SPLM/SPLA Command Friction, Operational Rivalry, and the Martyrdom of A/Cdr Dhieu Warabek in Torit, 2002
By Maj. Gen. Chol Michael Maker, Juba, South Sudan
Tuesday, 01 September 2026 (PW) — Who still vividly remembers the intense command friction and operational rivalry that emerged between Cdr Obote Mamur Mete and Cdr Wilson Deng Kuoirot, also known as Mocarab, during the 2002 campaign?
During that period, Cdr Obote Mamur Mete was assigned the mission of capturing Kapoeta, while Cdr Pilot Patrick Aiteng Lotwa was tasked with taking Lafon. Both commanders successfully accomplished their respective objectives. Subsequently, Cdr Oyay Deng Ajak assigned Cdr Deng-Wek to undertake the offensive against Torit. According to our recollection at the time, this decision generated considerable disagreement within the command structure, particularly because Cdr Mamur Mete maintained that the Torit operation should have fallen under his responsibility. Nevertheless, the offensive proceeded. Cdr Wilson Deng Kuoirot and Cdr Chol Thon Balok led their forces against the enemy positions, broke through the defensive lines and captured Torit. On the same night that Torit fell, Cdr Mamur Mete reportedly insisted upon mounting an operation against Khor Inglizi, maintaining that the area was his birthplace and that his umbilical cord had been buried there. On that basis, he argued that he could not accept another commander taking responsibility for the capture of his birthplace.
The subsequent assault on Khor Inglizi proved extremely costly. Three tanks had been committed to the operation. During the fighting, one tank was destroyed by an enemy gunship, while a second was knocked out by a recoilless anti-tank weapon. The crew of the tank struck by the recoilless weapon survived the engagement. The third tank managed to withdraw from the immediate battlefield, while the attacking force sustained serious losses under concentrated enemy resistance. Cdr Gabriel Jok Riak was not present during the initial engagement. He joined us at the forward position the following day after receiving reports that two of his tanks had been destroyed at Khor Inglizi. As the overall commander of the Armoured Corps, he came forward to assess the battlefield situation personally, inspect the remaining tank and establish what had happened during the engagement, including the circumstances surrounding the destruction of the armour and the loss of the crew associated with the tank destroyed by the enemy gunship. The crew of the tank knocked out by the recoilless anti-tank weapon, by contrast, had survived.
It was during this battlefield inspection that another dangerous incident unfolded. The enemy gunship returned and began hovering over the area, apparently searching for the third tank that had escaped destruction during the previous day’s engagement. We were sheltering beneath the remaining tank while the aircraft circled overhead. In what I regarded at the time as an act born of frustration, Cdr Mamur Mete attempted to engage the gunship from our position. Opening fire would have risked revealing precisely where we and the surviving tank were located, potentially drawing the gunship’s fire directly onto our position. Given that we were taking cover beneath the tank, the consequences could have been disastrous. It was Cdr Gabriel Jok Riak who strongly argued against Cdr Mamur Mete opening fire. His intervention prevented an already dangerous tactical situation from escalating further. Recognising the vulnerability of remaining beneath the tank while an enemy aircraft searched the area, Cdr Jok urged Mamur Mete and me to follow him. We moved away from the vehicle and took cover in a roadside ditch while the gunship continued operating overhead. I remember this episode vividly because I was personally present. It was neither information relayed to me afterwards nor an account reconstructed years later. I was there with Cdr Obote Mamur Mete and Cdr Gabriel Jok Riak at the forward position when the enemy gunship returned, and I witnessed the exchange between the two commanders.
These events occurred despite the availability of Brigade Three, a formidable formation of approximately 3,000 combat-ready troops that had been earmarked to spearhead the attacks against Khor Inglizi and Lira. Brigade Three was under the command of A/Cdr Diing Adim, deputised by Lt Col Makur Nhial. Maj Mabor Achol Kuer served simultaneously as Brigade Administrator and Political Commissar, with responsibility for Moral and Political Orientation throughout the Brigade. At the time, I was a Captain serving as the Brigade Intelligence Officer (IO) and the most senior intelligence officer responsible for the formation advancing towards Juba. Brigade Three was intended to spearhead the offensive against Khor Inglizi and Lira, where enemy formations withdrawing from Kapoeta, Lafon and Torit had been ordered by Khartoum to concentrate, reorganise and restore their combat capability. From these concentration areas, they were expected to regroup and subsequently launch a counter-offensive to recapture Torit. Khor Inglizi and Liria therefore represented strategically important enemy concentration points whose neutralisation was essential to consolidating the capture of Torit, denying the enemy an effective counter-attack capability and maintaining the operational momentum of the advance towards Juba. Despite Brigade Three’s numerical strength, combat readiness and designated operational role, the formation was not permitted to participate in the Khor Inglizi operation. From an intelligence and operational perspective, this was particularly significant because the enemy concentration along the Khor Inglizi–Liria axis represented a direct threat to the territorial gains already achieved at Kapoeta, Lafon and Torit.
Yet, while senior commanders were consumed by operational rivalry and actions that many of us at the time regarded as mutually obstructive, another great freedom fighter, A/Cdr Dhieu Warbek, widely known as Achotmur, was labouring to rebuild and restore the severely depleted brigade at Khor Deleb. Far removed from the contest over operational prominence, he was engaged in the difficult task of reorganising a battered formation and restoring its fighting capability. It was there, in the course of that duty, that he ultimately met his fate. I still vividly remember that infamous evening when we bade farewell to A/Cdr Dhieu Warbek, Achotmur. His death remains one of the painful memories of that campaign. During an engagement, he believed that he had successfully shot an enemy officer. When he subsequently returned towards the enemy trenches to retrieve his hammer, the officer whom he believed to have killed was apparently still alive. The enemy officer opened fire, and A/Cdr Dhieu Warbek was killed instantly. Thus ended the life of a freedom fighter who, while others wrestled with disagreements over command and operational responsibility, had been concentrating his efforts on rebuilding a depleted fighting formation.
The difficulties confronting the campaign were not confined to tactical command decisions. Serious logistical and ordnance problems also emerged. From the operational headquarters in Torit, Cdr Oyay repeatedly attempted to direct Cdr Wilson Deng Kuoirot to facilitate the movement of essential supplies. Yet Mamur Mete’s forces were reportedly receiving little more than sorghum contaminated with diesel fuel, without adequate provisions to supplement the troops’ rations. More disturbing were the problems affecting ammunition and associated equipment. Incorrect fuses, chargers and other essential components were reportedly dispatched to forward units, seriously affecting combat effectiveness. One notable example involved the supply of 120 mm mortar fuses when the operational requirement was for BM-107 rocket-system fuses. Whether these incidents resulted from deliberate interference, logistical incompetence or failures within the supply chain remained a matter of considerable suspicion among those of us serving in the operational area.
The deterioration of command cohesion, combined with logistical deficiencies, competing operational ambitions and the failure to employ available combat formations effectively, created circumstances that warranted serious military scrutiny. As the Brigade Intelligence Officer directly involved with the advancing forces, I observed these developments from within the operational command environment rather than through retrospective or second-hand accounts. I documented these concerns at Kiala in 2002, approximately one week after enemy forces recaptured Torit from us, in an article entitled “The Bereaved Adopted Child: Torit in Three Weeks.” The title reflected the painful reality that Torit, despite the enormous sacrifices made to capture and hold it, had returned to enemy control within approximately three weeks.
The events surrounding the Torit campaign therefore remain more than a story of territorial gains and reversals. They are equally a story of command friction, sacrifice, battlefield courage, tactical judgement and the consequences of fractured unity of effort. Amid disagreements over operational responsibility stood fighters such as A/Cdr Dhieu Warbek, Achotmur, whose attention remained fixed upon rebuilding fighting strength and carrying forward the liberation struggle until he paid the ultimate price. Whatever disagreements existed among commanders, the enduring military lesson remains clear. No individual ambition should supersede the mission, no command rivalry should compromise combat effectiveness, and no personal contest should be permitted to weaken unity of command or unnecessarily expose troops to hostile fire when their lives and the success of the operation are at stake.
Throughout the liberation struggle, rivalries among commanders were not unknown within the SPLA. Differences over command authority, operational responsibility, military prestige and the conduct of campaigns occasionally generated considerable friction within the ranks. Yet, from my own experience and observation, none was more visible or more pronounced than the rivalry between Cdr Obote Mamur Mete and Cdr Wilson Deng Kuoirot. The events surrounding Kapoeta, Lafon, Torit, Khor Inglizi and Lira in 2002 brought that rivalry into particularly sharp relief. History should remember these events not merely to reopen old disagreements, but to preserve the military lessons they left behind. Armies prevail through unity of command, discipline, mutual confidence, sound intelligence, dependable logistics and concentration of combat power against the common enemy. Whenever personal rivalry begins to compete with the operational mission, it is ultimately the fighting force, and sometimes the objective itself, that bears the cost.
Footnote: The rivalry between Cdr Obote Mamur and Cdr Deng Kuoirot continued into the post-war period in Juba. In 2007, when both were serving as Deputy Chiefs of Staff, Mamur was arrested and subsequently detained for approximately two years at the New Site military detention facility. Significantly, Cdr Wilson Deng was once again entrusted with overseeing the execution of Mamur’s arrest warrant and carrying out the orders associated with his detention. This episode illustrates that the tensions and rivalries that had developed during the liberation struggle did not necessarily disappear with the transition to the post-war military establishment.
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