Rusani Civil War
The Rusani Civil War was an internal conflict that took place in the Islamic Republic of Rusana from 1953 to 1965 between two armed coalitions vying for control of the country. The Front for the Defense of the Homeland or FDH was a grouping of conservative and islamist forces which included the officer core of the old Ghanim national army and the Jamaat-e-Islami and Party of God political parties which advocated the imposition of Sharia law and islamism. Notably the Sunni Jamaat and the Shia Party of God put aside their sectarian division aside for most of the war. In opposition to the FDH stood the National Congress for the Defense of the People or NCDP composed of military and tribal elites from regions opposed to the centralization efforts of Javad Spabod, the Unity Party and minority ethnic and religious groups wary of the FDH's islamist program.
Rusani Civil War | |||||||
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Fighters aligned with the FDH at a mustering point in Fazil province | |||||||
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Belligerents | |||||||
Front for the Defense of the Homeland(FDH) |
National Congress for the Defense of the People(NCDP) Supported by: Corumm | ||||||
Commanders and leaders | |||||||
Javad Spabod Afsar Gorshani Mirza Bakri |
Farrukhzad Khosa Bilal Taghi Qiu Heng | ||||||
Strength | |||||||
150,000 | 130,000 | ||||||
Casualties and losses | |||||||
Military dead: 90,000+ |
Military dead: 78,000+ |
Background
Unification process
The unification of Rusana in 1947 was achieved after a rapid and disorderly process led by the three separate armies of Ghanim, Lakdu and Barpubad. The failure to replace the monarchist system with a truly democratic and representative democracy allowed resentment and suspicion to begin festering not only between the population and the regions but also inside the allegedly newly united army command. As the most heavily populated area, military officers and functionaries from Ghanim also began to try and monopolize positions in the state, against the spirit of the unification process.
Fragmentation of the Army
The Rusana Revolutionary Military Command that was supposed to take charge of the nation was a body that quickly became riven with factionalism and regionalism, all worsened by egocentric and paranoid officers like Javad Spabod and Farrukhzad Khosa, who maintained a bitter rivalry for control of the body. In seeking to gain an edge, these men divided the army units according to region of origin. The situation was so tense that General Spabod ordered all units from Lakdu to leave the capital, which led to a tense standoff that was only resolved through the intervention of the capital's chief imam. To bolster their positions, the generals began courting organizations they had previously suppressed or ignored such as various hardline islamist currents and minority political parties.