No battle demonstrates the apex of imperial expansion by western powers up to 1900, the end of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century European warfare, the inevitable clash of modern technology with medieval-style armies, or local tribesmen hurling themselves at invading ‘infidel’ foreigners quite so well as Omdurman, 2 September 1898. Over the years several misconceptions have grown up around the events of that day; chief of these – inspired by the obvious inequality of warriors armed only with spears, hurling themselves in massed attacks against well-armed, well-trained troops using dum-dum bullets, heavy artillery and machine guns – is that the Mahdists were just a rabble without any coherent plan of attack. This is not true; the dervishes had been fighting the British for 15 years and developed proven and successful methods of campaigning.
At Omdurman the Khalifa Abdullahi and his commanders had a plan. It failed for three main reasons: firstly, it required precision timing; secondly, it failed sufficiently to take into account the possible reactions of the enemy; and thirdly, it lamentably overlooked the huge technological supremacy of the Anglo-Egyptians, especially their fast-action Maxim machine guns.
Coming during the high noon of the British Empire, just after Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee, the Battle of Omdurman was hugely popular amongst all classes of British society. The Press crowed that it liberated the Sudan, ended the tyrannical rule of the Khalifa, revenged the death of General Gordon in 1885 and expunged the national shame caused by the withdrawal from the Sudan. Politicians were delighted that Omdurman helped confirm British domination of the Nile valley to its uppermost reaches while removing the Mahdist threat for a moderate cost in men and money.
The Press made a media star out of the relatively unknown commander of the Egyptian Army chosen to plan and lead the advance to Omdurman – Horatio Herbert Kitchener, the Sirdar. This somewhat cold and aloof man would rise meteorically to become, by the time of the battle, more famous than most other Victorian generals. Kitchener was a poor tactician and the battle would display weaknesses in him and even worse ones in his opponent. Yet Kitchener’s carefully planned, methodical re-conquest of the Sudan, which he always hoped would end in a battle outside Omdurman (the Mahdist capital) was and remains a magnificent example of good logistical planning.
In an age when fundamentalist warriors were just as prevalent as today, the Battle of Omdurman destroyed the Mahdiya and its attempts at global jihad. Now, in the twenty-first century, when British soldiers still face Muslim fundamentalists on the battlefield, fighting across inhospitable terrain, Kitchener’s strategy, the remarkable achievements of his spymaster, Reginald Wingate, along with the battle itself, can give much food for thought for soldiers and armchair historians alike.