El Ferik Ibrahim Abboud (1900-1983) was a military leader who instituted the first military government of the independent Sudan, but who yielded to civilian rule when he was unable to solve the country's problems.

Ibrahim Abboud was born on Oct. 26, 1900, at Mohammed-Gol, near the old port city of Suakin on the Red Sea. He trained as an engineer at the Gordon Memorial College and at the Military College in Khartoum. He received a commission in the Egyptian army in 1918 and transferred to the Sudan Defense Force in 1925, after its creation separate from the Egyptian army. During World War II he served in Eritrea, in Ethiopia, with the Sudan Defense Force, and with the British army in North Africa. After the war, Abboud rose rapidly to commander of the Sudan Defense Force in 1949 and assistant commander in chief in 1954. With the declaration of independence for the Sudan in 1956, he...