WI: Osama stays in Sudan not Afghanistan, and America invades Sudan instead of Afghanistan?

[Richard Osborne]

What it says on the tin. How would America handle invading such a large ethnically fraught nation? How would American race relations be effected by Black Chirstians being prominently on our side? How would Egypt react? How would the region be affected? Could Ethiopians be recruited to help? What if Sudan used chem weapons? Would Eritrea be attacked to secure the seaways?

 

[RamscoopRaider]

Who says America invades? Omar al-Bashir is not Mohammed Omar, he is a pragmatist. He isn't going to pointlessly resist the US, he's going to serve up Bin Laden's head on a silver platter and grovel

OTL he basically offered that for ending sanctions in '96, the US didn't care enough to end sanctions for that and instead just insisted he get kicked out

Edit: Assuming al-Bashir is stupid enough to not hand over Bin Laden, he gets couped by his generals who then hand over Bin Laden, about the only thing that saved Bin Laden's head after 9/11 was local hospitality traditions and the nature of the Taliban, neither apply to Sudan

 

[Chris S]

Who says America invades? Omar al-Bashir is not Mohammed Omar, he is a pragmatist. He isn't going to pointlessly resist the US, he's going to serve up Bin Laden's head on a silver platter and grovel

OTL he basically offered that for ending sanctions in '96, the US didn't care enough to end sanctions for that and instead just insisted he get kicked out

Edit: Assuming al-Bashir is stupid enough to not hand over Bin Laden, he gets couped by his generals who then hand over Bin Laden, about the only thing that saved Bin Laden's head after 9/11 was local hospitality traditions and the nature of the Taliban, neither apply to Sudan

Which might change the fortunes of al-Bashir as he can loudly claim he tried to hand over Osama in '96 but was turned down and instead Osama gets handed over in 2001 either dead or alive.

The Taliban continue in Afghanistan and Pakistan gets less funding and military aid as that is diverted to America's new body al-Bashir to help him root out al Qaeda in Sudan and as a reward for serving up Osama.

How this affects South Sudan would be interesting since al-Bashir might try to frame his fight against the SPLA as a fight against terrorists and actually receive American backing to end the Southern revolt.