abandon a close relationship with Tehran when its regional priorities and interests change. The 2016 rupture is the clearest example. CMI analysis indicates that Sudanese leadership continues to face this dilemma in its current relationship with Iran.

On the other hand, several factors could increase Iranian influence: continuation of the war and associated military needs, increasing dependence on Iranian technology, expansion of relations between Tehran and Sudanese political and military networks, and declining ability of other states to provide alternative support.

If these factors converge, Iran could gradually move from being a “useful supplier” to a partner that is difficult to replace.

New Axis or alliance of necessity?

Current evidence supports the first interpretation more strongly: Sudan has not clearly joined an Iranian axis, and there are insufficient indicators that Tehran has obtained exclusive influence over Sudanese military or foreign-policy decisions.

The Sudanese leadership has continued to operate within a network of competing external powers, benefiting from Iranian support while maintaining relations with Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Qatar.

This conclusion, however, is not necessarily permanent. Long wars can transform temporary relationships into institutional dependencies that are difficult to dismantle.

If Iranian cooperation becomes embedded in arms procurement, maintenance, training, and military-institution relationships, the future cost of distancing Sudan from Tehran could become considerably higher than it was at the beginning of the war.

The most important future measure of Iranian influence should therefore not simply be the number of weapons or political visits but the degree to which Iranian cooperation becomes integrated into Sudan’s military structure.

Intelligence assessment

We assess with high confidence that the current relationship between the Sudanese Armed Forces and Iran is closer to a political-military partnership of interests than to a full strategic alliance.

The army’s need for military capabilities was the direct driver of rapprochement, while Tehran used that need to re-enter Sudan and build influence within the state apparatus during the war.

We assess with high confidence that Sudanese leadership follows a policy of diversifying partners rather than relying exclusively on Iran. Continued military and political relations of varying intensity with Egypt, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar provide alternatives that help limit complete dependence on Tehran.

We assess with medium confidence the possibility that the relationship could become a long-term strategic partnership. The outcome depends primarily on what happens after the war.

If cooperation remains limited to equipment purchases, the relationship is likely to remain reversible. If long-term defense agreements, institutional cooperation, training, maintenance, technology transfer, or maritime and logistical arrangements emerge, the probability of Iran becoming one of Sudan’s principal security partners rises substantially.

The best intelligence description of the relationship as of August 2026 is therefore “a flexible alliance of necessity,” rather than a definitive strategic alignment.

The army uses Iran to expand its capabilities and options, while Iran uses the army’s needs to regain a foothold inside Sudan.

The future of the relationship depends on whether each side can transform temporary wartime gains into institutional arrangements that survive after the fighting ends.

7. Final intelligence assessment: information gaps and future scenarios

The overall open-source evidence indicates that Iranian intervention in Sudan moved, since late 2023, from the restoration of political relations toward an actual defense relationship with observable military effects.

Its most prominent manifestation has been the arrival of Iranian-origin drones to the Sudanese Armed Forces, accompanied by logistical activity between Iran and Port Sudan and by defense contacts that developed during the following years.

However, the available evidence does not support describing Sudan as a military ally subordinate to Iran or as a component of Iran’s regional influence network.

The most likely picture as of August 2026 is a relationship of mutual interests created under wartime pressure, with the potential to evolve into longer-term political and security influence if Sudan’s military institution becomes dependent on Iranian cooperation.

This assessment has become more important because of the sharp changes in the regional environment during 2026.

The expansion of confrontation involving Iran, disruption to maritime traffic in the Strait of Hormuz, and escalation in the Red Sea have increased the strategic value of Red Sea ports and maritime corridors.

During July and August 2026, the Red Sea and Bab el-Mandeb witnessed a new escalation in attacks affecting maritime traffic and facilities associated with Saudi Arabia. This has made any potential Iranian influence on the Sudanese coast more sensitive than it was when relations between Khartoum and Tehran resumed in 2023.

At the same time, this regional shift increases the value of Sudan to Iran while increasing the political cost for Sudan’s leadership of deepening the relationship with Tehran.

Major intelligence gaps

Despite the strengthening evidence surrounding Iranian intervention, several fundamental questions remain unresolved.

1. The actual scale of Iranian military supply

Open sources establish the presence of some systems and defense relationships, but they do not provide a complete picture of the overall size of the arms transfers, the number of systems delivered, or the financial terms of the transactions.

2. The nature of technical support

It remains unclear whether Iranian support is limited to training Sudanese personnel outside the country and supplying spare parts or whether it includes Iranian experts operating inside Sudan for defined periods.

As of now, there is insufficient public evidence to establish the existence of organized Iranian combat units operating on Sudanese territory.

3. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps connection

The degree of involvement of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps remains one of the most important intelligence gaps.

The U.S. Treasury accused some Sudanese Islamist actors, including the Al-Baraa ibn Malik Brigade, of being linked to Iran and receiving support connected to the Revolutionary Guard in September 2025. U.S. authorities subsequently placed the Sudanese Islamist movement on their lists in March 2026.

These actions increase the weight of the hypothesis that channels exist between Iranian institutions and some Islamist forces fighting alongside the army.

They do not publicly establish the full size of those channels or prove that they constitute the official channel through which the Sudanese Armed Forces manage their relationship with Iran.

4. The future of maritime relations

No open-source evidence currently proves that Iran obtained a military base in Sudan.

However, Port Sudan’s strategic value has increased substantially amid current maritime tensions. Monitoring should therefore not be restricted to the question of whether a formal “base” is established.

More ambiguous forms of cooperation may prove more significant, including regular maritime cooperation, recurring access to ports, maintenance services, institutional military agreements, or arrangements that grant Tehran logistical access without the creation of a formally declared Iranian facility.

Sudan’s continued handling of an old Russian proposal for a naval facility on its coast also demonstrates that the Sudanese leadership regards its maritime position as a strategic asset that can be used in negotiations with multiple powers.

Future scenario 1: the relationship remains within the limits of an “Alliance of Necessity”

This is currently the most likely scenario in the near term.

Under this scenario, the Sudanese Armed Forces continue obtaining certain weapons, technology, and political support from Iran while simultaneously maintaining relations with Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Qatar, and other powers.

Tehran does not receive permanent military or maritime privileges that would make the relationship difficult to reverse.

The behavior of Sudanese leadership so far supports this scenario: Khartoum has benefited from Iranian cooperation but has not demonstrated complete political alignment with Tehran.

The diversification of arms sources also reduces dependence on a single supplier.

This scenario becomes more likely if regional pressure on Khartoum to reduce its relationship with Iran increases, particularly amid the current escalation between Iran and its regional opponents.

We therefore assess the probability of this model continuing in the near term as relatively high.

Future scenario 2: long-term institutional defense partnership

The second scenario assumes that the relationship that began during the war develops into sustained cooperation between the two military institutions after the intensity of fighting declines.

Under this scenario, cooperation would no longer depend solely on purchasing ready-made systems but would expand toward:

• Regular training.
• Institutional relations between defense ministries.
• Potential defense-industrial cooperation.
• Technical support.
• Possibly technology transfer.

This would represent a qualitative shift because Iranian influence would become linked to the military institution itself rather than simply to an emergency wartime need.

As the Sudanese Armed Forces become more dependent on Iranian technical and technological support, the cost of distancing from Tehran would increase.

At the same time, the existence of alternative military suppliers and pressure from Sudan’s Arab partners could limit the development of this path.

We currently assess this scenario with medium probability, but its likelihood would increase significantly if long-term defense agreements or sustained training and maintenance arrangements appear after the war.

Future scenario 3: Iranian influence extends to the Red Sea

This scenario is strategically the most sensitive but currently less likely than the previous two.

It assumes that Iran succeeds in transforming military cooperation into arrangements that give it regular maritime or logistical access to the Sudanese coast.

Regional escalation in 2026 makes this possibility more strategically important. Disruptions affecting the Strait of Hormuz and the Red Sea have encouraged regional powers to reassess maritime alternatives, increasing the importance of Red Sea ports in energy, trade, and security calculations.

CMI analysis has specifically noted that these developments have increased the geopolitical value of Port Sudan.

The obstacles to this scenario are substantial.

A permanent Iranian maritime presence would directly affect the calculations of Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and other states. It could also threaten Khartoum’s ability to maintain the balancing policy it has pursued until now.

Sudan itself needs Arab economic support and investment to a degree that Iran may not be able to compensate for.

Accordingly, we assess the probability of an openly declared Iranian base appearing in the near term as low, while the probability of less visible maritime or logistical arrangements is assessed as medium and warrants close monitoring.

The factor that could change all scenarios

The continuation of the Sudanese war remains the most important variable.

The longer the conflict continues, the greater the parties’ need for external weapons, technology, and support, while Sudanese institutions’ ability to resist dependence on foreign military partners declines.

Drones have already become one of the defining characteristics of the war. In July 2026, the United Nations again warned about the civilian losses associated with drone strikes, while battlefield developments showed that both sides were capable of using these systems at distances increasingly far from traditional front lines.

The increase in civilian deaths associated with drone warfare demonstrates that the introduction of this technology is not merely a change in the balance of power between the parties. It is reshaping the nature and risks of the conflict for civilians.

These consequences cannot be attributed to Iran alone because multiple actors use systems from different sources. However, the continued flow of foreign military technologies increases the war’s capacity to continue and expand geographically.

Early-warning indicators

Monitoring during the next phase should focus on qualitative changes, rather than merely continued diplomatic contact.

Political visits alone are insufficient to demonstrate a strategic transformation.

The more important indicators will be:

• The emergence of new institutional defence cooperation.
• The continuation or expansion of military contracts.
• Credible evidence of Iranian technical training or support.
• Regular expansion of relations between defence institutions in the two countries.
• Any declared or undeclared cooperation in the maritime sphere.
• The return of Iranian military vessels to Sudanese ports regularly.
• The emergence of arrangements granting Iran sustainable logistical access to the Sudanese coast.

Inside Sudan, one of the most important indicators will be any change in the position of Islamist forces within postwar institutions.

If individuals or organizations with longstanding relations with Iran gain greater influence within the defense, security, political, or foreign-policy sectors, the probability of continued relations with Tehran will increase.

Conversely, if these networks decline or Sudan enters a broader political settlement based on Arab and international support, the space for Iranian influence may shrink.

A third factor to monitor is the response of Saudi Arabia and Egypt.

If their opposition to the Iranian relationship increases, or if they offer more attractive military and economic alternatives, Sudanese leadership may have incentives to reduce cooperation with Tehran.

Conversely, if Sudan’s international isolation deepens or its regional options decline, Iran’s ability to consolidate its position will increase.

Final intelligence assessment

The paper concludes that Iranian military intervention in Sudan is established at the level of arms supply and defense support, but that it has not yet developed into Iranian military or political dominance over Sudan.

The current relationship began as a response to the Sudanese Armed Forces’ need for military capabilities during a critical phase of the war. Tehran benefited from this need by rebuilding a relationship that Sudan had severed in 2016.

We assess with high confidence that Iranian drones were an important component in developing the Sudanese Armed Forces’ capabilities during the war and that military cooperation became one of the principal pillars of the restoration of relations between the two countries.

We assess with medium to high confidence that Iran seeks to preserve this influence after the immediate military need declines, benefiting from Sudan’s geographic position and historical networks within the state.

The Red Sea remains one of the most important motivations behind this interest, but it does not constitute evidence that Iran has established a military base in Sudan.

Regarding political Islam, the paper concludes that Islamist networks and former-regime networks played a role as an enabling environment for Iran’s return rather than necessarily being the sole reason for it.

Historical relationships, personnel, and networks formed during the Bashir era reduced the institutional cost of restoring contact with Tehran, while subsequent U.S. sanctions and assessments indicate that relationships between some Sudanese Islamist actors and Iran continued.

However, open-source evidence is insufficient to establish that the Islamist movement manages the Iranian relationship with the army or that the Sudanese Armed Forces operate as an Iranian proxy or as part of an Iranian axis.

The most likely interpretation remains that Sudan and Iran entered an asymmetric and changeable relationship of mutual interests.

The army gains access to weapons, technology, and a broader margin for manoeuvre among multiple suppliers, while Tehran gains political and military access to a strategically important state on the Red Sea.

Iran’s ability to convert this gain into lasting influence will depend less on the quantity of weapons it supplies during the war and more on whether it succeeds in making cooperation with Tehran an institutional component of Sudan’s security and defence structure after the war.

Accordingly, the decisive indicator that should guide the future assessment is not the continued arrival of Iranian weapons in itself, but rather the transition in the relationship from “support during the war” to “institutional dependency after the war.” If this transition occurs, it would be possible to speak of a genuine strategic shift in Iran’s position within Sudan. However, if Khartoum maintains a diversity of partners and reduces its military cooperation as the field necessity comes to an end, Iran’s return will remain significant but limited by the boundaries of the interest-based arrangement that the war has produced.

This article is a product of the Open-Source Intelligence (OSINT) Paper (August 2026)

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